The Art of Digital Orchestration explores how to replicate traditional orchestration techniques using computer technology, with a focus on respecting the music and understanding when using real performers is still the best choice. Using real-world examples including industry-leading software and actual sounds and scores from films, VR/AR, and games, this book takes readers through the entire orchestration process, from composition to instruments, performance tools, MIDI, mixing, and arranging. It sheds light on the technology and musical instrument foundation required to create realistic orchestrations, drawing on decades of experience working with virtual instruments and MIDI. Bringing together the old and new, The Art of Digital Orchestration is an excellent resource for anyone using software to write or compose music. The book includes access to online videos featuring orchestration techniques, MIDI features, and instrument demonstrations.

The MIDI Manual: A Practical Guide to MIDI within Modern Music Production, Fourth Edition, is a complete reference on MIDI. Written by David Miles Huber (a 4x Grammy-nominated musician, producer and author), this best-selling guide provides clear explanations of what MIDI 1.0 and 2.0 are, acting as a guide for electronic instruments, the DAW, MIDI sequencing and how to make best use of them. You will learn how to set up an efficient MIDI system and how to get the most out of your production room and ultimately ... your music. Packed full of useful tips and practical examples on sequencing and mixing techniques, The MIDI Manual also covers in-depth information on system interconnections, controllers, groove tools, the DAW, synchronization and more. For the first time, the MIDI 2.0 spec is explained in light of the latest developments and is accompanied with helpful guidelines for the long-established MIDI 1.0 spec and its implementation chart. Illustrated throughout with helpful photos and screenshots, this is the most readable and clearly explained book on MIDI available.

Classical Recording: A Practical Guide in the Decca Tradition is the authoritative guide to all aspects of recording acoustic classical music. Offering detailed descriptions, diagrams, and photographs of fundamental recording techniques such as the Decca tree, this book offers a comprehensive overview of the essential skills involved in successfully producing a classical recording. Written by engineers with years of experience working for Decca and Abbey Road Studios and as freelancers, Classical Recording equips the student, the interested amateur, and the practising professional with the required knowledge and confidence to tackle everything from solo piano to opera.

Covering the basics of producing great audio tracks to accompany video projects, Using Soundtrack provides recording and editing tips and guidance on noise reduction tools, audio effects, and Final Cut Pro's powerful real-time audio mixer. Readers also learn how Soundtrack can be used to give video projects a professional finish with the addition of custom, royalty-free scoring. Theory is presented on a need-to-know basis and practical tutorials provide hands-on techniques for common tasks, including editing video to audio, editing audio to video, changing the length of a music bed, editing dialog, and mixing dialog with music and sound effects. The accompanying downloadable resources include tutorial lessons and sample media.

Audio Education: Theory, Culture, and Practice is a groundbreaking volume of 16 chapters exploring the historical perspectives, methodologies, and theoretical underpinnings that shape audio in educational settings. Bringing together insights from a roster of international contributors, this book presents perspectives from researchers, practitioners, educators, and historians. Audio Education highlights a range of timely topics, including environmental sustainability, inclusivity, interaction with audio industries, critical listening, and student engagement, making it recommended reading for teachers, researchers, and practitioners engaging with the field of audio education.

Sound and Image: Aesthetics and Practices brings together international artist scholars to explore diverse sound and image practices, applying critical perspectives to interrogate and evaluate both the aesthetics and practices that underpin the audiovisual. Contributions draw upon established discourses in electroacoustic music, media art history, film studies, critical theory and dance; framing and critiquing these arguments within the context of diverse audiovisual practices. The volume's interdisciplinary perspective contributes to the rich and evolving dialogue surrounding the audiovisual, demonstrating the value and significance of practice-informed theory, and theory derived from practice. The ideas and approaches explored within this book will find application in a wide range of contexts across the whole scope of audiovisuality, from visual music and experimental film, to narrative film and documentary, to live performance, sound design and into sonic art and electroacoustic music. This book is ideal for artists, composers and researchers investigating theoretical positions and compositional practices which bring together sound and image.

