Mixing Technology

A lot of the sounds on Tomita's albums are very jarring and shrill. I wonder how much of that was intentional (to create a unique atmosphere) or how much it was due to primitive sound recording technology. What do you think? Think, for example, of how wonderfully smooth sounding are the analog synths on say Jarre's Oxygene (1976) compared to Tomita's work from the same time period.
Mr. "Sound Creature" created unique sound landscapes, and the way he mixed his stuff, and the sounds he created, often seem to me to reflect his being "Eastern" somehow...that makes it seem intentional. Yet, once he went digital in the early 80s, he went for as smooth a sound as did every other keyboard artist...so perhaps all that shrillness wasn't intentional afterall, but just was the result of his not-entirely-complete mastery of sound mixing during the 70s? What do you think?

 

I don't agree. I think he's reflecting the kinds of contrasts you hear in Classical music in the latter part of the 19th Century on and in much soundtrack work, expecially in hi-fi. By no means all of it is sort of smooth and upbeat in the manner that Jarre used to do so well. I would say that "Bermuda Triangle" is quite aggressive in parts and I guess one could go on for a long time comparing what I think the original classical pieces intended versus how Tomita interpreted them. Sometimes he had the same intent as the original composers, sometimes he repurposed pieces to various extents to fit into his broader vision. From the viewpoint of the unintended - there's also some distortion on "Snowflakes" and a lesser amount on "Firebird" - now that wasn't intentional.

As for electronic sounds and middle of the road EM composers (what I mean is not outright avant garde experimental or industrial) just compare Tomita to just about analog works by Synergy or more aggressive Kitaro numbers (say "From the Full Moon Story") - Now Jarre I feel comes very much from perfecting more pop oriented ideas that were more or less originated by Perrey and Kingsley in the 1960s. I do see Jarre as intending to be more radio friendly and easily adapted live (his material in those days was some of the most creative and skilled out there - I don't want it to seem like I'm putting him down because of course there wasn't a lot else like him- something that does make him special.) You can get into experimental composers from the era too - some are way more intense and then I guess by the late 70s you even had industrial, especially on into the 80s.

I guess his particular sense of light humor might be "Eastern" but I'm not so sure about what else. I guess Yellow Magic Orchestra were far more "Eastern" but that was because of their even more sly humor of making one of their founding concepts that playing up Westerner's stereotypes- in other words Japanese Pop music didn't sound like YMO. They came up with a sound concept that involved Western people's ideas on how "oriental" music sound like combined with the technological sounds of video games and Kraftwerk.

My theory on Tomita's later albums was at the time it was something of a novelty to use those almost real digital sounds - but they were by nature more tame and canned than a big orchestra. So what happened in years since is that as technology went into cheap synthesizers and you've heard more and more of those semi-pro guys doing hours of ROM wave vaguely classical meets EM compositions with MIDI sequencers. You don't have any people with Tomita's mastery of old analog gear- so everyone is far further away on those earlier works. Now that I think about it, those later works people do with MIDI are also much less re-arranged. How Tomita takes apart and build up his interpretations is something you don't get by just working off some sheet music and a sequencer program like today's category of EM semi-pros who compose with notation rather than improvise ... though some of this doesn't really apply to Jarre, who's arrangements are less based on classical technique and arranged for synths... though thinking about Jarre, I guess some of his more lackluster works are arranged for more generic orchestra.

 

