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The ECVST Dictionnary is a digest of the knowledge dispensed on the Espace Cubase Mailing Lists. These definitions are given by the subscribers wheither to answer a question or spontaneously. But you can bring your contribution too, by posting a definition or giving a different version of an existing definition. To do this, click here...


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LEXICON

Lettre M Lettre N Lettre O Lettre P Lettre Q Lettre R Lettre S


MASTER : it designs two different things. On a mixing board, the master corresponds to the main section, i.e. the stereo out bus. And in a wider sense, it is also the corresponding fader. In the process of recording a CD, the master is the definitive recording of the project, which will be burn on a CD. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : MASTER"> Ceedjay

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MASTERING : Operation which consists in reducing a multi-tracks version mix to a stereo version. Next, it becomes definitive by applying equalization, and dynamic process (compressor, limiter...) to give it more punch. This operation is a crucial step in the making of a song. Mastering is even considered as art. Indeed, a mix can be destroyed by a bad mastering (too much compression for instance. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : MASTERING"> Ceedjay

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MIDI : Musical Instrument Digital Interface. This interface has been made by Dave Smith, helped by Chet Wood, who were both working for Sequential Circuit.It is in fact an evolution of the Universal Synthesizer Interface (U.S.I.), also conceived by Dave Smith which built the first bases of the MIDI norm. The information from the outside are received by the MIDI INplug, and sent by the MIDI OUT plug. The MIDI thru plug restricts itself to sending back everything which arrives through the MIDI IN plug. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : MIDI"> Denis VASSALLUC

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MIXING : Essential operation in the making of a song. It consists in harmniously and artisticallay mixing the recorded audio signals, by modifying parameters such as level, pan, effects or timbre (with equalization) ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : MIXAGE"> Ceedjay

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MONITORING : It is an out on a mixing board, before the faders (and the effects). It is also called pre fader auxiliary. The sound which is entering a track can go out without being affected by the other elements which are sent to the main section. For example, the sound of a guitar enters the mixing board and goes out with reverb and eq through the main section. The Monitor signal corresponds to the sound of the guitar as it is when it enters the mixing board. We can do many things from that: taking the monitor signal in a second mixing board on the scene, another mix can be done for the stage monitors for example. In studio, the monitor out will be linked to headphones for a musician who is recording in overdub. It is, in a way, as the bypass of a multi-effect. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : MONITORING"> Ceedjay

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MP3 : Compressed audio file format, which offers a correct compression / quality ratio (near CD for a compression ratio of 12:1). The process uses audio signal redundancy and the frequencies coverings to put off data. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : MP3"> Ceedjay

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MUTE : It is a button on the mixing board thanks to which the signal sent to the main section and the auxiliary circuits (effects...) is cut. We can automate this button (on automated mixing board and sequencers' virtual mixers) to turn on or off tracks in a mixing, in an artistic way. This button also allows to lower the general noise level by turning off the unused tracks on an analog mixer. In short, we can do many things! ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : MUTE"> Ceedjay

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N/A : Abbreviation of Numerical Analog. It concerns every conversion from a numerical sound to an analog one. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : N/A"> Ceedjay

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NON DESTRUCTIVE : Said of every process which is undoable. For example, we are talking of non destructive audionumerical edition when the treatments apllied can be cancel as soon as the file has not been saved. As far as Direct-To-Disk is concerned, we are talking of non-destructve when the data which are recorded do not replace the existing ones. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : NON DESTRUCTIF"> Ceedjay

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NUMERICAL : Said of an analog sound in computer language (0 and 1) after numerisation. The big difference compared to analog sound is that the possible values to represent it are not infinite, but fixed. During the numerisation, the converter takes "photos" of the sound, to fixed and close intervals. The qulity depends on two factors: the sample rate, which corresponds to the number of photos taken every second, and the resolution, which corresponds to the possible sharpness to reproduce each photo. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : NUMERICAL"> Ceedjay



PAN : On a mixing board, this little button allows to "place" the sound of a track more or less to the left or right of the stereo image. It is essential during the mixing. This term also designs the action of slowly moving the sound from one side of the stereo field to the other (like a travelling in the cinema). ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : PAN">Ceedjay