Major Label Mastering: Professional Mastering Process distills 25 years of mastering experience at Capitol Records into practical understandings and reliable systems. Containing unparalleled insights, this book reveals the mastering tricks and techniques used by Evren Goeknar at one of the world's most notable record labels. Beginning with the requisite competencies every Mastering Engineer must develop, Major Label Mastering delves into the particulars of the mastering studio, as well as fundamental mastering tools. Included among these tools is The Five Step Mastering Process, a rigorously tested system that equips the practitioner to successfully and confidently master a project to exacting standards of audio fidelity. Covering all bases, the book discusses both macro and micro considerations: from mindset approach and connecting with clients down to detailed guidelines for processing audio, advanced methods, and audio restoration. Each chapter ends with exercises intended to deepen understanding and skill, or to supplement course study. Suitable for all levels, this is a unique resource for students, artists, and recording and Mastering Engineers alike. Major Label Mastering is supplemented by digital resources including audio examples and video tutorials.

- Includes a number of interviews with diverse practitioners, offering extensive case studies - Supplemented by a website to be hosted and developed by the author, including videos, practice files and additional interviews - Acts as a supplementary text to the bestselling 'Dance Music Manual', which does not include a section on performance/performance tech

In an era when performing live is more essential than ever, this is the go-to guidebook for getting your show on the road and making a living from music. Previously published as The Tour Book, this new edition has been extensively revised, reorganized, and updated to reflect today's music industry. Written by a touring professional with over 25 years of experience.

Recording Analysis: How the Record Shapes the Song identifies and explains how the sounds imparted by recording processes enhance the artistry and expression of recorded songs. Moylan investigates how the process of recording a song transforms it into a richer experience and articulates how the unique elements of recorded sound provide essential substance and expression to recorded music. This book explores a broad array of records, evaluating the music, lyrics, social context, literary content and meaning, and offers detailed analyses of recording elements as they appear in a wide variety of tracks. Accompanied by a range of online resources, Recording Analysis is an essential read for students and academics, as well as practitioners, in the fields of record production, song-writing and popular music.

This collection interrogates and stimulates deep, cross-disciplinary engagement with the various understandings and interplays of 'radio modernisms' from the early decades of the twentieth century through to the 1950s. Academics from a range of different disciplines explore their common interests in the richness and heterogeneity of BBC Radio's imaginative programming - in terms of sound; as cultural events from specific moments in time; as team creations; as something experienced live in the domestic context; and as cultural works that, in many cases, attracted a certain canonical pedigree. Radio modernisms are, as these chapters demonstrate, a combination of the particular, the contingent, and the contextual. More than a decade after the publication of the first scholarly works to yoke together 'modernism' and 'radio', this collection emphasises the plurality of 'modernisms' as a defining aspect of contemporary BBC historiography. The authors bring multiple lenses to bear - including race, gender, and transnationalism - in order to (re)locate twentieth-century radio programming in broad, expansive contexts. They also underline the dynamic entanglements of radio - and radiogenic feature programmes, in particular - with other kinds of media and cultural forms and formats, reframing radio as a site of and vehicle for remediation and intermediality. In examining the myriad ways in which radio gave shape to new modernities, and both evolved and constituted new forms of modernism, this collection offers fresh perspectives on the interconnected significance of 'radio modernisms' within the socio-cultural, literary, and political landscapes of twentieth-century Britain. This book was originally published as a special issue of Media History.

In this thorough introduction to the technology behind audio workstations, Dr Francis Rumsey explains not only how digital audio works but also how to make best use of its capabilities. A combined revision of his two successful titles, MIDI Systems and Control and The Audio Workstation Handbook, this new book covers recent developments such as surround sound formats, direct stream digital, new audio project formats, new interfaces and alternatives to MIDI.
Desktop Audio Technology begins by setting out principles of digital audio and how these are applied in recording, replay and editing within workstations. MIDI and synthetic audio control is then covered, looking at the means by which artificial sounds can be controlled and manipulated. This is followed by explanations of hardware, including storage devices, buses, computer interfaces and audio processing options. Dr Rumsey then focuses on transferring audio between systems, including coverage of audio interfaces, networking and file formats. The next section examines audio software, providing working examples of different commercial packages that exemplify some of the concepts previously described. The final chapter considers operational issues such as recent spatial reproduction formats, consumer format mastering and quality control issues, as well as troubleshooting and systems issues.
If you are a student, lecturer or practitioner in the field of audio and are looking for an authoritative technical guide to the underlying principles of digital audio and MIDI, this book is for you.
Dr Francis Rumsey is a Reader in Sound Recording at the University of Surrey (UK) and a Visiting Professor at the School of Music in Pitea(Sweden). He is a Fellow of the Audio Engineering Society and a regular contributor to the AES Journal. Dr Rumsey is also author of Spatial Audio and co-author of Sound and Recording (with Tim McCormick) and The Digital Interface Handbook (with John Watkinson), all published by Focal Press.
* Complex issues are covered in a lucid manner, accessible for those with little prior knowledge of the subject
* Explains how to get the best results from your equipment and includes advice on troubleshooting when things go wrong
* Written by a leading academic and Fellow of the Audio Engineering Society

