Delay is an audio effect which records an input signal to an audio storage medium, and then plays it back after a period of time[1]. For the album by The Jam see Sound Affects. Sound effects or audio effects are artificially created or enhanced Sounds Audio signal processing, sometimes referred to as audio processing, is the processing of a representation of auditory signals, or Sound. The delayed signal may either be played back multiple times, or played back into the recording again, to create the sound of a repeating, decaying echo. In Audio signal processing and Acoustics, an echo (plural echoes) is a reflection of sound arriving at the listener some time after the direct
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Early delay systems
The first delay effects were achieved using tape loops improvised on reel-to-reel magnetic recording systems. Reel-to-reel, open reel tape recording is the form of magnetic tape audio recording in which the recording medium is held on a Reel, rather than being Magnetic storage and magnetic recording are terms from Engineering referring to the storage of Data on a Magnetized medium By shortening or lengthening the loop of tape and adjusting the read and write heads, the nature of the delayed echo could be controlled. This technique was most common among early composers of Musique concrète (Pierre Schaeffer), and composers such as Karlheinz Stockhausen, who had sometimes devised elaborate systems involving long tapes and multiple recorders and playback systems, collectively processing the input of a live performer or ensemble[2]. Musique concrète ( French; literally "concrete music" is a style of Avant-garde music that relies on recorded sounds including natural Pierre Henri Marie Schaeffer ( August 14, 1910 &ndash August 19, 1995) was a French Audio engineers working in popular music quickly adapted similar techniques, to augment their use of plate reverb and other studio technologies designed to simulate natural echo. Audio engineering is a part of audio science dealing with the recording and reproduction of Sound through mechanical and electronic means Popular music is Music belonging to any of a number of musical styles that are accessible to the general public and are disseminated by one or more Reverberation is the persistence of Sound in a particular space after the original sound is removed
Analog delay
Before the invention of audio delay technology, music employing a delayed echo had to be recorded in a naturally reverberant space, often an inconvenience for musicians and engineers. The popularity of an easy-to-implement real-time echo effect led to the production of systems offering an all-in-one effects unit that could be adjusted to produce echoes of any interval or amplitude. Effects units are devices that affect the sound of an electric instrument or other audio source (such as recorded material when plugged in to the electrical signal path the instrument The presence of multiple "taps" (playback heads) made it possible to have delays at varying rhythmic intervals; this allowed musicians an additional means of expression over natural periodic echoes. A tape head is a type of Transducer used in Tape recorders to convert electrical signals to magnetic fluctuations and vice versa
Many delay processors based on analog tape recording, such as Ray Butts' Echosonic (1952), Mike Battle's Echoplex (1959), or the Roland Space Echo (1973), used magnetic tape as their recording and playback medium. Delay is an Audio effect which records an input signal to an audio storage medium, and then plays it back after a period of time The Roland RE-201, commonly known as the Space Echo, is an audio analog delay Effects unit. Magnetic tape is a medium for Magnetic recording generally consisting of a thin magnetizable coating on a long and narrow strip of Plastic. Electric motors guided a tape loop through a device with a variety of mechanisms allowing modification of the effect's parameters[3]. In the case of the popular Echoplex EP-2, the play head was fixed, while a combination record and erase head was mounted on a slide, thus the delay time of the echo was adjusted by changing the distance between the record and play heads. In the Space Echo, all of the heads are fixed, but the speed of the tape could be adjusted, changing the delay time. Thin magnetic tape was not entirely suited for continuous operation, however, so the tape loop had to be replaced from time to time to maintain the audio fidelity of the processed sounds. Fidelity is a notion that at its most abstract level implies a truthful connection to a source or sources
