Years ago, INA-GRM, the pioneers in sampling (musique concrète) developed a free cross-platform (mac windows max ios) DAW "GRM Player" based on its studio practice starting in the 1940's of sampling using insanely modified tape machines.
This is a photo of Pierre Schaeffer, the "Godfather of Sampling" with one of those tape machines, the Phonogene (ca 1963):
..
And here is a pair of machines, to create feedback:
..
This is the world's first piece of sample-based music, using train sounds, by Schaeffer in 1948:
.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJwoQlYUVTk
.
The GRM Player download (below) includes two articles about the INA-GRM development process (in French). Here are some of my background notes based on those articles:
BACKGROUND ON GRM PLAYER
A DAW is based on a computer emulation of a recording studio, with musicians, an engineer, etc but GRM Player is inspired by Schaffer's studio at GRM where musicians played with those modded tape recorders and their magical magnetic strips, where one needs to 'make' something first, to then hear it, so it is more 'playful' than a DAW. It is intended to be experimental, allow imperfections, and enable discoveries.
GRM Player is sample-based, hosts plugins, but does not use midi. The GUI is rendered by the graphics card, which provides smooth animation and frees the CPU. It is designed for medium and large touch screens placed horizontally, where each user can interact with sounds. Multiple musicians can use the same screen, or be connected remotely.
The audio engine is based on the idea of ‘virtual editing.’ This means multi-channel sound sources are loaded into memory and treated as ‘aliases’. This allows non-destructive editing and mixing, the ability to duplicate sound regions without increasing memory load, and enables other types of flexibility, including infinite undo/redo. You can play several segments of the same loop sound, with a fixed or moving playhead.
Performing multiple simultaneous playings of a single loop, fixed or moving, allows for many sound effects, such as when you play the same or multiple sounds at different speeds or selecting different lengths of the loop from long to extremely short.
An internal database (in this case a tree structure) in synchrony with the audio engine lets you execute commands (new, cut, copy, paste, duplicate, undo, redo, etc.) without interrupting audio playing. In this new paradigm, editing becomes a game.
On-the-fly resampling adapts to the playing speed, so the slower a sound is played, the more accurately it is resampled. This allows very high quality listening at speeds as low as one-hundredth or one-thousandth.
Over 40 audio formats are supported including aac, aiff, flac, mp3, ogg, and wav. All sounds can be opened or closed without audible clicks, and with infinite undo/redo.
GUIDELINES FOR LEARNING GRM PLAYER
I helped GRM translate the pdf User Guide from French to English for the first version, but it was not published and instead they added Tooltips in English which are more useful, with only the Online Documentation in French.
Here are some guidelines on ways to learn this program if you only speak English:
1. Get the latest GRM Player updated 7 December 2023 from https://inagrm.com/fr/showcase/news/372/grm-player
2. In the upper right of the Work Area, open the big ? popup and click Show Tooltips. Go through the Tooltips first, because GRM has their own vocabulary and you will need to learn it before Step 4.
3. Open the Tutorial in the GRM Player Goodies folder and mess around with it using Tooltips.
4. Click the Help menu, go to Online Documentation, and paste that URL into the main Google Translate page (the 'Websites' option). This gives a pretty good translation of the Documentation, but some GRM terms are translated differently, which is why you need to first read the Tooltips. [ BTW, Google Translate is terrible with the pdf articles ]
5. Watch Adrien's video on the Introduction page of the Online Documentation. It is in French, but will give you a good feeling for the playful approach of this program in expert hands!
5. Read the rest of the Online Documentation.
I do not provide any support at all and neither do they AFAIK, but I am sharing this just FYI.
Have fun!![:party:]( "Party!")
This is a photo of Pierre Schaeffer, the "Godfather of Sampling" with one of those tape machines, the Phonogene (ca 1963):
..
And here is a pair of machines, to create feedback:
..
This is the world's first piece of sample-based music, using train sounds, by Schaeffer in 1948:
.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJwoQlYUVTk
.
The GRM Player download (below) includes two articles about the INA-GRM development process (in French). Here are some of my background notes based on those articles:
BACKGROUND ON GRM PLAYER
A DAW is based on a computer emulation of a recording studio, with musicians, an engineer, etc but GRM Player is inspired by Schaffer's studio at GRM where musicians played with those modded tape recorders and their magical magnetic strips, where one needs to 'make' something first, to then hear it, so it is more 'playful' than a DAW. It is intended to be experimental, allow imperfections, and enable discoveries.
GRM Player is sample-based, hosts plugins, but does not use midi. The GUI is rendered by the graphics card, which provides smooth animation and frees the CPU. It is designed for medium and large touch screens placed horizontally, where each user can interact with sounds. Multiple musicians can use the same screen, or be connected remotely.
The audio engine is based on the idea of ‘virtual editing.’ This means multi-channel sound sources are loaded into memory and treated as ‘aliases’. This allows non-destructive editing and mixing, the ability to duplicate sound regions without increasing memory load, and enables other types of flexibility, including infinite undo/redo. You can play several segments of the same loop sound, with a fixed or moving playhead.
Performing multiple simultaneous playings of a single loop, fixed or moving, allows for many sound effects, such as when you play the same or multiple sounds at different speeds or selecting different lengths of the loop from long to extremely short.
An internal database (in this case a tree structure) in synchrony with the audio engine lets you execute commands (new, cut, copy, paste, duplicate, undo, redo, etc.) without interrupting audio playing. In this new paradigm, editing becomes a game.
On-the-fly resampling adapts to the playing speed, so the slower a sound is played, the more accurately it is resampled. This allows very high quality listening at speeds as low as one-hundredth or one-thousandth.
Over 40 audio formats are supported including aac, aiff, flac, mp3, ogg, and wav. All sounds can be opened or closed without audible clicks, and with infinite undo/redo.
GUIDELINES FOR LEARNING GRM PLAYER
I helped GRM translate the pdf User Guide from French to English for the first version, but it was not published and instead they added Tooltips in English which are more useful, with only the Online Documentation in French.
Here are some guidelines on ways to learn this program if you only speak English:
1. Get the latest GRM Player updated 7 December 2023 from https://inagrm.com/fr/showcase/news/372/grm-player
2. In the upper right of the Work Area, open the big ? popup and click Show Tooltips. Go through the Tooltips first, because GRM has their own vocabulary and you will need to learn it before Step 4.
3. Open the Tutorial in the GRM Player Goodies folder and mess around with it using Tooltips.
4. Click the Help menu, go to Online Documentation, and paste that URL into the main Google Translate page (the 'Websites' option). This gives a pretty good translation of the Documentation, but some GRM terms are translated differently, which is why you need to first read the Tooltips. [ BTW, Google Translate is terrible with the pdf articles ]
5. Watch Adrien's video on the Introduction page of the Online Documentation. It is in French, but will give you a good feeling for the playful approach of this program in expert hands!
5. Read the rest of the Online Documentation.
I do not provide any support at all and neither do they AFAIK, but I am sharing this just FYI.
Have fun!
Statistics: Posted by Michael L — Wed Mar 27, 2024 8:54 pm — Replies 0 — Views 29