Providing vital reading for audio students and trainee engineers, Sound and Recording is the essential guide for anyone who wants a solid grounding in both theory and industry practices in audio, sound, and recording. This updated and comprehensively restructured edition includes new content on DAW configuration, effects processing, 3D/immersive audio systems, object-based audio, and VR audio technology. This bestselling book introduces you to the principles of sound, perception, audio technology, and systems. Sound and Recording is the ideal audio engineering text for students, an accessible reference for professionals, and a comprehensive introduction for hobbyists.

We're all able to record music; a smartphone will get you quick results. But for a good sound, a lot more is involved. Acoustics, microphone placement, and effects have a huge influence on the resulting sound. Music Production: Learn How to Record, Mix, and Master Music will teach you how to record, mix, and master music. With accessible language for both beginner and advanced readers, the book contains countless illustrations, includes tips and tricks for all the popular digital audio workstations and provides coverage of common plugins and processors. Also included is a section dedicated to mastering in a home studio. With hundreds of tips and techniques for both the starting and advanced music producer, this is your must-have guide.

In Monitoring Adaptive Spoken Dialog Systems, authors Alexander Schmitt and Wolfgang Minker investigate statistical approaches that allow for recognition of negative dialog patterns in Spoken Dialog Systems (SDS). The presented stochastic methods allow a flexible, portable and accurate use. Beginning with the foundations of machine learning and pattern recognition, this monograph examines how frequently users show negative emotions in spoken dialog systems and develop novel approaches to speech-based emotion recognition using hybrid approach to model emotions. The authors make use of statistical methods based on acoustic, linguistic and contextual features to examine the relationship between the interaction flow and the occurrence of emotions using non-acted recordings several thousand real users from commercial and non-commercial SDS. Additionally, the authors present novel statistical methods that spot problems within a dialog based on interaction patterns. The approaches enable future SDS to offer more natural and robust interactions. This work provides insights, lessons and inspiration for future research and development, not only for spoken dialog systems, but for data-driven approaches to human-machine interaction in general.

Learn how to create, produce, and perform your music at the next level by unlocking the power of Ableton Live 9. This book and web combination shows, if you get it right, exactly what Live can deliver. Engineered to follow Live's non-linear music environment, the book looks and feels like the program. Its unique format utilizes the terms and creative features of Live - tabs, keys, pointers, and labels-to help you learn the littlest things that make the biggest difference. Packed with professional insight, concepts, definitions, and hundreds of tips, tricks, and hidden features, author Keith Robinson covers the software's nuts and bolts, while never neglecting creative techniques for creating, producing, performing, - all the tools for making music on the fly. The accompanying website contains bonus chapters, Live Sets and clips to sync and download. Ableton Live 9... * Features step-by-step tutorials, useful web-based media (Sets, Clips, Loops, and Samples) designed to perfect your techniques * Identifies key concepts and definitions, and uncovers hidden features of Live 9 * Its unique graphic format, mirrors Live's structure, terms, and creative features, so you can get into a "Live frame of mind" as you read

Master the basics from first principles: the physics of sound, principles of hearing etc, then progress onward to fundamental digital principles, conversion, compression and coding and then onto transmission, digital audio workstations, DAT and optical disks. Get up to speed with how digital audio is used within DVD, Digital Audio Broadcasting, networked audio and MPEG transport streams. All of the key technologies are here: compression, DAT, DAB, DVD, SACD, oversampling, noise shaping and error correction theories are treated in a simple yet accurate form. Thoroughly researched, totally up-to-date and technically accurate this is the only book you need on the subject.
* Expand your knowledge with this thorough treatment of digital audio for a wide range of disciplines* Clearly explainations require a minimum of math to allow for easy understanding* Get up to speed with how digital audio is used within DVD, Digital Audio Broadcasting, networked audio and MPEG transport streams

