Geometry of Music: Bill Wesley at TEDxAmericasFinestCity 2011

[@luismireles7316]

I had the honor of watching him improvise on his Array Mbira at a DIY show. After the show, he gave me a personal demo of his invention. Truly a revolutionary genius.

[@heidiholmberg3504]

Just half way in to the vid.. wow.. Marvellous.

[@xxxrdc]

You are demented

[@michaellindsay7033]

As a person who does not understand music at all, this technology seems very intuitive and self correcting which indicates an attempt to success ratio that allows even a child or someone like myself to succeed despite a lack of experience. Incredible!

[@mariabambill1833]

It actually will allow you to speak with music like you speak with your voice in terms of emotion, I had wanted to call this the "Geometry of Emotion" but then we are not including the word "music". What is needed is an inexpensive midi controller anyone can afford, even an app for a large touch screen. Everyone already uses music of voice to express emotion while speaking, yet no one practices this or plans how they will do it, its automatic, effortless, intuitive! The array instruments provide the hands with the same opportunity the voice already has. The inner ear is the first human organ to reach full maturity at about 3 months, probably so we can hear the emotion in our mothers music of voice before we are born.

[@trentp151]

"There is a huge amount of scientific evidence that early musical exposure, even if you don't continue to play, permanently changes brain function, and preserves it. People who play music, actually, are immune to many forms of mental deterioration with age." I certainly agree. Musicians draw strength and power from music just as you describe. It makes them seem 'different', but truly, everyone is capable of obtaining this mental power and strength. Thanks for your good work!

[@whatabouttheearth]

I think Syd Barret and many others disagree.

[@432hzLoveFrequency-TruthInside]

“If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration.” - Nikola Tesla To understand anything non-physical, one needs a certain level of creativity and imagination. Frequencies are hard to see but easy to feel.

[@bullsquid42]

Of course the keyboard sounds horrific, but still the placement of the notes does make a lot of sense to me

[@SailingHarper]

I just stumbled across this and I am =SO= reminded of Harry Partch doing this kind of work about 80 years ago (and completely acoustic in that era, BTW). If he hasn't read Partch's "Genesis of a New Music", then he's re-inventing the wheel... and if he has, then he owes a lot of citations to Partch that haven't been made here.

[@xenmaster0]

This Wesley guy is obviously a genius. You have to ask yourself why he isn't playing these instruments in giant arena stadiums to tens of thousands of people cheering wildly.

[@OmegaFalcon]

Is there a website that breaks down the geometry and math behind this arrangement of notes?

[@newplanman9836]

As a musician and composer I like your perspective. Thanx for your view. Question, you arrange your instrument according to "harmonious vs. disharmonious"...is that based on mathematics or culture? Not all cultures consider a minor 2nd or flatted fifth disharmonious like western culture has taught us to. The ethnomusicological aspects of your claim needs to consider this. Moreover, the classification of happy/sad and major/minor is conditioned in music of the last 2000 years of the West. If we listen to traditional Chinese or Kenyan instrumental music what novice western listener could tell if the music was happy or sad?

[@beenaplumber8379]

The generalizations are more blatant even than that. He stated a lot of things as fact that I question. I cringed every time he said "most people." I wonder if he used his own experience of frustration as inspiration to try something new (as we all do), but along the way he assumed most of us had the same negative experiences for the same reasons as he did. (Some of us really are linear thinkers.) The result looks to me like a toy that does not lend itself to playing existing compositions very well. I think it would be a wonderful musical toy to teach children that music can be expressive, and I think it could inspire them to create their own compositions, but could you imagine playing Chopin on that thing? I also think it would train children's ears to hear and understand tonal relationships (biased to the Western tradition, as you point out), which will serve them later if they decide to study music further. It's not without its merits, but I think its application is very limited beyond welcoming non-musicians to the world of music. I'm a semi-pro rock musician and theatrical composer. I don't have much experience with non-Western music, but I did compose theme and transition music for one play based on my rudimentary understanding of Turkish makhams (I can't remember the spelling), which this instrument would be completely unable to play.

[@darkstar4494]

Amir El Akil Bey not only that, but no matter how you arrange the keys, you will still have to memorize the note locations in order to play what you want. and there will still be tritones even in the “happy” section. the only way to really do the sort of thing he was thinking about originally is to have the computer determine which note to play on the fly, based on which other notes are already being played and the past notes. in other words, any given key may produce different notes depending on context.

