This page contains hyperlinks to online documents and information relevant to:
Music 215: Music Technology – Spring 2014
University of California, Irvine
Christopher Dobrian. Professor’s UCI website.
University of California, Irvine. Official UCI website.
Assignments are posted online for the upcoming class session.
Programming examples made for the class are available online.
Programming examples from all past classes are also available online.
The page of Max examples from the 2013 class also includes links to the class examples from prior years.
Students are expected to be regular contributors the class research Wiki.
Students are also expected to keep their own personal webpages/blogs documenting the things they have studied and learned.
Post your questions, and answer other people’s questions, on the class Q&A site.
The website for Music 51 as taught in Summer 2013 has some useful articles, links, and listenings.
A document detailing all the music technology facilities at UCI and the policies that govern their use is available online.
There is a class email address, which addresses all registered students and the professor.
For ongoing discussion of class topics, things that don’t belong on the Wiki or the Q&A site, there is a EEE MessageBoard.
Cycling ’74, publisher of Max.
Cycling ’74 User Forum for discussion of Max/MSP/Jitter.
Max 7 Help and Documentation online.
Max 6 Help and Documentation online.
Max Objects Database of third-party objects for Max.
Cycling ’74 offers a variety of tutorials by members of its staff suggesting ways of working with Max.
Max programmer Joshua Clayton has written this helpful article on Event Priority in Max (Scheduler vs. Queue).
Christopher Dobrian’s blog on algorithmic composition with sonic, musical, and visual examples in Max.
The article “Digital Audio” is an introduction to the topic, published as “How Digital Audio Works” in MSP: The Documentation (1997) by Christopher Dobrian.
The book Electronic Music and Sound Design, volume 1, by Alessandro Cipriani and Maurizio Giri teaches basic principles of audio synthesis and processing using MSP.
Electronic music professor Peter Elsea has written a large collection of Tutorials for Max/MSP/Jitter.
Peter Batchelor has compiled a large collection of his own Max Tutorials.
The “MaxMSP Baz Tutorial” is a set of video tutorials demonstrating various audio and video techniques in Max/MSP/Jitter.
Professor Kojiro Umezaki has quite a few short video tutorials about Max objects on his YouTube channel.
V.J. Manzo has written a book titled Max/MSP/Jitter for Music “A Practical Guide to Developing Interactive Music Systems for Education and More”.
Miller Puckette, the original creator of Max, has written a book, which is published online, titled The Theory and Technique of Electronic Music. Although its examples are in Pd rather than Max, the two programming environments are sufficiently similar that you can usually easily port his ideas to Max.
Here is an online textbook/course called Music and Computers – A Theoretical and Historical Approach that covers a wide range of topics, by Phil Burk, Larry Polansky, and others.
Introduction to Digital Filters (with Audio Applications) by Julius O. Smith III is a complete online book on filters. It’s dense, but thorough and useful.
Nigel Redmon posts a blog of well made and comprehensible tutorials on many topics of digital audio at the site EarLevel Engineering.
Here’s a pretty good article explaining The Decibel as it’s used to discuss sounds in the real world. (The same principles apply when talking about digital audio, except that the 0 dB reference amplitude in digital audio is usually the greatest amplitude the system can produce, rather than the softest sound we can hear.)
If you’re interested to know the details of common audio file formats, you can read detailed explanations of the WAVE and AIFF file formats.
A book on Max is available in Spanish, Max/MSP: guía de progamación para artistas by Francisco Colasanto.
For francophones, here is a French Max forum.
And here is a whole page of links to additional Max resources.
Website of David Cope, including writings, compositions, and software.
Zbikowski, Lawrence M. “Cross-Domain Mapping”, Chapter 2 of Conceptualizing Music: Cognitive Structure, Theory, and Analysis, pp. 63-95. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. [Scroll down to the Table of Contents and click on “2. Cross-Domain Mapping 63”.]
A drum sample player (programmed in Flash).
Whitney Music Box by Jim Bumgardner, software realization of phase relationships between geometry, time, and musical tone.
An interactive musical Flash animation of an eight-bar march/fanfare, animated by Aude Picault and realized by Zanorg.
