Why Aren't Electronics Incorporated Into Orchestration Lessons?

It has just always seemed strange to me...With the amount of study that has gone into writing books on orchestration, to the attention to detail in writing with it in mind...The subtle (arguable) changes in the registers of each instrument. Why is the electronic manipulation of soundwaves not more encouraged, or required in this age? Sure, you could double major, I suppose...nobody is stopping you, but it doesn't seem encouraged to me...or is it?

There are ways to create sound from scratch, not using anybody's plugins, but creating your own. Or, sure, use someone's plugins, and disregard any presets, and create your own...either way, your color pallete has grown tremendously. Much, much more, than knowing all the registers, and combinations of all standard acoustical instruments. The issue of blending isn't -really- and issue. It's not like it can't be perfomed, in real-time either. If the score indicated a waveform, with it's settings, and notations regarding the many possible manipulations that will occur...then it seems fine to me.

Obviously, I'm not bringing anything to light here...just wondering people's opinions on the matter. Why isn't it more incorporated?

I completely agree. I use several synthetic VSTi's when creating my music, such as 3xOsc and Sytrus. I am completely self-taught in terms of manipulating these, but I would have appreciated it if I had have been able to learn from somebody else... It seems as there is almost no education in this area of composition available.

...that's what this topic is about, right? Not sure if I completely understood your point :unsure:

Right - here are a couple, useful articles, at least :

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/allsynthsecrets.htm

http://www.residentadvisor.net/feature.aspx?1351

But, yeah...my question still stands :hmmm:

Orchestration is the business of writing for an ensemble of acoustic instruments. It is thus perfectly apparent why writing purely electronic music is not considered a part of this discipline. The techniques of composing with this medium are very different to those of acoustic composition and require different approaches to handle the resources available. Thus, one should not expect to find detailed information in an orchestral textbook, nor expect to study it to any great extent in an acoustic composition class.

That said, I am unsure as to why you seem to encounter a lack of study material. There are plenty of texts and other media instructing in the use of electronics, many to support the various sequencing programs available, whilst academic institutions are likely to have an individual composing in this medium on their staff (at least in Europe, and I suspect in North America too) and teaching the relevant skills. In any case, many modern orchestration texts do have sections on the use of samplers, backing tapes and electronic effects, due to the increasing incorporation of these as additions to the symphony orchestra.

Well in reality the point of trying to teach instrumentation and arrangement is so that you can learn how to manage your resources, not so you can learn B or A doctrine in particular. A good arrangement/instrumentation class is also tremendously helpful when you're dealing with electronic music, since it's less about the instruments and more about the arrangement and management.

In other words, the meaningful part of any orchestration/instrumentation/arrangement course is to be able to carry the same musical ideas through different practical implementations. In the same way Tomita or Wendy Carlos made electronic versions of acoustic pieces, you can apply the core knowledge much further than just writing for orchestra or whatever acoustic ensemble.

But yeah finding a good teacher that actually mentions this fact is not that easy it seems.

Yeah, what they said.

For those wanting to go more into it, I strongly urge you to check out LSU. Stephen Beck, who is Associate Dean, runs the EM courses. He's phenomenal!

At the conservatory in Copenhagen there's a separate class for electro-acoustics.