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> An iPad will never replicate the beauty of a human playing a piano or a violin. I mean, one of its primary uses is to replicate the beauty of a human playing

> An iPad will never replicate the beauty of a human playing a piano or a violin. I mean, one of its primary uses is to replicate the beauty of a human playing piano or violin via videos and recordings. Aside from that, isn’t this just an appeal to tradition? An iPad is a tool just like a piano or the violin, people make beautiful music with them all the time. I am sure there were curmudgeons saying that the piano and violin would never replicate the beauty of the human voice when they were the top technology of the day.

eweise 2y ago
They might make beautiful music but not beautiful piano music. The piano must exist in order to be recorded into the ipad, and recording isn't unique to ipads. You could play the piano samples via midi from the ipad but hundreds of other devices can also do that and that still wouldn't replicate from the player's perspective, actually playing a piano or and audiences experience of actually hearing a piano.
graypegg 2y ago
I don't personally play an instrument, but I can also understand that the physicality of keys, strings and pedals is innately different from tapping on a glass screen. A digital piano aims to replicate the sound a specific piano, and provide a piano-inspired interface for playing it. A real piano is a big single use device, in theory yeah, but I imagine for the people playing it the direct control over the things making the sound that is irreplaceable. There's things that will always be impossible on a VST instrument because it's construction (Prepared Piano [0]), and vice versa [1]. They seem like two different avenues of artistic expression to me. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepared_piano https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepared_piano [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthesizer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthesizer
- wilsonnb3 2y ago
  > They seem like two different avenues of artistic expression to me I agree completely, this is the point I was trying to make. People are treating the iPad and the piano as fundamentally different despite both being tools that are equally as capable of making beautiful music in the hands of a talented musician in my eyes.
fnordpiglet 2y ago
It’s for this reason I have a minstrel that follows me everywhere. There’s really no substitute for the original analog sound - it’s warmness and the subtle imperfections of the original - can’t be substituted with a consumer device manufactured by a soulless megacorp. It does become problematic on flights as the imperialist cryptofascist lackies of capitalism require my minstrel buy a full ticket and doesn’t let her play my tunes on the flight. People at work get pretty irritated and complain about flow and focus and whatnot and keep insisting I submit to the consumerist mediocrity of a sound cancelling headphone - and I’ve tried in honesty to build a portable sound proof booth with an ear trumpet attached but it’s kind of bulky and I’m not really that handy with tools to begin with. It was also really hard to get a badge for the minstrel but eventually HR just gave me a neurodiversity exemption and classified her as a support animal, which in my opinion is kind of sexist but there’s only so many things one can get outraged about. The real issue is that a single instrument is kind of insufficient to fully capture a wider range of sound and experience so I’ve been trying to figure out how to pull off a quartet - really some of the best music is done by a four piece band anyway - but the above problems just seem to get worse but I’m sure I’ll figure out how to scale this solution.
- teddyh 2y ago
  Minstrels are also useful in the event you travel through the frozen land of Nador.
- mncharity 2y ago
  Minstrel "music" is perhaps problematic itself. On the one hand, you have music as an emergent property of the gathered individuals' culture and skills. That blurs when a tavern sings to a traveling minstrel rather than a neighbor. But professionals can enhance rather than displace. Consider European acting troupes traveling a US West steeped in discussion of Shakespeare. Or printed "poems" to be spread and read in support of real spoken poetry. And minstrels do collaborate with local players... but they can also displace. Something is lost to a community when the local kid or elder can no longer make a bit of money piping in the harvest. Or neighbors play the gather fiddles. When music becomes for a community a spectator sport, rather than something embedded. A train car singing together, versus an occasional platform busker. Like trust-fund kids who see strength of knowledge and skills as something to buy not build in themselves. Or a merchant who doesn't value strength of body for farming. And then there's the my-tower-is-taller-than-yours of court "professional music". With richly textured diversity, complexity, nuance, and surprise consequences, these can be hard to think and discuss clearly. Like struggling now to appreciate the impoverished isolation of people's un-musical experience of tunes before AR's ambient-rendezvous-and-collaborate jamming apps.
coldtea 2y ago
>Aside from that, isn’t this just an appeal to tradition? No. It's an appeal to something that is eternally true.
JohnFen 2y ago
> I mean, one of its primary uses is to replicate the beauty of a human playing piano or violin via videos and recordings. Videos and recordings don't actually replicate those things. They approximate them. Recordings leave out tons of really important expression.

