Skip to content
    • about
    • ai in music resources
    • archives
    • art about music
    • atelier
    • books
    • brett’s sound picks
    • database (a cache of perceptions)
    • film
    • interview
    • keywords
    • music
    • thought tools
    • ventrilo-dialogues

brettworks

thinking through music


  • July 12, 2018

    Resonant Thoughts: Jacques Attali’s “Noise” (1977)

    “In music, the instrument often predates the expression it authorizes…it contributes, through the possibilities it offers, to the birth of a new music, a renewed syntax.” -Jacques Attali, Noise, p. 35. Continue reading

    musical instruments, Uncategorized
  • July 11, 2018

    Brett’s Sound Picks: Abul Mogard’s “Quiet Dreams” (2018)

    Continue reading

    Brett’s Sound Picks, Uncategorized
  • July 10, 2018

    Art About Music: Harry Partch’s “Gourd Tree” (1964)

    Continue reading

    art about music, Uncategorized
  • July 9, 2018

    Music Production: Working With Effects

    At some stage in the music production process, I work with audio effects. These effects are known as software “plug-ins” that load inside of my DAW software. An effect can be as simple as an EQ or a reverb, or it can be a more complex type of sound mangler that alters a sound through… Continue reading

    music production, Uncategorized
  • July 7, 2018

    Resonant Thoughts: Richard E. Nisbett’s “Mindware” (2016)

    “The most important thing I have to tell you—in this whole book—is that you should never fail to take advantage of the free labor of the unconscious mind.” Richard Nisbett, Mindware (2016) Continue reading

    mindware, Resonant Thoughts, thought tools, Uncategorized
  • July 5, 2018

    Music As Labor

    I hear music as labor now— which struck me when I was standing in line at Whole Foods the air conditioning wasn’t working and staff were complaining while stocking shelves it’s hot up here and I noticed the blues playing on the sound system the guitar solo that couldn’t end the drums slap-shuffling the baseline dutifully… Continue reading

    poetry, Uncategorized
  • July 3, 2018

    Art About Music: Frans Francken II’s “An Allegory Of Death And The Rich Man” (1581-1642)

    Continue reading

    art about music, Uncategorized
  • July 2, 2018

    Attention Over Time: Slow Noticing

    “A ‘bit’ of information is definable as a difference which makes a difference. Such a difference, as it travels and undergoes successive transformations in a circuit, is an elementary idea.” -Gregory  Bateson, Steps To An Ecology Of Mind (1972), p. 315 When I’m working on music I often wonder whether I could work faster, but… Continue reading

    attention, Uncategorized
  • June 29, 2018

    Four Chords, One Photo (2018)

    Continue reading

    altered states, documentaries, drone, sound art, Uncategorized
  • June 28, 2018

    Resonant Thoughts: Richard Sennett’s “The Craftsman” (2009)

    “As a performer, at my fingertips I experience error—error that I will seek to correct. I have a standard for what should be, but my truthfulness resides in the simple recognition that I make mistakes…I have to be willing to commit error, to play wrong notes, in order eventually to get them right.” “If the… Continue reading

    minimum force, musical touch and feel, Resonant Thoughts, Uncategorized
«Previous Page Next Page»

Thomas Brett is a musician and writer who holds a PhD in ethnomusicology from New York University. He is the author of Principles of Electronic Music Production and The Creative Electronic Music Producer, a book described by Sound On Sound magazine as “a deep philosophical analysis of the various creative inspirations, ideas and processes involved in producing electronic music.” His essays have appeared in the journals Popular Music and Popular Music and Society, as well as edited collections by Routledge, Oxford, and Cambridge University presses. Thomas has played percussion on Broadway since 1997 and writes about music at brettworks.com.

Recent Posts

  • Database: Clark on Zero Expectations and the Actual Idea
  • Fine-Tuning
  • Suspiramus
  • Database: Burial on the Impression of the Drums
  • My Favorite Things: Running Gear

Subscribe To Brettworks


©

brettworks

2022, All Rights Reserved.

Blog at WordPress.com.

Loading Comments...

You must be logged in to post a comment.

  • Subscribe Subscribed
    brettworks
    Join 780 other subscribers

    Have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.

  • brettworks
    View site in Reader
    Manage subscriptionsSign upLog in
    Report this content
    Collapse this bar