The Sound of Sorting: 15 sorting algorithms visualized and sonified in 6 minutes, by Timo Bingmann.
Documentary video of a remix of “Bicycle Built for Two” done with Max.
Reactable, an innovative computer music instrument with a Maxlike interface.
Demonstration video of SLABS, a music controller developed at UC Berkeley, which sends multiple streams of signal data from pressure- and location-sensitive touchpads to Max.
Andrew Benson recounts his experience using Jitter at Coachella 2009.
SynthPond is a clever and interesting algorithmic composition application for iPhone and iPod Touch.
RGB MusicLab is an application that converts image documents into music algorithmically.
Light Music is a gestural music/video performance by Thierry De Mey and Jean Geoffroy.
An algorithmic improvisation for 6 pianos done in Max/MSP by Maurizio Giri.
Works made with Max/MSP by Akihiko Matsumoto.
The following videos explain the basics of Max for Live:
Introducing Max for Live
Max for Live Video Tutorial #3: Simple Delay
Max for Live Video Tutorial #4: State-Variable Filter
Max for Live Video Tutorial #6: User Interface Part II
Programming in Max for Live: Creating a Wobble Bass MIDI Instrument (3 videos)
Programming in Max for Live: Creating a Live API-based Step Sequencer (2 videos)
The full collection of Cycling ’74 tutorial videos is on the Cycling ’74 YouTube channel.
Audacity is an effective free open-source cross-platform audio editing application.
Blender is a free open-source cross-platform application for 3D modeling, animation, and rendering.
Cipriani, Alessandro, and Giri, Maurizio. Electronic Music and Sound Design – Theory and Practice with Max/MSP. Rome: Contemponet, 2010.
Cope, David. The algorithmic composer. Madison, WI: A-R Editions, 2000.
Cope, David. Computer models of musical creativity. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2005.
Cope, David. Computers and musical style. Madison, WI: A-R Editions, 1991.
Cope, David. Experiments in musical intelligence. Madison, WI: A-R Editions, 1996.
Dodge, Charles and Thomas A. Jerse. Computer Music: Synthesis, Composition, and Performance, 2nd ed. New York: Schirmer Books, 1997.
Harries, Dan. The new media book. London: BFI Publications, 2002.
Kahn, Douglas. Noise, water, meat : a history of sound in the arts. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1999.
Loy, Gareth. Musimathics, v. 1 and 2. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2006.
Manovich, Lev. The language of new media. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001.
Manzo, V.J. Max/MSP/Jitter for Music “A Practical Guide to Developing Interactive Music Systems for Education and More”. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
Miranda, Eduardo Reck. Composing music with computers. Oxford; Boston: Focal Press, 2001.
Miranda, Eduardo Reck. Computer sound synthesis for the electronic musician. Oxford; Boston: Focal Press, 1998.
Miranda, Eduardo Reck. Computer sound design: synthesis techniques and programming. Oxford; Boston: Focal Press, 2002.
Miranda, Eduardo Reck. New digital musical instruments: control and interaction beyond the keyboard. Middleton, WI: A-R Editions, 2006.
Miranda, Eduardo Reck. A-life for music: music and computer models of living systems. Middleton, WI: A-R Editions, 2011.
Moore, F. Richard. Elements of Computer Music. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1990.
Norman, Donald. The Design of Everyday Things. UCI Langson Library ANTPAC listing with a link to online edition of the book, available with UCI login.
Puckette, Miller. The Theory and Technique of Electronic Music. Singapore: World Scientific Publishing Co., 2007. Also published online at the above link.
Roads, Curtis, et al. The Computer Music Tutorial, Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1996. The single greatest concentration of computer music information.
Rowe, Robert. Interactive Music Systems. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993.
Rowe, Robert. Machine Musicianship. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001.
Schank, Roger C. and Robert P. Abelson. Scripts, plans, goals, and understanding : an inquiry into human knowledge structures. Hillsdale, N.J.: L. Erlbaum Associates, 1977.
Wardrip-Fruin, Noah and Montfort, Nick. New media reader. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003.
Zbikowski, Lawrence M. Conceptualizing Music: Cognitive Structure, Theory, and Analysis. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.