THE EVOLUTION OF RECORDING

THE STUDIO AS AN INSTRUMENT

THE STUDIO AS AN INSTRUMENT – COMPOSING WITH TECHNOLOGY

AVANTE GARDE is experimental music, such as using the tape machine and the studio as instrument.  Some forms of Avante Garde music use the TECHNOLOGY as the instrument. 

Some avante garde music has consisted of edited sounds (such as a rubber band twang).  Some consisted of sound relationships that changed by the course of technology (such as “Come Out”).  “Come out” consisted of a few words that were looped and played back at the same time on two different machines.  Since the machines ran at SLIGHTLY different speeds, the loops very slowly became out of sync with each other.  As the relationships between the loops changed, different rhythms were created and gradually changed.

The Beatles were among the first musicians to use a studio as an instrument in a Pop music setting, and used techniques such as placing microphones in unconventional places in order to capture traditional instruments in unusual ways.  They also used tape loops, studio processing and other studio “tricks” as compositional tools.