Trying to get
gigs in some places as a solo act is hard work, all
because of people's preconceptions. Don't judge how 'good' an act is by
how many members there are in that act. Judge them by how good they
sound.........
Why
I’m different to your idea of a solo act
I’ll start this
short piece with my summary.
Let
your ears do the listening not your pre-conceptions
Here’s
why...........
Many
people love the sound of a live band yet when they hear
a solo act no matter how good they are musically, it never sounds quite
the
same.
Q.
Why is this?
A.
It’s the ‘dynamics’ of the music that you
hear with a
band that are missing with almost all solo or duo acts - except
with Rockin’
ROB it's different.
I
guarantee that if you listen to me with your eyes closed
you will think you’re listening to a band and the reason for
that is the method
I use for my backing band. Most solo or duos use backing
‘tracks’ usually on
mini disk, sometimes CD and increasingly mp3 via media players, either
way you
are listening to an audio ‘recorded’ track and with
that comes the compression and
format limitations that ruins the dynamics, especially mp3. The
compression
used is the reason even a professional band sound different live to how
they
sound on CD. Compression destroys the dynamic sound of live music.
Q.
So why is Rockin’ ROB different?
A.
The short, simple, non-technical answer is because I use
MIDI files through a hardware synthesizer. “What difference
does that make?” I
hear you asking. Without getting too technical - MIDI isn’t
audio, you can’t
play it like an audio track. MIDI is a set of instructions that needs
to be interpreted
by a musical instrument that understands MIDI. If
you’ve ever seen a band with a keyboard
player you’ll already have heard MIDI in action. In fact any
professional live
band will make use of MIDI in their shows in all sorts of ways from
guitar to
drums. The result is that when my backing band plays it’s
musical instruments
played in real time that you are hearing, not a pre-recorded audio
track. MIDI contains
all the musical information required to produce a sound at a certain
pitch,
volume, velocity and timbre and all the other numerous nuances that
make the
dynamics of a live performer – hence it sounds
‘real’. The only difference is
that the player isn’t a person that you can see ‘in
the flesh’ but the sounds
are ‘real’, being played then and there as you
listen. That is why I am
confident with your eyes closed you can’t tell the difference.
The
next obvious
question is if there’s such a great difference why
isn’t everybody doing what I
am? Well in reality I’m not the only person in the world
using this method but
we are in the minority. The reason is twofold, first the expense and
secondly
the technical knowledge required for using MIDI.
Cost
first - CD and mp3 players start from a few pounds and
mini disc players from just over £100. These are all capable
of playing back
their respective musical formats very well. The limitation is in the
format of
the audio not the equipment. It doesn’t matter how much money
a performer
spends on a player, they will always be limited by the format that is
being
played back.
Hardware
MIDI synths that are capable of decent MIDI file playback
start at around £500 and go up from there. The limitation
with MIDI is always
in the equipment not the format. For details of the MIDI synth I use
see here.
It has a polyphony (number of sounds at once) of 128 voices, simply put the
higher the
polyphony the better the sounds played.
MIDI
is far more technically demanding as well. CDs and mp3
are as simple as inserting disc and pushing play. Mini disk systems are
similar but have the
advantage of being able to select what instruments are heard. You could
if you
wish mute the bass guitar for example. MIDI on the other hand has so
many
variables it’s hard to know where to start. Not only can
individual channels
within MIDI be silenced or run at different volumes but they can be
assigned to
any instrument within the synth that it’s controlling, in the
case of my Sonic
Cell a choice of over 1100 different sounds (not including the 32 different drum kits), all of which are
further
expandable via expansion cards. Each track can be controlled for many
variables
– velocity, expression, volume, pitch, vibrato to name a few of the more
basic ones. All of
this in real time if desired. In other words the quality of sound is
only limited
by imagination and money, not by a restrictive format.
In summary, please let
your ears do the listening not your
pre-conceptions - try me you won't be disappointed, neither will your
crowd.
|