[@darkstar4494]

Amir El Akil Bey PS - while the labels “happy” or “sad” may be arbitrary or cultural, consonance and dissonance are not arbitrary, and that’s basically how he’s laying out the notes. it’s no coincidence that the major lower the note is in the harmonic series, the more consonant and stable it sounds. the major 3rd comes up quickly after the perfect 5th, but minor 3rd does not. so if he just talked about consonance and dissonance, he would have been on more stable footing scientifically speaking.

[@newplanman9836]

....and LOL where are the Sitar microtuning buttons?

[@BuzzaB77]

Well yes and no, the harmonic series as we use it appears in nature first, then largely with the exception of arabic culture, most other cultures from east to west independently not only decided on the same harmonic structure, but even used the same vibration base of 432 vibration per second, as Pythagoras later discovered 1500 years ago. The base maths that all music is based on are common. Cultural iteration has happened yes, but the base maths are still true.

[@BuzzaB77]

great idea (this is why i like to compose with an ableton push grid), but holy moly did he choose an awful harshest brass sound to demonstrate it with!! next demo just use a piano dude.

[@albertgalea2330]

Natkingcol

[@pedro_sedso]

@@albertgalea2330 yeah that's what i thought haha

[@mosesramirez6330]

Video is 6.5 years old; web site still isn't up.

[@kbruff2010]

Very interesting - and yes - a lot of great emotionalism is linked in pure creativity.

[@jelleverest]

I'm much more interested in his theories behind the thing than that machine he built.

[@safarijim4211]

Me too, I’m sure that he wanted to talk about them but he just wanted to show off the thing he put a lot of work into. It is a really unique creation.

[@franklulatowskijr.6974]

That’s a most triumphant piece.

[@apteropith]

I certainly like the idea of music theory being clearer about the connections between how something sounds and how it feels. And also not relying on such bizarre and inscrutable piano-centric notation and terminology.

[@billwesley]

I will soon be publishing a lot more information, up top is a link to a collection of harmony array keyboard performances

[@nal8503]

Where is the link? I can't happen to find it.

[@billwesley]

oh, not up top, just under this comment, sorry

[@safarijim4211]

I like how you put the Mandelbrot set like that. I think I looks like a brain from that angle.

[@phoenixrising1576]

Music notation reading writing and theory means nothing to me. I don't think it is the correct form of musical understanding. The Cycle of fifths makes sense to me though.

[@halasimov1362]

Yes! Music is thought so confusing I love ways to visualize more harmonic info with patterns and stuff. Seeing patterns on the grid of a guitar helped me think of more information with less effort but notation always seemed to fall short. Harmonic Visualization can help people learn so much more and faster! Great work simplifying the vastly complex exploration of music

[@billwesley]

Thank you! A lot of people don't realize many array instruments are played by many artists already, even Taylor Swift used the Array Mbira , Imogen Heap used it constantly and Ry Cooder and his son Joachim, many film composers, jazz artists like Pharaoh Sanders and so on. The system makes it easy to compose and play things you'd otherwise need an orchestra to play for you, the controller is still in development.

[@RWBHere]

4:31 - Goodbye eardrums!... Interesting, but it's not an entirely new idea. The button accordion has that harmonic feature, as does the piano accordion chord board, and the melodeon, concertina, and Chemnitzer concertina. Steel drums and gamelan can also be arranged harmonically. The gamelan, for one, is a very old instrument. That last composition is strangely entertaining, and I see your point. Thanks. :-)

[@auralarchipelago]

"The gamelan" is not an instrument - it's an ensemble of many instruments, and it doesn't use harmony.

[@michaellindsay7033]

Special Education needs this technology!

[@mariabambill1833]

I think you are right, I have done experiments at fairs and during outdoor events, I just set out the array instruments and let nonmusicians walk up and play through the amplifier, usually an audience will form thinking they are hearing musicians, this would be especially fun for people otherwise suffering from impairments, music is inspiring and inspired people better overcome their limits.

[@MoechtegernPimP]

really beautiful intro and thoughts about inspiration!

[@MS-yz7sr]

I really want to try playing one of these.

[@billwesley]

Funny how charges of "lack of intent" in music seem to be leveled at nearly anyone doing nearly anything differently, thats what they said of many musical innovations including those of Stravinsky, the jazz greats and Jimi Hendrix. This is the opposite of "a program" although indeed to get this from a keyboard would be utterly impossible, you would in fact need a program as intuited. On these instruments every note is manually activated by hand and 100% intentionally, there are no automated programs, an acoustic accordion is more automated because it has single buttons for whole chords. Instead of being improvised these pieces were composed and played as written, as far from random as its possible to get. I could imagine the reverse scenario, someone who has never seen a keyboard being played before hears music they don't like being played on it and so assumes the keyboard itself must be why they don't like the music, but they would be wrong, many kinds of music can be played on a keyboard, and even more kinds of music can be played on the array controller.

