Help with Music Technology Degree

[stevel]

Friends,

I am in the process of creating a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Music Technology for our university.

we have a general education background, a core music background that includes Theory, Sight-Singing/Ear-Training, History, Keyboard skills, Applied lessons, and Ensemble requirements. We also require an Internship, Sophomore and Senior projects, and Recital Attendance.

The Technology part is going to focus on Music Technology - MIDI, Electronic/Computer Music, Mixing/Editing/Production, Acoustics, etc.

Beyond that, if you were to pursue such a degree (or have taken or taught such a degree) what types of courses or content areas (in Music, Music Technology, or Technology fields) would like to see (or did see) included?

Thanks for your help.

Steve

[Thorolf]

One thing springs to mind: Mastering.

This is a very discrete art, that makes or breaks musical productions all the time. It’s also very interwoven with mixing, and with some experience, you can make more informed choices about what you have to do in the mix, and what can and should be left for the general mastering to fix.



Regards

[gravehill]

I would advise against the mastering part. One thing is that usually you're not supposed to leave ANYTHING to be "fixed in the mastering" but instead try to get the mix as close to the final sound as you humanly can. The mastering engineers problem is then to make all the tracks sound like a) they belong together in terms of both volume and frequency content and b) make sure that the overall sound is balanced, loud and sounds the same regardless of the gear used to listen to it. To achieve this, most mastering engineers have INSANELY expensive equipment and room that's treated acoustically to top notch condition. Not many schools can afford that. Add to this usually dozens of years of experience in the process. I don't think anyone ever became a mastering engineer straight out from school. In the mixing part it is a good idea to go through the home mastering process involving just the basics like eq and volume matching and loudness boosting, IMHO, just don't tell them they're ready to do some professional mastering now.

[Thorolf]

Your general concerns are right, of course: Including “Mastering” in a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Music Technology, won’t produce mastering engineers. But concerning digital recordings of acoustic perfomances, understanding what is corrected in the mastering is vital for a successful mix. More than once, I have experienced that some oddity, especially too little audible reverb, fixes itself in a mastering process including band compression. So, if what you want is a natural pure sound without swimming reverb, you might just content yourself with “too little” reverb in the mixdown, and rely on the band compression to *both* put the instruments forward, *and* opening some naturally warm reverb, less audible in the outset.

You are also right that cutting edge mastering tools are insanely expensive, but my thought was to opt for just decent equipment, not Universal Studio standards… Many of the main points can be taught using just decent equipment, and if this university is offering this course, they surely would know that you need some money for equipment if you’re going to teach technology.



Regards

[chckn8r]

First off - Steve, kudos for even looking into this! We had a couple of "rogue" profs that put together fledgling electronic composition and MIDI for music education courses back in the day. They were considered more of a novelty than "real" courses by the "higher ups" at the school...

I guess my first question to you is: What is the goal of this degree? What do you expect students to get out of it? Will they be audio engineers, educators, composers, producers, technicians or a whole mix of things - in essence, at the end of it, what doors will this piece o' paper open for them?

As I know you're aware, "Music Technology" is a broad and deep subject and I'd think you'd want to focus on one or two key aspects of the matter to make the degree useful.

Cheers, D

[VicDiesel]

Originally Posted by stevel

The Technology part is going to focus on Music Technology - MIDI, Electronic/Computer Music, Mixing/Editing/Production, Acoustics, etc.

In depth discussion of synthesis types. Subtractive, additive, phase modulation, FM, granular, physical modeling, scanning, ....

Give them Csound or MAX/MSP and have them assemble the different types of synthesizers. That should make it academically valid.

Victor.

[gravehill]

+1.

Being able to go beyond the preset sounds in any synth is in my opinion the key element in defining your individual sound, especially when on one hand EVERYONE is fiddling with synths at home nowadays and on the other hand you hear all the time more and more electronic elements in genres that once used to be purely acoustic. It gets more important all the time plus many students will probably have a grasp of the basics already.

One good starting point for creating such a course would be the Sound on Sound Synth Secrets series.

[Thorolf]

+2.

One should add that reverbs, effects and delays are instruments in their own right that should be approached in the same manner.

Knowing the basics of DJ-ing/cueing/beat mixing will always be an asset too.

Regards

[chckn8r]

+3

These are all great ideas for tech subjects, and I'd love to have taken them all "back in the day", but I think there needs to be an end-goal defined for the course before going too far?

Is this going to be for budding composers, technicians, audio engineers, what?

I'm sure if Steve and his colleagues are selling this to the faculty, they'll need some sort of identified target market and "big picture" on how all these courses are going to fit in and support that end goal...

Cheers, D