eweise 2y ago

They might make beautiful music but not beautiful piano music. The piano must exist in order to be recorded into the ipad, and recording isn't unique to ipads. You could play the piano samples via midi from the ipad but hundreds of other devices can also do that and that still wouldn't replicate from the player's perspective, actually playing a piano or and audiences experience of actually hearing a piano.

graypegg 2y ago

I don't personally play an instrument, but I can also understand that the physicality of keys, strings and pedals is innately different from tapping on a glass screen. A digital piano aims to replicate the sound a specific piano, and provide a piano-inspired interface for playing it. A real piano is a big single use device, in theory yeah, but I imagine for the people playing it the direct control over the things making the sound that is irreplaceable. There's things that will always be impossible on a VST instrument because it's construction (Prepared Piano [0]), and vice versa [1]. They seem like two different avenues of artistic expression to me. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepared_piano https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prepared_piano [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthesizer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthesizer

wilsonnb3 2y ago
> They seem like two different avenues of artistic expression to me I agree completely, this is the point I was trying to make. People are treating the iPad and the piano as fundamentally different despite both being tools that are equally as capable of making beautiful music in the hands of a talented musician in my eyes.

fnordpiglet 2y ago

It’s for this reason I have a minstrel that follows me everywhere. There’s really no substitute for the original analog sound - it’s warmness and the subtle imperfections of the original - can’t be substituted with a consumer device manufactured by a soulless megacorp. It does become problematic on flights as the imperialist cryptofascist lackies of capitalism require my minstrel buy a full ticket and doesn’t let her play my tunes on the flight. People at work get pretty irritated and complain about flow and focus and whatnot and keep insisting I submit to the consumerist mediocrity of a sound cancelling headphone - and I’ve tried in honesty to build a portable sound proof booth with an ear trumpet attached but it’s kind of bulky and I’m not really that handy with tools to begin with. It was also really hard to get a badge for the minstrel but eventually HR just gave me a neurodiversity exemption and classified her as a support animal, which in my opinion is kind of sexist but there’s only so many things one can get outraged about. The real issue is that a single instrument is kind of insufficient to fully capture a wider range of sound and experience so I’ve been trying to figure out how to pull off a quartet - really some of the best music is done by a four piece band anyway - but the above problems just seem to get worse but I’m sure I’ll figure out how to scale this solution.

teddyh 2y ago
Minstrels are also useful in the event you travel through the frozen land of Nador.
mncharity 2y ago
Minstrel "music" is perhaps problematic itself. On the one hand, you have music as an emergent property of the gathered individuals' culture and skills. That blurs when a tavern sings to a traveling minstrel rather than a neighbor. But professionals can enhance rather than displace. Consider European acting troupes traveling a US West steeped in discussion of Shakespeare. Or printed "poems" to be spread and read in support of real spoken poetry. And minstrels do collaborate with local players... but they can also displace. Something is lost to a community when the local kid or elder can no longer make a bit of money piping in the harvest. Or neighbors play the gather fiddles. When music becomes for a community a spectator sport, rather than something embedded. A train car singing together, versus an occasional platform busker. Like trust-fund kids who see strength of knowledge and skills as something to buy not build in themselves. Or a merchant who doesn't value strength of body for farming. And then there's the my-tower-is-taller-than-yours of court "professional music". With richly textured diversity, complexity, nuance, and surprise consequences, these can be hard to think and discuss clearly. Like struggling now to appreciate the impoverished isolation of people's un-musical experience of tunes before AR's ambient-rendezvous-and-collaborate jamming apps.

coldtea 2y ago

>Aside from that, isn’t this just an appeal to tradition? No. It's an appeal to something that is eternally true.

JohnFen 2y ago

> I mean, one of its primary uses is to replicate the beauty of a human playing piano or violin via videos and recordings. Videos and recordings don't actually replicate those things. They approximate them. Recordings leave out tons of really important expression.