[@safarijim4211]

bill wesley I think your array is impressive, but I would really like to hear more about everything you said from 4:55-5:50. That stuff sounded really interesting and I think you really wanted to talk about it.

[@lhson]

Funny how any old codger can think he's the equal of Stravinsky and Coltrane cuz he took 5 mbiras and stuck 'em together side by side.

[@mdoerkse]

It's not every day that I see an instrument I have never seen before with a unique sound. What is that board of nails?! It sounds like little puppy-birds bark-chirping!

[@vivianeb90]

This would be great for composing music. I like how enthusiastic he is about his "invention". I wished it would not sound so electronic, though. That's why I thought his nail piano was just as interesting as his thousand-keys piano. I also think the camera perspectives didn't really show well what he was trying to say. The music he played also still sounded a bit amateurish but I can see the potential of his instruments for great music making.

[@everyonemakesmusicstudentf4062]

this is fun, but patterns on the piano are NOT confusing. I teach little children how to recreate the patterns in with different home tones in major or how to shift a song from Major to Minor on the piano keyboard. They are not confused.

[@dr.bonniewoodruff1906]

What you are presenting is awesome I'm so glad you are that you have an instrument I've doing those things without your social study and knowledge to be placed in your head to be able to do it that's a great instrument wow

[@macromachina7339]

This is beautiful some where out there is space in time there is a planet. With harmonious animals on a harmonious planet in a harmonious universe. if not its dam close.

[@hadleymanmusic]

Think maybe thats why I fell in love with fuzztone on electric guitar at such an early age? The overtones? Plus Im a natural sharp for some reason too so alot I tune " to" im a dissonant harmony to it?

[@rachelharrison7713]

I definitely could only follow along so far. The idea of kicking the hurdles down that make piano a pain or hard to understand (still don't know em or remember it myself) is a good idea. But having "practice, practice, practice" and a teacher goes a long way for the art of self discipline. I think we're conditioned with classical sounds or arrangements mostly in US or those taught similarly in background so as to only hear the scales as "happy" or "sad" based on years of thought/style influence throughout. But it does still seem proof that it is an art not just a science.

[@rozaepareza]

He's using the Wicki-Hayden note layout, which you can read about on Wikipedia.

[@danielabreu]

Thanks for niticing that, so I wonder how really innovative is this video?

[@bradcrane8364]

i love the music and I want more

[@learnpoise]

Finally I have something to show my friends when I talk about how you think about music... ;o)

[@MrVatov]

Music playing begins at 19:00.

[@RWBHere]

Frank Zappa being let loose on a keyboard! More correctly described as 'noise'. ;-D

[@teegees]

The puppy yelp machine was cool. This sort of experimentation is crucial if we want to come up with new things.

[@janineninger13]

This is genius !

[@the_Rade]

That's the most horrendous sound I've heard!! Very interesting idea though! I would really like to see a demonstration of different classic songs, originally played on linear instruments or guitar, performed on this instrument. And also a demonstration of beautiful music composed/improvised on this instrument. Again, a really interesting idea!

[@downtowngangstaz11]

Super interesting and innovative concept. This concept could have applications for Artificial Intelligence creating music. Mr. Wesley talked about how music is just a language of emotional conversation, so music revolves around coherent feelings. I just didn't really get any coherent feelings out of the performance, but the concept itself obviously has a lot of potential.

[@billwesley]

I think it has application to creating artificial intelligence, that is using music as a means of calculation, an ANALOG artificial intelligence perhaps, the one direction in which no one is looking. I read of a test in which one set of subjects were played music and told the music was by a famous musician and another set of test subjects were played the same music but were told the music was not a well known musician. In both cases subjects were attached to a brain scan to determine emotional arousal. Emotional arousal was shown to be strongly correlated to a subjects having been told the musician was famous and strongly against the subject having been told the musician was not famous regardless of the music itself. Emotion is very politically selective, for example "blood is thicker than water" The performance is strongly flawed, poor recording, , little time, had to hurry everything far too much, but people often look beneath the flaws when they believe there might be something of value there, hardly an innovation in music has ever been made without charges that it failed to inspire yet If we have reason to allow ourselves to feel even bad music would suffice. Here are some of the people who use array instruments; Ry Cooder, Pharaoh Sanders, Sting, Imogen Heap, Dave Porter and many more, they are united by no genera proving the wider application of the system beyond any one person

[@instant_mint]

He should have chosen a piano sample instead, more people would be familiar with it and this sound was too loud and sharp. But the theory is really interesting!