The Binson Echorec, another popular unit, used a rotating magnetic drum as its storage medium. Binson was an early manufacturer of Echo machines Unlike most other analog echo machines they used an analog magnetic drum recorder instead of a Tape loop. This provided an advantage over tape, as the durable drums were able to last for many years with little deterioration in the audio quality[4]. Other devices used spinning magnetic discs, not entirely unlike those used in modern hard disk drives. A hard disk drive ( HDD) commonly referred to as a hard drive, hard disk, or fixed disk drive, is a Non-volatile storage device
Robert Fripp used two Revox reel to reel tape recorders to achieve very long delay times for solo guitar performance. Robert Fripp (born 16 May 1946 in Wimborne Minster, Dorset, England) is a Guitarist, Composer and a Record ReVox is a brand name of Swiss audio equipment created by Studer in the 1950s He dubbed this technology "Frippertronics", and used it in a number of recordings. --> Frippertronics is a system of Tape loops originally developed in the electronic music studios of the early 1960s and first used by John Martyn is widely acclaimed as the pioneer of the echoplex. John Martyn (born Iain David McGeachy on 11 September 1948 in New Malden, Surrey, England) is a British Perhaps the earliest indication of his use can be heard on the songs Would You Believe Me and The Ocean on the album Stormbringer released in February 1970. Stormbringer is the name of the infamous black Sword featured in a number of fantasy stories by the author Michael Moorcock. Year 1970 ( MCMLXX) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link shows full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. This was a first taste of things to come from Martyn’s interest in electronics and the boundless possibilities of electric music. Glistening Glyndebourne on the album Bless The Weather (1971) showcased his developing technique of playing acoustic guitar through the echoplex to stunning effect. Bless the Weather is a 1971 album by John Martyn and marks his return as a solo artist having released two albums with his wife Beverley Martyn. Year 1971 ( MCMLXXI) was a Common year starting on Friday (link will display full calendar of the 1971 Gregorian calendar. He later went on to experiment with a fuzz box, a volume/wah wah pedal and the echoplex on highly acclaimed Inside Out (1973) and One World (1977). Inside Out is an Album released in 1973 by Scotland-based singer-songwriter John Martyn. Year 1973 ( MCMLXXIII) was a Common year starting on Monday (link will display full calendar of the 1973 Gregorian calendar. This album is one of John Martyn's more experimental works Trippy surreal atmospheres reggaeesque rhythms and jazzy vibes Also 1977 (album by Ash. Year 1977 ( MCMLXXVII) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link displays Martyn is cited as an inspiration by many musicians including U2's The Edge. David Howell Evans (born 8 August 1961 in Barking, East London) more widely known by his Moniker The Edge, is a Musician known best
Often incorporating vacuum tube-based electronics, surviving analog delay units are sought by modern musicians who wish to employ some of the timbres achievable with this technology. This article is about the electronic device not an evacuated pipe used for experiments in Free-fall.
Solid state delay units using analog bucket brigade delay circuits became available in the 1970s and were briefly a mainstream alternative to tape echo before being superseded by digital delays.
Old delay systems like the Roland Space Echo and Echoplex are still highly regarded and used with some frequency by modern bands. The Roland RE-201, commonly known as the Space Echo, is an audio analog delay Effects unit. Delay is an Audio effect which records an input signal to an audio storage medium, and then plays it back after a period of time The Space Echo has been remade almost exactly by the Boss Corporation with the RE-201 Space Echo pedal. Boss is a manufacturer of Effects pedals for Electric guitar and Bass guitar. The psychedelic noise rock band Comets on Fire is notable for its heavy use of Echoplex on vocals as well as other instruments (Noel Von Harmonson, the group's electronics operator, is staunchly opposed to digital delay units). Modern psychedelia For "psychedelics" see Psychedelic drug. Noise rock (also known as noise punk) describes one variety of Post-punk Rock music that became prominent in the 1980s Comets on Fire is a Psychedelic rock band from Santa Cruz, California.
