Someone suggested that Suss Müsik repost our contributions to the weekly Disquiet Junto projects, because they enjoy reading the explanations of the tracks. While you’re reading the original post, make sure you check out the other contributors’ works as well.
“Someone who doesn’t speak for a day has no idea what it’s like to not speak at all,” wrote the late film critic Roger Ebert, who spent the last seven years of his life speaking through a computer after thyroid cancer necessitated the removal of his lower jaw. He communicated verbally using Alex, the same text-to-speech (TTS) voice system that powers Apple’s VoiceOver engine for people who cannot see.
Mr Ebert bemoaned the lack of realism of computer-synthesized voices, describing how the comparisons between human speech and TTS were “relative, not absolute.” Communication isn’t simply about words, he explained; we also derive meaning from inflection, delivery, timing and tone.
For this short piece, Suss Müsik explored the relative (but not absolute) musical parameters of Apple VoiceOver. We recorded four quotes and identified one rhythmic phrase from each, which were then assembled to create a new sentence. The foundation of the piece is the combination of breaths, hiccups and nonverbal noises that accompany everyday human speech. Treated piano and metallic percussion were overdubbed.
The piece is titled Singularity in homage of Ray Kurzweil, who among other achievements is credited with inventing the first TTS synthesizer. The image is the Braille alphabet.
The quotes used in the piece are as follows:
“Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them… well, I have others.” ~ Groucho Marx
“Life is too short to work on inconsequential problems.” ~ C.K. Prahalad
“Somebody asked me, ‘If you had to give advice to a young actor, what would it be?’ I never even knew I was thinking this, but I said, ‘Always, even in a limo, wear your seat belt.’ To me, that’s good advice.” ~ Christopher Walken
“I’m seven people away from myself at the moment, but getting closer all the time.” ~ Don Van Vliet, aka Captain Beefheart