[@MrPellenisse]

This is a great idea for kids and animals that are randomly hitting notes. It would sound way less disturbing with his layout. Clearly, it still wouldn't sound like real music, but I think that is besides the point.

[@udomatthiasdrums5322]

Talent ist überbewertet!!

[@robertrericha9970]

Great video! Thanks! I'm a composer and understand very little about math. Real composers use rhetoric to create logical musical ideas.

[@billwesley]

I actually used no math at all, not a single equation, or even any arithmetic. I mentioned geometry but that is not math, the keyboard has a geometry and so does the guitar, or any musical instrument, All composition is filtered through some kind of a geometry, for example music notation is founded on geometry but it is not math. Specific notes that represent specific time intervals are a mathematical construct however, that makes note values the same as number values, every composition an equation, so you see, you do some math after all,

[@nevbass]

every instrument has aspects that help understand music, and aspects that confuse. This is another instrument, probably very useful, think I've seen things like it in some other videos. All good, everyone keep inventing, there's no end to the imagination.

[@gs032009]

Interesting. There is potential. It would have been very helpful if the orator/inventer had dwelt more on how he created the array keyboard, what keyboard notes he chose and why, etc.

[@jsoren9130]

Interesting. I agree with others that the tone was abrasive. I wasn't into many of the pieces he played. However, I was vibing on that last piece. I liked the sound of the instrument that Bill played......Listening again a second time, it did get a bit difficult to listen to. Not sure how that instrument can be adjusted to be less squeaky, if that's possible.

[@bobleclair5665]

20:14, thanks, you just killed my mint plant

[@Shashu_the_little_Voidling]

Anyone know what the instrument on the left is called with the nails?

[@EclecticSceptic]

This is brilliant.

[@kevycatminecraftmore7721]

This is so out of tune sounding. It may be easier, but it would probably take just as much effort to make it sound *good*.

[@themuse8651]

Is this a talk or a sales pitch?

[@beenaplumber8379]

I TOTALLY felt like I was passing a booth at a county fair!

[@vivianeb90]

Note, that this is a TEDx not a TED talk. Even if he was trying to sell his product it was still interesting what he was trying to teach us.

[@beenaplumber8379]

Yes, and I learned most of what I know about cooking with a wok by watching an infomercial. They have their place, but whether it's TED or TEDx, the name TED still means something bigger than an infomercial. It's a fascinatng toy, it really is. I think it can help kids learn about tonal relationships within the narrow Western paradigm only, but other than that, it's really a musical gimmick with a lot of built-in assumptions. Good pitch-men can make anything sound cool!

[@kpag3030]

That’s a cool novelty and a creative idea. It’s not that hard to learn a few chords and get some emotional expression out of them though. The guitar for instance is laid out brilliantly in my opinion to evoke emotional play. You form chords or “harmonious note combinations” according to this gentleman up and down the fret board and/or back and forth and creating these tones and finding them is part of the experience. Have you ever hit a tone and a half bend on the high “A” at exactly the perfect time and feel your mouth hang open and your back bend backwards? Probably not. I commend this gentleman for creating a new instrument that you might put in a mix somewhere. A good synth keyboard can create hits like that pretty easily however. Nice job creating a fairly interesting instrument sir. I can appreciate your effort. I’ll stick with my keyboard and guitar though, respectively. I am also not very good. Lol.

[@believerornot]

wow.. He made the most annoying sound in the world.

[@RWBHere]

My ears were nearly bleeding,mand my nerves were in shreds, after those sudden blares on a quiet night. A simple foot pedal could have allowed the salesman to modulate the loudness of the noises he was making. It reminded me of a very much amplified 1960's Stylophone, with its square waves and sawtooth waves. Full of very harsh harmonics which overwhelm the ears (or the shredded eardrums) so that the dischords cannot be heard. Music is not all about 'How loud can I make it?', and the pauses between the sounds are as important as the sounds themselves. These things have been lost by many modern musicians.

[@AnnaPrzebudzona]

Yeah, I felt for the public who had no way of turning it down/off

[@888claimthisenergynow]

believerornot 😂

[@ellblaek1032]

this is interesting, and i would love to see this instrument evolve into something a bit more expressive, however, a somewhat "classical" approach to harmony and, consequently, the manipulation of emotion, is much more satisfying and effective at conveying specific emotions. I'd love to get a chance to play around with the array at some point as i don't think it excludes the possibility of classical music theory being applyied

[@bw6138]

I have Autism and when I hear music or write music. I see colors with it. I was wanting to make a chart, a color wheel, for myself for the key signatures of colors that I see. For D minor, I see the colors of a sunset.