Digital delay
The availability of inexpensive digital signal processing electronics in the late 1970s and 1980s led to the development of the first digital delay effects. Digital signal processing ( DSP) is concerned with the representation of the signals by a sequence of numbers or symbols and the processing of these signals This article is about the Decade 1970-1979 For the Year 1970 see 1970. The 1980s was the decade spanning from January 1 1980 to December 31 1989. A digital system uses discrete (discontinuous values usually but not always Symbolized Numerically (hence called "digital" to represent information for Initially, they were only available in expensive rack mounted units but eventually as costs came down and the electronics grew smaller, they became available in the form of foot pedals. The first digital delay offered in a pedal was the Boss DD-2 in 1984. Boss is a manufacturer of Effects pedals for Electric guitar and Bass guitar. Rack mounted delay units evolved into digital reverb units and on to digital multieffects units capable of more sophisticated effects than pure delay, such as reverb and Audio timescale-pitch modification effects. Reverberation is the persistence of Sound in a particular space after the original sound is removed Time stretching is the process of changing the speed or duration of an audio signal without affecting its pitch.
Digital delay systems function by sampling the input signal through an analog-to-digital converter, after which the signal is passed through a series of digital signal processors that record it into a storage buffer, and then play back the stored audio based on parameters set by the user. An analog-to-digital converter (abbreviated ADC, A/D or A to D) is an electronic integrated circuit which converts continuous signals to A digital signal processor ( DSP or DSP micro) is a specialized Microprocessor designed specifically for Digital signal processing, generally In Computing, a buffer is a region of memory used to temporarily hold Data while it is being moved from one place to another The delayed ("wet") output may be mixed with the unmodified ("dry") signal after, or before, it is sent to a digital-to-analog converter for output. Audio mixing is the process by which a multitude of sound sources are combined into one or more channels In Electronics, a digital-to-analog converter ( DAC or D-to-A) is a device for converting a digital (usually binary code to an Analog signal
Many modern digital delays present an extensive array of options, including a control over the time before playback of the delayed signal. Most also allow the user to select the overall level of the processed signal in relation to the unmodified one, or the level at which the delayed signal is fed back into the buffer, to be repeated again. Some systems today allow more exotic controls, such as the ability to add an audio filter, or to play back the buffer's contents in reverse. An audio filter is a type of filter used for processing Sound signals.
Digital pedals remain the most popular delay effects for electric guitarists today because of their ease of maintenance, durability, and relatively low cost. An electric guitar is a type of Guitar that uses pickups to convert the vibration of its steel-cored strings into an electrical current which is made louder Digital delays have been criticized as sounding "unnatural" when compared to genuine echoes or analog delays, but some more recent units have made progress toward answering these concerns by adding audio filters. As digital memory has become cheaper, modern units have been able to offer rapidly increasing amounts of storage, some as large as the 16-second delay and looping machine offered by Electro-Harmonix. Electro-Harmonix is
Computer software
A natural development from digital delay-processing hardware was the appearance of software-based delay systems. In large part, this coincided with the popularity of both professional and consumer audio editing software. Software delays, in many cases, offer much greater flexibility than even the most recent digital hardware delays. Abundant system memory on modern personal computers offers practically limitless storage for the audio buffer, and the natural efficiency of audio delay algorithms has made the implementation trivial for delays offering shifting or random delay times, or the insertion of other audio effects during the feedback process. Computer data storage, often called storage or memory, refers to Computer components devices and recording media that retain digital For the album by The Jam see Sound Affects. Sound effects or audio effects are artificially created or enhanced Sounds Many authors of software plugins have added functionality to emulate the sounds of the earlier analog units.
Software-based delays are most popular today among musicians in electronic genres or those who prefer to audition the effect in a digital audio editing and mixing environment. Electronic music is music that employs Electronic musical instruments and Electronic Music technology in its production A digital audio workstation (DAW is an electronic system designed to record, edit and play back digital audio
Uses
The most familiar use of delay processors is by electric guitarists in popular music, who frequently employ delay as a means to produce densely overlaid textures of notes in rhythms complementary to the tempo of the overall piece. Electronic musicians use delay for similar effects, and less frequently, vocalists and other instrumentalists use it to add a dense or ethereal quality to their playing. Extremely long delays of 10 seconds or more are often used to create loops of a whole musical phrase.