PHRASING : Warning, this is a personal definition! :)))). So the phrasing is when we begi to understand that music is a language (it took me 20 years :))) but I'm a bit stupid: ;)) So when we have heard enough and we understand what people are saying by playing, we understand the phrase, the most demonstrative music in this domain being of course the Bop (cf. J. Coltrane, Parker, Dizzy, Jarrett, Herbie etc.). The phrasing can be defined as "playing something which means something for yourself and the audience, taking into account the swing, the aesthetic, the passage of the phrase in the harmony, and the phrases invented by our Fathers! :)))). I know there evreryone won't agree... In short, I am not alone to think that in order to "phrase" coreectly, you have to heard a lot, and... appreciate... and collected... :))... It is like in society, for people who wants to go deeper... where there are things you mustn't say... or mustn't play! There are things I hear sometimes, well nobody plays that in this context... Why? Bicoz it's not nice! It's mean! So phrasing is also sort out and say "that, I don't want to play it again", "this phrase is ugly" etc... ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : PHRASING">Bertrand JAY

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PITCH SHIFTING : See the definition of "Transpose". Also designs the action to change the heigth of an audio sample, through an effect processor or in an audionumerical editor. We say we "pitch" a sound. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : PITCH SHIFTING">Ceedjay

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PLUG-IN : It is a little programm which works "on" a more consistent application (sequencer, audio treatment software...) to enrich its functions. We can find audio effects plug-ins, virtual instruments plug-ins, or virtual samplers. Plug-ins exist in several formats, the most common are VST (Steinberg) or DirectX (Windows). Most of the big sequencer or audio treatment software are compatible with several formats ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : PLUG-IN">Ceedjay

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PREDELAY : Parameter which allows to introduce a little delay between the reception of the original sound and the sending of the affected sound. It is enormously used for the reverb effects. A little pre-delay enables to unstick a voice from its reverb, to make it more clear in the mix. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : PREDELAY">Ceedjay

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PROGRAM CHANGE : A synthesizer has many different sounds in its memory (128, or 256...) and we assign a sound to a MIDI channel through a manipulation of the synthesizer. During this operation, the message Program Change is sent. On the reverse, this message enables to change the synth sounds or expander at distance. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : PROGRAM CHANGE">Denis VASSALLUC

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Q (Quality) : In a parametric eq, this parameter correspond to the width of the frequency band around the central frequency affected by the eq. The more this parameter is high, the more the effect will be audible. If you want to cut a too present frequency and that you have to precisely target it you will use a very high Q factor. On the other hand, if you want to subtlely correct, you will use rather low Q factors. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : Q">Ceedjay

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QUANTIZE : In a sequencer, it is an automatic process which enables to prop up the notes on the beats. Settings can be done for the result not to be too mechanical. Use with care and subtlety! ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : QUANTIZE">Ceedjay

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RAM : Corresponds to the read-write memory of a computer or numerical machine. Its main characteristics is that it empties when the machine is turned off. This memory is used to load data during their use as well as the open applications. We could use the computer HD, but the RAM is far more quick, especially in terms of data acces time (5 nanoseconds instead of 7-8 milliseconds). The more a machine has RAM, the better its performance will be. There are many kinds of RAM, but the most use are the SD-Ram and the DDR SD-Ram (twice more data transfered compared to the SD-Ram). ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : RAM">Ceedjay

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RESOLUTION : During the digitalization of a sound, the resolution corresponds to the maximal number of values than can be taken by a sample (one of the 44100 samples taken each second by the converter for a CD quality sample rate). The resolution is expressed in bits per sample. A bit can take two values: 0 or 1. If the sound is coded on 8 bits, we will have 256 possible values (2^8). On 16 bits, we will have 65536 (2^16). On 24 bits, we will have 16777216 values. Enlarge the resolution will allow a larger dynamic range. For further information, you can read the article about the digital audio, in the "Learning" section. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : RESOLUTION">Ceedjay

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REVERBERATION : It is a very used effect which reproduce the multiple reflection of a sound on the walls of a room. We can play on factors such as the type of surface of the walls, the size of the room, its height, the absorbed frequencies... This effect surrounds the sound by an acoustic blurring and makes it live. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : REVERBERATION">Ceedjay