[@billwesley]

this is a little bit different, instead of assigning colors to notes they are assigned to the intervals between notes, this way the same song progresses through the same colors regardless of the key signature its played in. colors are broken down according to how they interact with one another in the same way intervals are broken down according to how they interact with one another. For example bright colors are related to intervals close in the series of fifths which provide pentatonic or bright harmonies while deep colors are related to intervals distant in the series of fifths which provide chromatic or deep harmonies. Warm colors are related to intervals with more fifths than fourths which sound "expectant" while while cool colors are related to intervals without more fifths than fourths which sound "resolved", so as the musical intervals relate to one another so do the visual colors. There are also two other patterns of confluence between the behavior of intervals as compared to the behavior of colors.

[@magmasunburst9331]

Check out R.S. Pearson and his music with the 1000P.

[@kpag3030]

The Plecktrum thing or whAtever was really cool sounding. So was the table full of carpentry nails. Those might be legit instruments. The keyboard cover thing might be a miss though. I could be wrong however. In the right hands, may be brilliant.

[@randyllst]

My ears shat blood at 4:30 But I'm stubborn, so I kept going until 19:00

[@wise_fool]

the music in the video was annoying except for the ending at 22:30 i kinda started to see his point but it wasn't different from what a nonmusician would do with a musical instrument.

[@GiffysChannel]

I think this would be even more amazing scaled up so you could use your legs and arms to reach for specific notes/areas of notes. Something that your emotions could not only be expressed through music but also body language

[@billwesley]

Your right. An array pedal board could play chords across many octaves despite the use of only the two feet, it would almost double ones capability. Imagine an organ, the pipes arranged in the array configuration would sound their absolute best, the keyboard and pedalboard would be the same pattern, but also the stops too!

[@dirkkaufmann9393]

now play the Bhairavi Scale on that thing -> you cannot learn music if you are learning only the most simple scales of western music.

[@darkstar4494]

uhh.. sure you can. you can learn western music. if you want to understand other scales, you need to learn a different instrument. but beethoven could have known nothing about the bhairavi scale and still composed all his famous music.

[@udomatthiasdrums5322]

cool stuff like it!!

[@dr.bonniewoodruff1906]

You should have someone come up and demonstrate it by knowing nothing is that possible? How much learning do you have to know to manipulate those instruments?

[@billwesley]

Your absolutely right and that is a good suggestion. We had little time, really I'd need several "episodes" ti give such a big subject justice. I have a lot of footage but can't post it just yet. I set up at a park and let people play with it amplified loud. Quite a few excelled and I caught it on my phone, the audience that gathered from around the park thought the people playing knew what they were doing and so they did really, they were having fun.

[@bakedcreations8985]

My ears! Damn!

[@anteconfig5391]

I want one of these.

[@sergiobaglieri1146]

me too

[@kithkin01]

This would have been great if he could pay literally anything impressive

[@MontoyaMatrix]

Yeah, argueably one of the more imporant TED Talks EVER, but he's such a geek, that he couldn't even bring a little Yamaha sequencer just to get some nice piano sounds, or a smooth synth-pad.

[@darkstar4494]

Frank Montoya i don’t think it was a very important talk. all these ideas have been done before in many different ways. he’s just rearranging the notes. there are problems that come up right away when you do that, which he didn’t tell you about. but as a quick way to generate interesting sounds, sure it’s a fine concept. as for the instrument he paired with his triggers- the sequencer doesn’t make the sound, the synthesizer does. he could have used a nice piano sound or anything else. i think the fact that he isn’t a musician is the main reason he didn’t even think of that, and why he was unable to perform anything impressive musically. i’ve seen steeet musicians with even more innovative trigger systems performing very impressive music.

[@C.D.J.Burton]

6 minutes in and I'm gripped

[@meranger92]

I actually enjoyed the part from 19:00 to 20:38

[@chrisjbernier]

As a musician, this sounds absolutely horrific.

[@0EEVV0]

what do u hav against masaging a keyboard hmmMmmm?

[@clearlight808]

i don't like this idea either , although I do think there needs to be seceral huge revolutions in our musical system. I just don't think it needs to be simpler in general.

