When bands want to use pre-recorded samples in their live performances, they lose their freedom to change the tempo of their songs since the samples would than be out of synch. Dr Andrew Robertson from Queen Mary University developed a software that provides a solution for this problem.
Transcript:
Ann-Kathrin Lindemann: In the run up to festival season, bands are looking for the best technology to enhance their live performances. Dr Andrew Robertson is someone they should keep in mind. He is the mastermind behind the B-Keeper software, which allows electronic recordings to keep up with live changing drumbeats. His latest development is now being picked up by Ableton, a music software manufacturer, whose products are used by leading DJs and professional musicians.
Dr Andrew Robertson: B-Keeper is a piece of software that synchronises an audio sequencer with the drummer and it controls the tempo so that these backing tracks move with the drummer. So his movement is followed by this software.
AL: This works by controlling the speed from the bass drum and the snare. The software accounts for a window of error so minor changes are picked up quickly. The beat that is closest to what is thought to be correct is adopted by the system. Accordingly, the other sounds hooked up to the software also change their speed. At the beginning of the project, it was quite slow in picking up changes in tempo, but Dr Robertson improved the software, and reduced the lag time significantly.
AR: There is a lag I would say of a couple of beats now. It’s pretty quick. If the change is very small, then it is almost immediate and so you’ve got this constant, subconscious-like adaptation taking place. But there are limits to the tempo that it can handle, the kind of change. If you suddenly change tempo, then there is no real way for it to know that without making it, I think, unstable.
AL: Modern music is almost always recorded to a click track, so at the moment, there may not appear to be much need for the B-Keeper. However, for older musicians and live performances, this technology could become an interesting tool.
AR: The sort of older music, like the Stones and stuff, was very much not done in that way. So I think it’s more leaning towards having some kind of looseness, a bit of feel or fluidity, and yet still having some quite cool sounds that you can get with some of the synths.
Particularly its focus is on live stuff. That’s where it fits in as part of this picture of synchronising computers to live music without compromising.
AL: It is possible not only to connect synthesisers with the software, but even robotic instruments. Dr. Robertson and his colleague Dave Meakin tried this with a computer-operated Glockenspiel.
AR: We did some work with the robot, this Glockenspiel, to show really how it actually is working; it can control this robot to play in time. So really it’s about then slotting something in to say “Ah, this is the use I want to put it towards.”
AL: Robotics, recordings, live performances: What else does the future hold for B-Keeper and other music technology?
AR: I think that we are heading towards a kind of, like almost intelligent visual, audio-visual system. Commercially, I would make that lighting more intelligent so that it kind of integrates just more pleasingly and easily with the band. It’s not just this system that could be used to do that kind of thing. I think for the B-Keeper itself, I think it is really about taking some of electronic music and some of the more electro and synthesised, you know, studio-based stuff and say “I can put that into a live band, and yeah, I can still the Rock’n Roll of just people plugging in and playing.“
Image courtesy of LiquidMolly
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