For this week’s reading on Artful Design Ch. 4, “Programmability and Sound Design”, I first want to respond to the design of the THX Deep Note, mentioned on pg. 176-177. I find it incredible, especially given the broad and vague instructions behind its design. It’s also so interesting how distinct that particular sound logo is and how it seems almost universally recognized by people who watch American films. Visual logos become even more memorable when it is accompanied and associated with a particular sound logo, and I’m interested to see more of what the design process behind my favorite sound logos are – when I think of these brands, I can hear the sound in my head: GameCube, McDonald’s, Intel, Nationwide, and the MGM Lion.

I also wanted to respond to the mention of Paul Lansky’s Homebrew on pg. 182. The growth of recording technology and its increasing portability has made it truly possible for the world to be our instrument. We can record on our phones, use digital samplers to take sections of sounds, and apply digital filters to shape them into completely new ones. I took Music 192A (Foundations of Sound-Recording Technology) at CCRMA last year, and it drastically changed my perspective on what I qualified as “music”. Our final project was to create a song, but we were constrained to minimal use of the MIDI, and had to record “instruments” created from every day sounds. I remember using tongue clicks, thumps on wood, crackling cookie containers, and shuffling paper to create some of the sounds in my piece. It made me realize that my view on what qualified as “music” was not only narrow (mainly due to my classical training), but that I was also using the MIDI like a crutch for my music creation process. The assignment was incredibly challenging and uncomfortable, but I learned that truly anything can be or can be shaped into an instrument. The growth of digital tools, filters, and simpler user interfaces has lowered the barrier to entry and made it much easier for more people to simply create. On a last note, reading pg. 182-183 made me think of a scene in the movie August Rush, where a musically gifted orphan runs away on a journey to find his parents through this intangible thread of music that connects them. The scene is known as the “City Symphony”, and as the child wanderers through the New York streets, the chaotic bustle of the city slowly starts to converge into music – similar to how the THX Deep Note begins with chaos and converges into a satisfying resolution. I couldn’t help but think of this particular scene, and I think it visualizes the notion of the world becoming an instrument very well.