The purpose of this project was to explore a few different algorithms for creating musical or pseudo-musical expressions on both a physical model stk and a sampler. The three different algorithms we used were logistic map, random, and sinusoidal. For the physical model I used Saxofony, a built-in UGen in ChucK. The algorithms were tied to several parameters, namely the pitch, reed stiffness, pressure (volume), and blow position (lip stiffness). In the case of the sampler, the algorithms' output was tied to affect the start position in the sample, and also to control the playback rate. Altering the playback rate has the side effect of changing pitch and timbre, which creates interesting auditory side effects. The audio file I chose to sample was a recording of a man throat-singing in the Tibetan/Mongolian style. I thought this was an interesting choice because the audio is harmonically very rich, which allows for very musical sounding transformations when the algorithms are applied to it.
Structure: The piece has a distinct structure that is supposed to mimic that of Ferretti's "Pipe and Drum". You will notice that the physical model begins the piece with a solo. Then, we hear the sampler for a brief solo. After that, both play essentially concurrently until the end of the piece (there are a few smaller interspersed solos).
The throat-singing audio file was retrieved from freesound.org.