Virtual environments such as games and animated and "real" movies require realistic sound effects that can be integrated by computer synthesis. The book emphasizes physical modeling of sound and focuses on real-world interactive sound effects. It is intended for game developers, graphics programmers, developers of virtual reality systems and training simulators, and others who want to learn about computational sound. It is written at an introductory level with mathematical foundations provided in appendices. Links to code examples and sound files can be found on the Downloads/Updates tab.

Anyone wanting to set up a low cost web radio station will benefit from the advice and information provided by this book. Not only will you gain technical and practical know-how to enable your station to go live, but also an appreciation of the legal and copyright implications of making radio, potentially for international audiences and in the rapidly evolving environment of the web.
To succeed, your radio content will need to be carefully planned and your station properly promoted. Advice is given on taking advantage of the scalability web radio introduces for building audiences in line with your resources, for scheduled live output and for making programmes available on demand, including music, news, speech radio and audience participation. Case studies from around the world are provided to demonstrate how different radio organisations are applying the new flexibility web radio has to offer in a wide range of situations.

Together with its associated website www.web-radio-book.com, the book also acts as a starting point for locating a range of sources for further advice and lines of research.
Learn how to:
- go live with your own low cost web radio station (either managing the server yourself or using a host service)
- assess the right server set-up to handle the number of simultaneous listeners expected
- get the best sound quality to your listeners
- take account of the range of devices available for receiving web radio
- plan your station, programming and associated website
- identify and reach your audience
- build audience feedback and data into your station's strategy
- tackle the additional legal and ethical dimensions of radio on the web
- source more detailed information
Learn the technology and practice of sending and receiving web radio
Expand your knowledge with the accompanying website giving extra information and useful links
Get professional results with tips on successful programming

With the growing impact of information technology on daily life, speech is becoming increasingly important for providing a natural means of communication between humans and machines. This extensively reworked and updated new edition of Speech Synthesis and Recognition is an easy-to-read introduction to current speech technology.
Aimed at advanced undergraduates and graduates in electronic engineering, computer science and information technology, the book is also relevant to professional engineers who need to understand enough about speech technology to be able to apply it successfully and to work effectively with speech experts. No advanced mathematical ability is required and no specialist prior knowledge of phonetics or of the properties of speech signals is assumed.
Speech Synthesis and Recognition:
· Explains the complexity of speech communication;
· Describes mechanisms and models of human speech production and perception;
· Covers concatentive synthesis techniques and format synthesis by rule, as well as the processing required for synthesis from text;
· Introduces methods for automatic speech recognition by whole-word template matching and by statistical pattern matching using hidden Markov methods;
· Describes practical techniques that contribute to the successful implementation of speech recognition systems, including those for recognizing very large vocabularies;
· Includes chapters covering the related technologies of digital speech coding and automatic recognition of speaker characteristics;
· Discusses applications and performance of current speech technology.
Throughout the book the emphasis is on explaining underlying principles with sufficient but not unnecessary detail, so as to provide the reader with a thorough grounding in the problems and techniques in speech synthesis and recognition. This book is therefore ideal as an introduction before tackling more advanced texts.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203484681

Clearly technology has added a "voice" to music, but how does that voice affect the traditional human craftsmanship of music? In other words, can the music created still be called one's own? In Strange Sounds, Timothy Taylor addresses the anxieties provoked by technology's role in music composition since World War II. In this accessible and comprehensive study, Taylor discusses the nature of technology, its use in making music, and the inevitable fears of losing one's agency further with the new digital technologies being developed. From the early tape music of France and the "space age pop" of 1950s America to the numerous electronic dance music genres of today that detour into "illegal" activities like those argued in lawsuits over the sampling of traditional folk music, and the trance club scenes in cities like New York and London that have become synonymous with the drug ecstasy, technology has irrevocably penetrated the production and consumption of contemporary music.