[@hanktheblesseddeejay]

Although I like how this guy is linking the tones to emotion but I'm not sure this was big enough an issue to qualify redesigning the tone row, and the proof is in the pudding here, the composition sounds horrendous

[@mike325ci]

I agree the timbre is not pleasant... But interesting nevertheless.

[@brianwkinyua]

I think the guy in the presentation is more inventor than musician. How do you think this can affect talented (real) musicians who are starting out (in terms of learning curve)?

[@getlost8027]

That keyboard looks like it'd give you repetitive stress issues. Bending your fingers backwards to combine vertically doesn't suit the joints.

[@getlost8027]

I do like the sound on that nailboard.

[@billwesley]

The final version of the harmony array keyboard has a curve across the octave columns so that fingers can always be comfortable. This design does not require anything like the frantic cross overs of fingers and arms that the standard keyboard requires, the economy of motion for the harmony array keyboard is about 20 fold greater so the reduction in repetitive stress injury is also about 20 fold . Arpeggiations are made using simple sliding actions across about 4 inches toward or away from the player for the harmony array keyboard while for the standard keyboard it is complex finger walking maneuvers with all kinds of finger and arm cross overs covering a left right distance of about 4 feet! There is no comparison between the two in terms of stress reduction, the harmony array keyboard wins.

[@KateNord]

It looks like a fun toy for kids. A likely downside of starting with this thing and then switching to any other instrument, as far as I can see, would be the initial disappointment when you actually have to concentrate a tiny bit to find the sounds you wanted.Also, the idea of an organ that you can't play Bach on makes me a little sad (many pianists would likely be happy about that though 😉).

[@dr.bonniewoodruff1906]

Some digital keyboards have that capability now I'm not sure all 5 octaves at the same time but many at the same time

[@billwesley]

In fact such capability was a standard of the old acoustic reed organs and organs in general, its some kind of a stop. There was a patent for an electronic multi octave traditional keyboard where each key divided into octaves, the deeper one reached back on the key the higher the octave the key added, if the finger extended flat across the key all the octaves played at once. None of these solutions suffice for the simple reason that , in the first case a stop is all or nothing which gets old fast and in the second case the architecture of the standard keyboard makes sliding across any consistent row of intervals impossible and even for octaves not many can fit in such a confined area as one white key tip. The trick is to be able to slide between locations, especially between octaves, a casual sliding action can achieve the same end as frantic finger tip arpeggiation which requires many years of practice, this kind of sliding notes in can allow one to mimic the composition maneuvers as a soloist that would have otherwise required an orchestra of people to pull off.

[@inbrachisto852]

rip. shack of radios

[@ealdredaruspex5819]

It's always cute when mathematicians try to explain the magic of music.

[@LunaticTheCat]

But it's not magic. It's just physics and chemistry..... which is all technically quantifiable although we have not developed these methods yet.

[@ealdredaruspex5819]

All hail reductionism! Good luck with that.@@LunaticTheCat

[@hadleymanmusic]

Like I had three keyboards midi together. So I would split and double to 12 6 per hand

[@dr.bonniewoodruff1906]

I did a little study back to where you're talking about right back they must have known it but they didn't have it written down while some of it was written down I got to study the math of the Ancients and yes they had it but not accept it is as widely because of way back then. There is a documentary on acorn TV. Com

[@MaleAdaptor]

I used to like music but after this video I am not sure.

[@darkstar4494]

The piano is limited in many ways and unnecessarily difficult to learn. stringed instruments are much better for learning music theory. and they all have the important quality this guy mentioned, which is that transposing to any key is very easy (unless open strings are required to play it). anyway it’s nice to rearrange the notes, but he’s hardly the first person to think of that, and nothing he’s saying is news to any musician. a different arrangement of keys might make the learning process more rewarding for a beginner, and definitely allows certain things to be performed more easily (but not others, there’s always a trade off). this could sell some units at Guitar Center, but they haven’t “revolutionized music”

[@RWBHere]

The piano, a keyboard instrument, has hundreds of strings. The harp is one of its ancestors. One problem with the instrument in this video is that translating musical notation, which is arranged in the order of a piano or organ keyboard rotated through 90°, to this kind of layout requires a different set of mental gymnastics. If you want versatility with several different instruments, you are helped greatly if you can read music scores. This kind of key layout, reminiscent of the buttons on an accordion, works best for those who have not yet learned to read music, and who play 'by ear'. Nothing here to say it's useless, but it has real limitations. And it's crying out for some dynamics! An organ pipe, per se, has no dynamics, but an organ has a variety of different pipes, each with no dynamic capabilities, but the blending of the sounds makes it one. of the most versatile instruments around. I would like to have heard this instrument with different sounds other than that rangel or square wave, and with. one means of altering its loundness on the fly, maybe with a foot pedal. Even an accordion can play quietly, and have great expression. This instrument is, for most of the demonstration, like listening to ten different trumpet fanfares all being played simultaneously! [Apologies for any typos here. This stylus is insensitive on the touchpad, and autocorrect is having a field day! ;-) ]

[@bigolbearthejammydodger6527]

now do it with glasses of water!