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RIFF : Generally associated with the guitar, rather rock, the riff is a rhythmic pattern characteristic of a composition. An famous example would be Deep Purple's Smoke On The Water which every guitaris learnt to play on a single string with one finger. It's tain - tain - tain, tain-tain, taintain ! Can be applied to Brass... I'm clear, ain't I? ;-o)) ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : RIFF">FeedBack


It is also, in the tradition of Big Bands, a repetitive pattern (generally played by the brass) which don't take into account the chords change of the rest of the orchestra. We can find these riffs as accompaniment pattern during a theme, but the riff can sometimes be the theme (I don't have any example in mind, but I think that Bag's Groove is one). ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : RIFF">Régis LAMORA


Melody, musical phrase. We can find riffs anywhere in the songs, for example guitar riffs behind the voice in the verse, or riffs put "in front" in breaks. The riff is to the music what the potatoe was for our ancesters: not very original, but necessary to survive... ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : RIFF">Arnaud LE BOULANGER

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SATURATION : Sound deformation in a machine. This distortion is due to a too high gain, or to a too high in level which cannot be faithfully reproduced. This effect can be artistically used, especially on electric guitar and certain drums sounds. A little saturation can be agreeable on an analog signal, because it gives some warmth. But this phenomenon has to be avoided on a digital signal, because there is a risk of digital clipping. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SATURATION">Ceedjay

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SAMPLE : sound obtained after the transfer from an analog signal to a numerical one, by a machine such as a sampler or a computer. If you record a bass drum kick on your hard drive through your soundcard, you will obtain a sample of bass drum. At the moment of the signal conversion, the sample also designs the smallest part of the analog sound that can be caught by the converter. It is, in a way, a photo of the analog sound taken off and on by the converter. For example, a sample with a definition of 44.1kHz contains 44100 sound samples per second.... well... do you follow me ? ;o) ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SAMPLE">CeedJay

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SAMPLING : recording a sample of sound, most of the time by digitalizing an analog sound. We can then use this sample in a numerical machine such as a smapler or in a computer musical piece of software. The sampling of sounds produced by a real piano enables to play the piano through a keyboard and a piece of software or a sampler. No need to have a real piano ! ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SAMPLING">CeedJay

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SHUFFLE : It is a syncopated rhythm where the second and fourth beats of the measure are late compared to a precise tempo, which makes him look like a good old "blues" (from where it comes from). A good example of shuffle: Steevie Ray Vaughan "Life by the Drop" and The Rolling Stones "Harlem Shuffle". ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SHUFFLE">Arnaud LE BOULANGER


It is also the way to define a 4beats measure where the semiquaver is "swinged", that is to say instead of playing regular semiquaver, we will play a quaver and a semiquaver in triolet (16T in a sequencer ;o). So it is ternary for the semiquavers, even if the measure is 4/4 with very binary quavers. Example: John Scofield "Blue Matter", Chick Corea "Beneath the Mask", Ron Thal "Fever. Example in a 3 beats measure: Richard Galliano "Waltz for Nicky". ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SHUFFLE">Régis LAMORA

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SOLO : On a mixing board, it is a button made to mute all the tracks except the one for which the button is pushed. Very useful to listen to a single track. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SOLO">Ceedjay


Well... I don't agree Ceedjay! Solo is the moment where the female elements of the audience pounce on the guitarist! Right? ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SOLO">FeedBack

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SOUNDFONT : Sample banks format created by E-MU for the Sound Blaster soundcards. This format allows to load sound baks in the central memory of the computer in order to play them as sounds of an expander or sampler. It is a cheap way of doing sampling, as we can record any sound and play it through MIDI in a sequencer. This format has become a standard, and many virtual sampling software can use it (Gigasampler, Halion, Kontakt...) as we can find hundreds of free sound banks on the Internet. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SOUNDFONT">Ceedjay

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SYSEX : System Exclusive Message: message made to set the internal parameters of MIDI machines, when these parameters are not forseen int the MIDI norms. These messages sart with the identification of the factory, then the one of the machine. In Cubase, we can use them in different windows: the list editor, the midi mixer or the studio module. All these parameters are indicated in the machines documentation. It is in fact the machine language. ?subject=Commentaire Dico ECVST : SYSEX">Philippe HELLOUIN

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