Ornament & Crime | Episode 02 | Harrington 1200 + Quantermain

[@philipcarpenter1347]

"Working with Modular is like doing easy things the hardest way possible." You captured the essence of Eurorack in one sentence. Presets are for cowards.

[@jamessusbilla]

Thank *YOU*. And For the people that think this is like DJ'ing, get on this system, unplug all the cables, turn all the knobs down to zero, then let me hear you make beautiful sounds. I wonder if you can even get a sound out of it. LOL. This is sculpting electricity ya'll from nothing to something... God Awesome. =)

[@garystewart1438]

Some great insight here into how Harrington 1200 might be used with intent and purpose. I have been getting satisfactory results with an almost random approach ensuring I have record on to capture moments that surprise. Your video however is a real inspiration and encourages me to look at it methodically. I can't thank you enough for this series you are doing with Ornament & Crime you have some really fresh approaches which say's something given the high quality of content available. Looking forward to more.

[@CinematicLaboratory]

Thanks for sharing! I would never have used Harrington 1200 without the commitment of making this series, but the combo with Quantermain really surprised me. Ornament & Crimes :)

[@ericflesher]

I've been fiddling with the Harrington 1200 app a bit, partly because neo-Riemannian theory (on which the app is based) has been a background interest of mine for a couple decades. The TL;DR summary is this: the app can be an interesting way to explore chromatic chord progressions, but it's going to be inefficient at creating progressions that stay within the key-you'd need to quantize most transformations back to a major scale. (Same thing for the Automatonnetz app, which more or less doees the same thing as Harrington 1200 but automates the transformation process.) Basically, the app uses neo-Riemannian theory to produce a series of increasingly chromatic triadic progressions using smooth (sometimes referred to as "parsimonious") voice leading wherein the chord voices move as little as possible. The P, L, and R transformations shift one pitch at a time, whereas the N and S shift two at a time and the H shifts all three. This can yield the kinds of chromatic chord progressions found in Romantic-era music starting from around Beethoven and culminating late in the 1800s. However, more typical to that time period are progressions that combine transformations so that two happen at the same time, e.g., PL, PR, LR. PL and PR produce chromatic mediants (e.g. C maj - Emaj; C maj - Ab maj), whereas LR produces a string of relatively weak third-related chords that starts to wander out fo the key (e.g. C maj - E min - G maj - B min - D maj - F# min - etc.). N, S, and H are more complex: N ("Nebenverwandt," or neighbor-related) transforms a major chord to its minor subdominant, or a minor chord to its major dominant. This is actually central to Riemann's harmonic theory, which was based on the specious claim that an "undertone" series exists that mirrors the overtone series. It's how he explained the minor triad as originating in nature: it's a major triad, just upside-down. This is what "root mode" refers to in the app: major places the root on the bottom of the chord, and minor places it on the top. (I know, this is confusing.) S is the so-called "slide" transformation that holds the third of the chord and slides the root and fifth up or down by half step (e.g. C maj - C# min or E min - Eb maj). It's a pretty potent progression. Historically, this would most likely involve first-inversion triads in order to avoid parallel fifths. H creates something we call "double mode mixture," which is basically taking a chromatic mediant (e.g. C maj - Ab maj, above) and shifting the mode of the arrival chord (C maj - Ab minor). This yields some pretty remote chromatic chords. It can be interesting to hand-tune the triads because, unless you're using 12-tone equal temperament, they'll start to go out of tune. But if you start with in-tune perfect fifths and fidget with the major third, you can get some very in-tune (and decidedly non-equal tempered) major triads that start to pop out of the texture. As noted above, keeping a chord progression within the key is going to require quantization. This is because the app uses a theoretical model that creates chromatic harmony in a chord-to-chord, generative way; the whole point is to go out of the key. If the unquantized results seem too jarring-and they of course are not to everyon'e's taste-the app could be used in a more structural way by slowing down or manually triggering the chord progressions, letting them unfold at a much more gradual rate.

[@CinematicLaboratory]

Wow, thank you so much for taking the time to share this. I hope you realized I suck at music theory:) But after diving into the neo-Riemannian transformations a lot of it makes sense to me now. I can clearly spot your passion for this subject. Your post really helps me to gather some more background information, especially WHY people found this interesting a long time ago (we now just play I IV V and back to I on most pop songs). Thank you for explaining what the Slide transformation does! I still wish it could do a diminished, augmented, sus2 and sus4 chord because these are my favorites in 'cinematic' stuff. Today I've been playing with Automatonnetz to do a bit of research and I like it a lot more than Harrington 1200 since you don't have to program all the transformations with CV and Triggers. Thanks again for your great explanations and background info!

