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brettworks

thinking through music


  • September 8, 2023

    Brett’s Sound Picks: Arovane’s “rotor” (2023)

    2023 playlist Continue reading

    Brett’s Sound Picks
  • September 7, 2023

    Database: John Cale On Breaking Points

    “You have to understand that the breaking point of some of the equipment, and the breaking point of some of the ideas, they are very close to each other.” John Cale database. Continue reading

    database
  • September 6, 2023

    Art About Music: Jan van Heemessen’s “Young Girl At A Spinet” (1530)

    Continue reading

    Brett’s Sound Picks
  • September 4, 2023

    Keywords: Amplify

    To amplify is to turn a quiet sound into a louder sound, making the small gargantuan, putting sound details under an audio microscope to hear them better. Amplify is boosted signal and boosted signal is now up close, foregrounded, the center of your attention. When we amplify a sound we solo its details, boost its Continue reading

    keywords
  • August 31, 2023

    Piano Meditation 9

    Continue reading

    Uncategorized
    piano
  • August 30, 2023

    Art About Music: Jan Saenredam’s “Sense of Hearing” (c. 1575-1657)

    “Do not open your ears to the flattering sirens, that with sweet songs they hurt with charm.” Continue reading

    art about music
  • August 29, 2023

    Database: Skee Mask On Not Just Reveling In The Sound and Not Understanding Devices Completely

    “I try to make everything myself. Even when I just sample, I really try to program with the sample so that I’m not just reveling in the sound of the sample so that it doesn’t sound at all the way that it did before rhythmically. I try to somehow breathe new life into it from Continue reading

    database
  • August 28, 2023

    Keywords: Dub

    Dub is the echo traces of a sound that just happened, a response following its call, extending the traces as they float on rhythm trajectories. Sound engineers in Jamaica (King Tubby, Lee Perry) were the first to hear dub’s potential, building gear to harness it, hearing the negative space opened up when you mute one Continue reading

    groovology, keywords
  • August 25, 2023

    Drone Etude

    Spotify and Apple Music Continue reading

    drone
  • August 24, 2023

    Keywords: Alive At Many Levels At Once

    Making music alive on many levels at once is the point of both producing music and a necessary tool for suspending the listener’a disbelief in music’s fiction. Music alive on many levels at once hinges on presence, variation, interaction, responsiveness, suggestion, hidden depths, and arranging multiple elements to function as a whole in easy synergy. Continue reading

    keywords
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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: Dave Stewart On Stereo Picture, Frequency Differences, And Demos
  • Brett’s Sound Picks: Musicentrydelete’s “Depth” (2025)
  • When Less Leads To More
  • Omni 98 bpm
  • Drumming Diaries: Grip

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