Do you like Berlin? The hippest city on the planet has some interesting video blogs. My personal favorite is First We Take Berlin which is pretty off-beat and covers a lot of not so hip areas of the city. In their current episode they go to the annual may riots in Kreuzberg (after a weird little mouse story). Then there is Mayda3000 which is the longest running video blog about Berlin. Watch Berlin is a sort of compilation of many different video blogs most of which are in german but there are some are in english as well. And last but not least there's Verbundstoff which is in german only and takes a look at the very underground Berlin electronic music scene.
posted on May 20, 2008 - View this thread

Edgard Varèse : Ionisation. Iannis Xenakis : Rebonds. György Ligeti : Artikulation and Poème Symphonique For 100 Metronomes. [NOTE: see hoverovers for link descriptions]
posted on Apr 28, 2008 - View this thread

When Maurice Martenot met Lev Sergeivich Termen in the early 1920's and heard his revolutionary new musical instrument the Theremin, he was inspired to create his own electroacoustic instrument , which he christened Ondes Martenot. Next year will mark the 80th anniversary of the first performance of this remarkable hybrid keyboard which, aside from its lovely and ethereal sound, is also aesthetically pleasing visually, with its handsome collection of multiple speakers. See and hear the instrument being played and explained in this video interview and demonstration by Jean Laurendeau, which closes with a lovely rendition of the theme from Star Trek. And, here's the instrument in use, live, alongside who else? Radiohead.
posted on Dec 25, 2007 - View this thread

If you like electronic music, you probably already know about some of the blogs that offer free live set downloads. You might even know about mpiii. But, they all pale in comparison to the one and only mixes db.
posted on Oct 3, 2007 - View this thread

The Tenori-On is a new electronic musical instrument by Toshio Iwai [wikipedia], the creator of Electroplankton [previously]. It was just released commercially by Yamaha [flash site], to great excitement among those of us who get excited about such things. But what does it sound like? [more inside]
posted on Sep 5, 2007 - View this thread

Youscope is the result of hooking up an oscilloscope to a soundcard. [youtube] 3rd place winner in Short Films at Assembly 2007.
posted on Aug 30, 2007 - View this thread

Else Marie Pade (b. 1924) is a phenomenon in the history of Danish music. As a child she was often ill and bedridden. She would listen to the sounds around her... on the stairs, from the yard and the room next to hers. This is where her audio universe began. During the Second World War, she was arrested by the Gestapo and placed in solitary confinement. Rather than despair, she began composing music on the bare prison walls, where she scratched the notes with the fasteners on her garters. After the war and her discovery of the concrete music of Pierre Schaeffer and the French avant-garde, she realized that the sounds resembled those she had heard in childhood, and that this was the music she really wanted to compose. Read a long interview with Else Marie Pade here and listen to her collected works here. (Last link in Danish. Left column is production year, middle column is title. Click the bit rates on the right to listen to each work.)
posted on Jul 30, 2007 - View this thread

Introduced to Western culture by the Beatles in their single Norwegian Wood, the sitar has featured prominently in North Indian classical music for centuries. Princeton-based computer scientist Ajay Kapur updates the instrument with his ESitar, an audio and video controller that uses gesture input (PDF) and machine learning algorithms to facilitate joining the computer with Ajay in his sitar performance. Undergraduate engineering students at the University of Pennsylvania work from the other direction, building RAVI-bot, an award-winning, self-playing robotic sitar (YouTube) programmed to generate music from classical Raga scales and melodies all on its own. For those in the Philadelphia area, be sure to check out a live performance of RAVI-bot at the local Klein Art Gallery.
posted on Apr 19, 2007 - View this thread

Bay Area Yuri's Night 2007 Bay Area Yuri's Night 2007 Yuri's Night Bay Area will be held at Moffett Field in the NASA Ames Research Center's massive SOFIA hangar, home to the world's largest aerial observatory. Our host for the evening is pioneering space traveler Anousheh Anasari, the first privately funded female to reach orbit. She is joined by Dr. Chris McKay, world renowned expert in astrobiology and terraformation with the Space Science Division of NASA Ames Research Center, as they welcome you to a dazzling array of interactive art installations and science demos, interwoven with musical and acrobatic performances by some of the world's finest entertainers. Complete write up. Partially via MeFi's own lannanh.
posted on Apr 6, 2007 - View this thread