[@ericflesher]

@@CinematicLaboratory Glad you found it helpful! I taught music composition and theory for a lot of years, so this app pretty much got my attention right away. (What to do with it, though, was another question.) Unfortunately the app won't support those other chord types because the theory concerns major and minor triads pretty much exclusively. Theoretically if it were possible to hack the software, I suppose it would be possible to program the app to use other chord types, but the trick would be getting them to work within the theoretical paradigm because it forces the chord voices to move by half- and whole-step. The theory more or less tries to quantify what I suspect composers back then did by experimentation and intuition: sit at the piano and think about what happens to a chord if you just move some of its pitches up and down small distances. I'll look forward to an Automatonnetz video if you make one! One thing that did come to mind is the Oberheim Expander that Robby Kilgore designed in the 1980s. The late Michael Brecker, the great jazz saxophone player, used it on his tune "Original Rays" to create chordal homophony from a single pitch; the chord forms rotate and shift depending on parameters the performer sets. He gets a lot of sus 2 and sus 4-type structures because of how he programmed it. (There's an article about it here: robbykilgore.com/harmonic-expansionism/) You can hear how he used it at the beginning and ends of the track (kzbin.info/www/bejne/jHe7pqyBaMl6kLs) particularly when he repeats single pitches over time. Allan Holdsworth did somewhat similar things on guitar but simply used a pitch shifter to offset things by a perfect 2nd (or 4th, 5th, etc.).

[@blackrazorus]

So glad to have another o_c video! Amazing stuff and a reminder I need to bust out my music theory books to really learn to use it…

[@fleshback]

Deep device. Beautiful, as always.

[@walrtbstudios5430]

I bought my O_C just last week (by walking into an actual shop and completing a face-to-face transaction!) and Harrington was the second app I played with. Not sure what I was doing but it was reasonably musical. However, it now appears that I need a SECOND O_C. Thank you- I think…

[@magneticmonopole7824]

Great stuff again man. I've recently digged into Sequins after ignoring it fo r a long time. Super deep and powerful sequencer when being modulated by other sources. Looking forawrd to a video on that!

[@CinematicLaboratory]

I'll be working down the menu so it will take a while :).

[@Probbie]

Really interesting and useful. Thank you! 🥰

[@shualiko]

WOW! Such a great video!! The flow between text, music and information! Amazing. And what’s that sequencer you’re using there???

[@sonicaddiction]

Twice I thought a dog was loose in my apartment! I was running the video in the background, just listening to the music, and didn't realise the barking came from the video! Then I forgot about it and was scared by it again a couple of minutes later! :D

[@CinematicLaboratory]

The power of convolution reverb! I used an 'in the other room' preset and it sounds just like it. Sorry for the inconvenience :)

[@sonicaddiction]

@@CinematicLaboratory No problem and thanks for the great video! I think my open back headphones made the effect even more pronounced since the barking blended perfectly with the other sounds around me! :D

[@MrMarcLaflamme]

Hey have you seen Der Mann mit der Maschine - DROID yet? If not, looking forward to seeing what you come up with when you eventually get one (or more!)

[@onelittleatlas5645]

I've been really excited to try this app but it's still patched up in Quartermain 😅 Thanks for the video it'll really help me try it out and has clear explanations. Is everything in this patch just the chords or are there melody's along with it? Really like what you've managed to do with it. I only have a 6u case so it'll be interesting what I can come up with!

[@CinematicLaboratory]

What I learned so far it's a chord generator that uses a theory of making chord progressions with small transformations, almost like a classical way of making generative music. So I think it also represents a style of composing (see eric flesher's note below). The melody comes from your sequencer (transpose), so the triads follow your transpose CV.

[@ArkaHtun]

using any quantisation on any platform , daw dawless is removing all the hours youd take to learn to play an instrament .. but we have to learn all the patcching and sound design , mixing the sounds , djs these days just use sync buttons keylocks all tracks are have the keys shown ,, it doesnt campare .. ive been a dj since the rave days ,and djing on vinyl is a skill that is unrated i feel .. its all about knowing what tunes go with each other .. modular is way harder to make music than in a daw or recording a tune if you have learned an instrument .. we still have to choose the right scales and design the sounds to fit .. who ever said that hasnt had the experience to really know ..well thats my view ..

[@CinematicLaboratory]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. It's just that you don't have to be a musician to play a modular, if you can patch, you can play which makes it accessible and fun to anyone.

[@ArkaHtun]

@@CinematicLaboratory yeah man , musician is just a name we call ourselves ,, kids banging on a pot is music to the right listener .. well danced to worse for sure ..lol😆

[@adamsmith7058]

​@@CinematicLaboratory A person capable of expressing emotions or thoughts through music is by definition a musician. If it transcends the mundane or commonplace statements made in their chosen mode of espression you may even call them an artist. Besides, this is an apples and oranges type comparison in many ways. Speaking as someone who is reasonably good pianist and has experimented with modular to some degree, all I can say is that they are radically different worlds with very different aethetics and skill requirements. In the end, for me, it's about results rather than how you arrive at an idea and it'sgreat that we live in a time when so many modes of expression are available to us.

[@CinematicLaboratory]

@@adamsmith7058 Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this! I always consider myself a 'noodler' because I don't have any real playing skills and I suck at music theory. However, I always feel I can easily 'tell my stories' with music and make something that didn't exist before I made it. It feels great.

[@MrMarcLaflamme]

It's not composing, it's programming with patch cables :-)

[@onelittleatlas5645]

Or both 😉

[@adamsmith7058]

Arguably, it's programming with patch cables to ceate a compositional environment.