[@billwesley]

that would actually be the best way to arrange them, chords would be much easier to reach and melodies easier to play, but you'd need two of every glass/note for the unisons. Well, good, the unisons would inter-resonate for an optimum more string like tone from the glasses.

[@user-xs5fj3ms2l]

I'm 62 and I've been a musician since I was 7. This presentation is confusing to me and I don't see the point. Yes, math is deeply embedded in music. But it can be explained more simply than this. And the demonstrations were a messy compilation. I didn't enjoy it. I've had theory classes that were just as boring as this. He lost me early and I hope I never see this again.

[@tekmituduo2252]

I agree......if you speak so much about music ....that means that you've never compose music....

[@dr.bonniewoodruff1906]

Hey brilliant brilliant instrument but if you really want to know music on the piano my piano course a beginner learns 3 to 6 years in the first 6 months or less without hours and hours of practice I thought I'd just tell you that. Bon's way FasTrak piano educational system it also goes to doctorates level but most people only want to do the starter set that's fine they can play in any key on a real piano but I think you are real genius and introducing what you have it's awesome. And it should be in the universities for what they are projecting to do a music and even in worship teams in churches as well as a professionals outside of church.

[@EE-hu9zx]

Well aren't you just beautiful, makes me think that Jesus might have been a musician.

[@davestambaugh7282]

He is talking about hunter brained folks. You gotta have a lot of tollerance for ambiguity.

[@sarahsmithers4725]

Marker 23 min 💕

[@sachamm]

Very interesting.

[@Aprifel]

Comparison with traditional keyboard may not be effective for this. Maybe with bayan?

[@Alfalfa_Male]

This guy is nuts

[@billwesley]

your absolutely right, if I had only known just how nuts you have to be to think musical innovation would be respected I never would have made the attempt in the first place. No field is as conservative as music.

[@Alfalfa_Male]

I didn't mean it as rejection of his work. It's just a an observation. This guy is pretty nuts.

[@notsureinthemiddle]

Ross Geller approves.

[@billwesley]

Anyone who cites the sound as deficite has proven they have missed the point, the sounds are midi, whatever a user wants, this is NOT ABOUT THE SOUND however bad the sound mix (the sound mix was off, agreed) This is in particular about a new kind of midi keyboard, a new way of playing regardless of sound, I make no claims of better sound but only of an easier means of playing music, its almost as if the bad sound is a test of whether a person has got the point or not. Its as if Henry Ford demonstrates the first automobile but all eyes were on a flawed paint job only, can not get passed discussing the paint job to even discuss the automobile at all such that the horse and buggy is all we ever get.

[@timfenner666]

Wow. Looks like something fun to play with for all for 3 minutes, and then any musician would want to get back to a real instrument. Looks like it's only useful to play around. If it's so easy to play why didn't you play a well know contemporary song, or classical composition.

[@stephenallen1149]

This keyboard looks like a significant advance.

[@dr.bonniewoodruff1906]

I have a song that sounds just like that in one of my songs that I composed for piano interesting

[@billwesley]

The piano has such a wonderful sound for chords, just a few notes sound like a lot with it

[@windsofmarchjourneyperrytr2823]

Dm: the saddest of all chords

[@guff4]

please see that Trent Reznor gets ahold of these.

[@billwesley]

good idea!

[@rodrigoneves3628]

i guess this dude never took drugs AND listened to music lmao

[@mkozaluss]

if you look closely - the design has a lot to do with the circle of fifths.

[@billwesley]

That's right, if you locate octaves at intervals vertically with low octaves at bottom and high at top and then located different notes in order of circle of fifths horizontally with the lower fifths to the left and the higher fifths to the right that is all it is.

[@dr.bonniewoodruff1906]

Read my book on KZbin called, God's Creative Design of the piano, it is about the math connection, the color connection, and the spiritual connection through it all as you can imagine it'll blow your mind if you know music theory like I do. I made a study of there so I took 5 years with God's help you will see why I too am creative have always been and even more so now because I allow the spirit of God to be a part of that creativity after all he created it all. We are just now starting to see it and understand it Beyond the page of playing the song.