Raymond Scott dot com — you might not have heard of the man, this cartoon composer, inventor of electronic musical instruments and leader of the world's largest quintet, but his impact on modern music is hard to overstate [Realplayer, NPR]
posted on Mar 9, 2007 - View this thread

Pauline Oliveros, pioneer of electronic and new music, and Deep Listening. Inspired by Valerie Solanas, utilizes just intonation, plays accordion. Hear her . Watch her .
posted on Feb 6, 2007 - View this thread

A massive collection of live DJ and PA sets of electronic music sorted by year and genre. Enjoy.
(Coral Cache link. Please use this to help archive and propagate the files.)
posted on Dec 31, 2006 - View this thread

The Toriton Plus A new electronic music interface using water and light. (YouTube). Make your own. From Little-Scale, which is chock-full of cool and wonderous stuff.
posted on Nov 11, 2006 - View this thread

WaxDJ.com - an excellent source for free downloads and streams of original electronic music mixes of all sorts, from seasoned pros to beginning bedroom amatuers, all told numbering in the hundreds or thousands. My current brand new favorite is the very diverse and well-versed Detriot/Chicago techno stylings of DJ Rubsilent. Recomended mix: Future Funk 23: (Direct MP3 link) (Streaming mp3 link) But don't let me divert you - search for your favorite local DJ or browse for new ones.
posted on Oct 11, 2006 - View this thread

Will Vinyl Survive? Is vinyl on its last legs? Or like Gloria Gaynor, will it survive? Most home listeners chucked out their turntables years ago, but are DJs finally giving in and following suit? DJs face off in a pair of articles discussing the merits of vinyl vs. digital...
posted on Aug 24, 2006 - View this thread

To work around the proprietary whims of digital audio software developers and laptop processor limitations during the mid- and late-1990s, a small band of technically-minded people, including the electronic musician Blitter, pulled together in the late 1990s to engineer the open-source OPEN DSP EZ-Kit platform, a 16-bit computer designed entirely with a focus on low cost and extensible control and DSP arithmetic capabilities. While this project and similar commercial offerings never seemed to gain the critical mass needed to sustain long-term interest, perhaps the new Arduino hardware project from MIT's Processing hardware group may gain a foothold with Processing and Pure Data audio software hobbyists and artists alike, allowing the creative community to extend, enhance and share inventive uses of new technology. Arduino's use has already begun in fascinating museum installations around the world, and has become a part of this year's SONAR and Ars Electronica festivals.
posted on Aug 12, 2006 - View this thread

James Patten creates interactive works in diverse media with themes including performance and social commentary. Projects include Tactile Photography and, most impressive to me, The Audio Pad.
posted on Aug 1, 2006 - View this thread

A video broadcast of György Ligeti's Poème Symphonique for 100 metronomes (AVI, French), with helpful background on the controversial piece located here. For those who know French, you may also be interested in 1993's György Ligeti: Portrait, A Documentary by Michel Follin, showing Ligeti as "the displaced cosmopolitan", through the metaphor of train ride through the European countryside. These and many other avant-garde films can be found at Ubuweb, including features with William Burroughs, a recent "performance" of Cage's 4'33", and Varése and Le Corbusier's 1958 World Fair collaboration Poême électronique, a 400-speaker soundspace installation predating later, more experimental feedback pieces.
posted on Jul 2, 2006 - View this thread

Brian Eno and David Byrne released My Life in the Bush of Ghosts in 1981. It's a great album--and now it's available with a Creative Commons License. "This is the first time complete and total access to original tracks with remix and sampling possibilities have been officially offered on line."
posted on Mar 30, 2006 - View this thread

Self-organization leads to swarm synthesis
posted on Jan 31, 2006 - View this thread