That's an interesting reply, Nicholas. Thanks. The reason why Tomita's work sounds Eastern to my "general listeners" ears (there is no great reason!) is the type of instrumentation he used. Often he creates instrumental sounds that are say something between a harpischord and a sitar, and there seems to be a lot of emphasis on having notes (even the shrill, pinpoint type ones) that reverberate something like an eastern music drone. Something like Round of the Princesses comes to mind as having a real strong eastern flavour to his instrumentation. Also when he uses waves of electronic sound as a background to a piece (like the sound of a sea or something), rather than creating a musaky, "new age", pop nuance, it creates something like the emotional effect eastern music can have on my ears; where a drone type sound seems to be as integral to the music as the melody, in the process making the music seem to belong to a whole different aural space...or something. I know that's not a very good reply! But Tomita's music puts these feelings/thoughts in my mind anyway! Whatever the case, I think Tomita's music acquires it unique, strange effect not because it is "space age" music with silly alien sounds or because he is reinterpreting classical works, but because he kinda "paints a picture of sound" with electronic instruments in the way perhaps someone only from his part of the world might think of doing. The Japanese art on some of the reissue sleeves seems appropriate somehow, although I admit to being rather ignorant of Japanese culture! I think he said in an interview on this site that he was attracted to, and felt could do good versions of, those classical composers that drew from eastern influences, like Debussy...that could be a link too. As for the whole interpretation thing, I think that, generally speaking, Tomita could probably do his greatest work on classical compositions that were originally piano compositions...they are keyboard works, basically...and when he tried to do a massive symphonic piece, like Firebird or Planets, in comparison, his interpretations were usually less satisfactory. There are exceptions, of course, but its not surprising to me that that kind of pattern is there (or seems to be there, to my ears)

 

I'd say Tomita can and does his best work on music that's open to being orchestrated differently. I see your point that with piano work, since it's not ochestrated can open itself to creative reinterpretation. But that's not generally true of piano works in general. The majority of piano works don't have much going that lends itself to orchestration, the big exception is Debussy and as one can see he was being orchestrated by others quite regularly over 100 years ago. What's going on in Debussy is he has several melodic lines going on their own. And it kind of follows that I think "Snowflakes" is his only album of all piano works. I think most of what's on Bach Fantasy is re-orchestrated chamber music.

I mean it is a bit of a catch 22. If the composer's orchestration is really definitive then everyone involved questions why change it. If the orchestration was originally bad then how in the world would it ever be recognized as excellent music. (Though I brought up the situation with Mussorgsky some months back). I believe Tomita's general answer to how he chooses the pieces is they simply lend themselves well to being performed on synthesizers, theo offer opportunities to work with many sonic colors. That's probably a much more important criteria though somewhat connected if you think about it than what instruments the piece originally used.

As to drones - which I wouldn't really characterize as part of Japanese music - I get the feeling Tomita is more interested in long reverberation, it's something you do kind of get addicted to if you have good artificial reverb, you like the spacey things sound. I'm not sure but it might just coincidentally be connected with his use of sitar - which I think generally is quite justified when it appears in Tomita's music - it's being used for an exotic unusual effect where it's appropriate.

 

Interesting thread!

I think another reason for the differences in Tomita's recordings (compared to JMJ) is the fact that he was using modular synthesizers predominantly. IMO, modular synths invite sonic experimentation, and the result of that tends to be sounds that are more "out there".

On another note - I love Tomita's use of sitar. I wouldn't normally think of modular synths and a sitar being used together in the same piece of music, but I guess that's why we enjoy Tomita's music so much. The man is a genius!

 

Well actually Jarre's main early synths were semi-modular - namely the Arp 2600 and several similar EMS models... and he got a Moog Modular when he was even more successful but never used it a whole lot as he was captivated by the Fairlight too.

Also listen to Jarre before "Oxygene" - that material isn't as smooth as his post "Oxygene" work so clearly he's working in an intentional pop-instrumental style with much less dramatic contrast and range than Tomita's alternate take on Classical.

 

True that. I was mainly thinking along the lines of Oxygene and the types of patches used throughout - heavy string synth sounds, and standard VCO/VCF/VCA synth patches for solos/melodies. That, in contrast to Tomita's almost 100% Moog and Roland modulars adds to the sonic differences, IMO (although probably less than the reasons you stated previously).

Actually, here's an interesting thought. I wonder what their music would have sounded like if Tomita and JMJ would have recorded with each other's synths/studios back then.

 

Yes it would.

Though I guess maybe later in the early/mid 80s (say "Rendevous") with the Fairlight with chip based polysynth pads and then circa "Bach Fantasy" and the "Oxygene 8-13" with the early virtual analogs and retro sounds - they did come kind of close to having the generally the same gear.

for something on Jarre's synths choose "Current edition" -> "tech talk"
here:
http://www.electronicshadows.com/

in the archives there's also a "tech talk" article on "Vangelis" that's imho a little better.