[@billwesley]

Music is much more important than many people realise

[@pianostuff2731]

whats tim heidecker doing on ted

[@iamfrognabox4005]

No emotion there go..no flow..no feeling....no love....Diddle Daddel

[@claudewoodward77]

An interesting pitch arrangement. Good for generating new ideas. The problem is, without the articulation of timbre as well it sounds flat & boring - not conveying enough informalion. Acoustic instruments do this as part way they're played but synth players in general don't. I suggest one hand for notes & one hand for timbre control.

[@beenaplumber8379]

The hand doing pitch can also control velocity (how hard the note is struck) and aftertouch (the pressure held on the key after the note is initially struck). The other should definitely control mod and pitch wheels or something related to timbre. Maybe mod pedals would help too. I realize this was more of a proof of concept, but it sounded like a cheap toy that was programmed to play in tune no matter what you did to it.

[@themuse8651]

I agree. Computer generated music is created to play the sounds that we can hear but is usually missing the invisible noise that real instruments play. it is this 'invisible' noise that although we can't hear it our brain still registers it. This invisible noise prepares our brain to take in the sound that we can hear. Cd music was printed without this invisible noise data to reduce the cost of an album from about $80 or more down to about $30 to be competitive on the market. This is one reason why vinyl and cassette music had that ability to make you want to rock along with the music more so than cds did.

[@billwesley]

There were TWO acoustic instruments included in the demonstration, the array mbira and the array organ (nail violin) these instruments are acoustic

[@ondrejsamek6856]

i kind of got it the idea. it's amazing job for sure, but every time when he touches that synth or whatever this is, it's extremely annoying to listen to it... maybe just change sample to it :D

[@chuckwaddups3803]

I see many disadvantages to this design. The only advantage is that ( perhaps ) people with no knowledge or interest in studying music theory could make up simple things that sound semi-musical. However as far as making a direct connection to the " emotional quality " in the music is absurd.

[@billwesley]

Many people would agree that there is no such thing as an innate emotional quality in music, the idea is this is something that is assigned by each persons separate experience, a basic behaviorist explanation. Behaviorism states that it does not consider internal states so it can not make claims about emotions which are internal states, and this when most people claim musics primary utility is its effect on the emotions. These facts woulds suggest that the behaviorist approach can not tell us much about music. I would ask is it also to be granted that facial expression is conditioned and so arbitrary? I ask because studies have strongly suggested the reverse, that the facial expression of emotion is universally understood. In addition people vary the pitch tempo and timbre of their voice while speaking to communicate emotion (such variance is otherwise called "music" when instrumentation is made to do it, a sonic form of puppetry) studies suggest that people understand the emotions a speaker embodies in their music of voice while speaking regardless of whether they understand that persons language or not! The "atomic" components of music are intervals of pitch and time so if there is anything in music to be studied for its emotional affect it is these tonal and temporal intervals which form the basics. Many people assert a qualitative difference between major and minor chords and scales, that is not my assertion but that of the majority, therefor the least speculative assertion of all regards the geometric outlay of major and minor scales with regard to the harmony array. It is a fact that for local groupings of notes (a chord or scale) a tonic on the left will make the whole group sound major and will provably be major while a tonic on the right will make the whole group sound minor and will provably be a minor scale or chord. The commonly accepted qualitative differences like "major" and "minor" have more demonstrative patterns on the harmony array but Iv'e also noticed some other less commonly typified types of qualitative differences as well, but this would require careful listening of specific examples for each claim, for which there was not time in this case. A great many people would agree that the chromatic scale sounds harsher and less pleasant than the pentatonic scale, this is also not a new assertion. On the harmony array the tonic dominant and subdominant octave courses are all together, and these 3 adjacent octave courses sound the most pleasant. Add one octave course to each side and you get 5 adjacent octave courses, a pentatonic scale which is more serious sounding, then 7, a diatonic scale is more serious yet, then on to more chromatic options which are the most serious sounding of all. So width right to left correlates to how "serious" the intervals sound, narrower widths sound "light" and wide "heavy". I'm pretty sure many listeners would agree were it a scientific test..

[@MaceWinduDuHuen]

not the best presenter, but a good idea. i always felt there must be something to arrange sounds better

[@AMotoVlogger]

I enjoyed the lecuture, not so much the music. The kalinka was well played. Thumbs up the vid anyway

[@ronwalker4849]

OLIVIER MESSIEN OR MADNESS?