Mathematical proofs in sanus, with some visualization from Martin Wattenberg's The Shape of Song. "The music here...is a raw and unadorned representation of the mathematics itself, involving few human preconceptions beyond a basic mapping needed to accommodate the Western tonal scale."
posted on Dec 4, 2005 - View this thread

John "Paia" Simonton died late last week. His company, PAiA is one of the grandfathers of the DIY synth scene. I have one of his modular synths half-constructed in my garage. He helped create an American buzz for electronic music and DIY music gear in the 70s, and was highly influential till his passing away.
posted on Nov 29, 2005 - View this thread

just get yourself high [lo siento para el Player Real]
posted on Sep 25, 2005 - View this thread

Manic and mellow, the pop of YMCK shows that tight composition and live performance of video game-styled music isn't just for rock bands or eclectic GameBoy experiments, just as delightful 8-bit chip music or "chiptunes" make their way across the globe...
posted on Aug 13, 2005 - View this thread

When the beats are outlawed -- take away the beats. (related)
posted on Aug 3, 2005 - View this thread

Croatian keyboardist Belinda Bedekovic is quite a spectacle (video). According to her biography, "on her public appearances with her virtuosity and performance she 'demolishes everything in front of her', and they are regularly accompanied by enthusiastic applause, sometimes even leading to euphoria."
posted on Apr 5, 2005 - View this thread

What is he up to this time? Richard D. James, aka Aphex Twin has been the impetus and central figure of the electronic music scene from the 90s onwards. You might remember his deranged music videos, his habit of bullshitting the press, his outrageous stunts (such as the DJ set where he dropped the stylus onto a sandpaper disc before "seguing" it into a food blender, driving around in a tank, owning a submarine, and recording in a bank vault) or his utterly inconsistent discography, that ranges from genius to tripe. After much rumor and speculation, his record label, Rephlex, announced Richard will be releasing "Analord 10", a 2 track 12" vinyl-only EP, 13 mins duration in elaborate packaging and selling for an absurd £39.99 (~$77USD). Mike Paradinas (aka µ-Ziq) heard it and claims (see soundmurderer's post) that it is "some of the best music" he's ever heard, "the aphex everyone's been waiting for", but he might be in on what may well be another costly practical joke. Analord pre-orders have shipped and everyone is eager to find out.
posted on Jan 1, 2005 - View this thread

A Singular Christmas. You know how you're so busy during the holidays that you don't have time to listen to all that Christmas music you love some much? Brian Whitman and his Eigenradio have taken all the hassle out of holiday music-listening for you by "play[ing] only the most important frequencies."
posted on Dec 1, 2004 - View this thread

SoNHoRS - Panorama, histoire des musiques electroniques.
Great French language site on the history of electronic music.
posted on Nov 12, 2004 - View this thread

Daphne Oram, Godmother of Electronic Music • During WWII, Ms. Oram worked for the BBC as a sound engineer while indulging an obsessive curiousity of experimental audio in her free time. In 1958, she finally convinced the BBC to open the seminal Radiophonic Workshop, which also fostered the talents of sci-fi composers Delia Derbyshire and Ron Grainer. During that period she developed a technique known as Oramics: manipulating 35mm film to create electrical charges and thus, editable sound.
posted on Sep 27, 2003 - View this thread

Vintage Synth Explorer - I'm an unquestionable electronic music freak, and this site makes me drool every time I read it. You can find everything from the Roland holy trinity - the 303, 808 and 909 to the most obscure little Korg Mini Pops 35. This site is just totally sweet. Yum
posted on Nov 25, 2002 - View this thread

Let your feelings slip, boy, but never your mask. Dirty.org is the online presence of the group Underworld. You can listen to (occasionally live) streamed music, check out their gallery project detailing urban decay, or inquire about a charity dedicated to archiving the traditions of Tibetan Buddhists. Karl Hyde and Rick Smith, both members of uber UK design firm tomato, also ask the big question.
posted on Oct 1, 2001 - View this thread