Echoplex is a term often applied to the use of multiple echoes which recur in approximate synchronization with a musical rhythm, so that the notes played combine and recombine in interesting ways. In fact, it was the name of a particular delay unit, the Maestro Echoplex[5].
Doubling echo is produced by adding short-range delay to a recorded sound. Delays of thirty to fifty milliseconds are the most common; longer delay times become slapback echo. Mixing the original and delayed sounds creates an effect similar to doubletracking, or unison performance. Doubletracking is an Audio recording technique in which a performer sings or plays along with their own prerecorded performance usually to produce a stronger or "bigger"
Slapback echo uses a longer delay time (seventy-five to 250 milliseconds), with little or no feedback. The effect is characteristic of vocals on 1950s rock-n-roll records, particularly those issued by Sun. The 1950s Decade refers to the years of 1950 to 1959 inclusive Rock and roll (also known as rock 'n' roll) is a form of Music that evolved in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s with roots in mostly African Sun Records was a Record label based in Memphis, Tennessee, starting operations on March 27 1952. It is also sometimes used on instruments, particularly drums and percussion. A drum kit (also drum set or trap set) is a collection of Drums Cymbals and sometimes other Percussion instruments such as cowbells Slapback was often produced by refeeding the output signal from the playback head of a tape recorder to its record head, the physical space between heads, the speed of the tape, and the chosen volume being the main controlling factors. Analog and later digital delay machines also easily produced the effect.
Flanging, Chorus and Reverberation (known as "reverb") are all delay-based sound effects. Flanging is a time-based Audio effect that occurs when two identical signals are mixed together but with one signal time-delayed by a small and gradually changing amount A chorus effect is A condition in the way people perceive similar sounds coming from multiple sources Reverberation is the persistence of Sound in a particular space after the original sound is removed With flanging and chorus, the delay time is very short and usually modulated. With reverberation there are multiple delays and feedback so that individual echoes are blurred together, recreating the sound of an acoustic space.
Straight delay
In audio reinforcement, a straight delay is used to compensate for the passage of sound through the air. A public address or " PA " system is an electronic amplification system with a mixer, Amplifier and Loudspeakers used to Unlike audio delay effects devices, straight delay is not mixed back in with the original signal. The delayed signal alone is sent to loudspeakers so that the speakers reinforce the stage sound at the same time or slightly later than the acoustic sound from the stage, approximately 1 millisecond of straight delay per foot of air or 3 milliseconds per meter, depending on the air temperature's affect on the speed of sound. Sound is a vibration that travels through an elastic medium as a Wave. Because of the Haas effect, this technique allows audio engineers to use additional speaker systems placed away from the stage and still give the illusion that all sound originates from the stage. The Haas effect is a psychoacoustic effect related to a group of auditory phenomena known as the Precedence Effect or law of the first wave front. The purpose is to deliver sufficient sound volume to the back of the venue without resorting to excessive sound volumes near the front.
Straight delay is also used in audio to video synchronization to align sound with visual media, if the visual source is delayed. Audio to video synchronization (also known as Audio video sync, Audio/video sync, AV-sync, lip sync &ndash or lack of it lip sync error Visual media can get delayed by a number of mechanisms, in which case the associated audio should be delayed to match.
Samples
Delay effect (1)
Delay effect (2)
References
- ^ Lehman, Scott. "Effects Explained: Delay". 1996. Retrieved on June 30, 2006.
- ^ Gehlaar, Rolf. "Leap of Faith: A Personal Biography of Karlheinz Stockhausen's Prozession. 1998. Retrieved on July 30, 2006.
- ^ "RE-201 Space Echo", Vintage Synth Explorer. 1997. Retrieved on July 30, 2006.
- ^ Studholme, Richard. "History of the Binson Echorec". Retrieved on July 30, 2006.
- ^ "Maestro Echoplex tape delay". Retrieved on July 30, 2006.
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