Leading with Sound is the must-have companion guide to working on video game projects. Focused on the creative, collaborative, philosophical and organizational skills behind game sound and eschewing the technical, this book celebrates the subjects most essential to leading with sound in video game development at any level. Refuting the traditional optics of sound as a service in favour of sound as a pro-active visionary department, , this book examines each of the four food-groups of dialogue, sound design, music and mix, not through the usual technical and production lenses of 'how' and 'when', but the essential lens of 'why' that enables leadership with sound. Leading with Sound is essential reading for aspiring sound designers, inside and outside of the classroom, as well as experienced professionals in the game industry.

Game Audio with FMOD and Unity introduces readers to the principles and practice of game audio through the process of creating their own First Person Shooter (FPS) game. All the basics are covered, as well as a simple introduction to coding. Using the free software Unity and FMOD Audio Middleware, the reader will be able to create a game of their own and develop a portfolio that demonstrates their capacities in interactive sound design. Perfect for classroom use or independent study, Game Audio with FMOD and Unity also comes with a full suite of audio assets provided on a companion website.

Convergence in Broadcast and Communications Media offers concise and accurate information for engineers and technicians tackling products and systems combining audio, video, data processing and communications. Without adequate fundamental knowledge of the core technologies, products could be flawed or even fail. John Watkinson has provided a definitive professional guide, designed as a standard point of reference for engineers, whether you are from an audio, video, computer or communications background.
Without assuming any background and starting from first principles, the four core technologies of image reproduction, sound reproduction, data processing and communications are described. Covering everything from digital fundamentals to conversion methods, sound and image technologies, compression techniques, digital coding principles, storage devices and the latest communications systems, the book shows how these technologies operate together and the necessary conversions that take place between them. Acronyms and buzzwords are introduced only after their purpose has been described in plain English - as the book serves to give a reliable grasp of the fundamentals. The criteria involved in determining image and sound quality are based on a thorough treatment of the human senses, a unique description of how motion portrayal works in managing systems.
John Watkinson is an international consultant in audio video and data recording. He is a Fellow of the AES, a member of the British Computer Society and a chartered information systems practitioner. He presents lectures, seminars, conference papers and training courses worldwide and writes for many industry magazines. His other booksfor Focal Press are widely acknowledged as standard reference works and industry bibles'. John is author of MPEG2, The Art of Digital Video and the Art of Digital Audio, An Introduction to Digital Video, An Introduction to Digital Audio, The Art of Sound Reproduction, Television Fundamentals, Co-author of The Digital Interface Handbook and Contributor to The Loudspeaker and Headphone Handbook.
A fundamental approach to audio, video, data processing and communications systemsWritten for engineers of any discipline (audio, video, computers, communications)Demonstrates audio and video principles alongside the essential communications technologies: MPEG transport streams, DVB, Networks, Telephony, ADSL, Firewire, ATM

How can we engineer systems capable of "cocktail party" listening?

Human listeners are able to perceptually segregate one sound source from an acoustic mixture, such as a single voice from a mixture of other voices and music at a busy cocktail party. How can we engineer "machine listening" systems that achieve this perceptual feat?

Albert Bregman's book Auditory Scene Analysis, published in 1990, drew an analogy between the perception of auditory scenes and visual scenes, and described a coherent framework for understanding the perceptual organization of sound. His account has stimulated much interest in computational studies of hearing. Such studies are motivated in part by the demand for practical sound separation systems, which have many applications including noise-robust automatic speech recognition, hearing prostheses, and automatic music transcription. This emerging field has become known as computational auditory scene analysis (CASA).

Computational Auditory Scene Analysis: Principles, Algorithms, and Applications provides a comprehensive and coherent account of the state of the art in CASA, in terms of the underlying principles, the algorithms and system architectures that are employed, and the potential applications of this exciting new technology. With a Foreword by Bregman, its chapters are written by leading researchers and cover a wide range of topics including: Estimation of multiple fundamental frequenciesFeature-based and model-based approaches to CASASound separation based on spatial locationProcessing for reverberant environmentsSegregation of speech and musical signalsAutomatic speech recognition in noisy environmentsNeural and perceptual modeling of auditory organization

The text is written at a level that will be accessible to graduate students and researchers from related science and engineering disciplines. The extensive bibliography accompanying each chapter will also make this book a valuable reference source. A web site accompanying the text, http: //www.casabook.org, features software tools and sound demonstrations.