| Title: | * * Computer Music, MIDI, and Related Topics * * |
| Notice: | Conference has been write-locked. Use new version. |
| Moderator: | DYPSS1::SCHAFER |
| Created: | Thu Feb 20 1986 |
| Last Modified: | Mon Aug 29 1994 |
| Last Successful Update: | Fri Jun 06 1997 |
| Number of topics: | 2852 |
| Total number of notes: | 33157 |
From an article in a computer music mag:
A hundred and fifty years before Beethoven was born, an
English essayist, Roger Bacon, wrote a futuristic story called
"The New Atlantis". Describing life in this ideal world, the
inhabitant of New Atlantis says:
"...We also have sound-houses, where we practice and
demonstrate all sounds and their generation. We have
harmonies which you have not, of quarter sounds and lesser
...diverse instruments of Musick likewise to you unknown,
some sweeter than you... with Bells and Rings that are
dainty and sweet, we represent small souncs as well as
Great and Deepe ... we make diverse Tremblings and Warblings
of sound. We have certain helps, which, set to the ears,
doe further hearing greatly. We have strange and artificial
echoes, reflecting the voice many times... and means to convey
sound in trunks and pipes, in strange lines and distances..."
It sounds authentic. Does anyone know for sure?
P.S. later: encyclopedia says bacon is even earlier,
middle ages, was the futurist nut of his time,
quite remarkable. no mention of "new atlantis", tho.
| T.R | Title | User | Personal Name | Date | Lines |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2035.1 | SALSA::MOELLER | Never say 'forget it' to a computer. | Wed Jul 05 1989 16:10 | 3 | |
yes, I've seen this passage before. It be authentic.
karl
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| 2035.2 | Encyclopedia on Bacon | CONFG5::FALOR | Mon Jul 24 1989 11:21 | 24 | |
I checked the library. Only an encylclopedia had something on
Roger Bacon.
Born around 1220, died 1292. A (the) major medieval exponent
of experimental science. He was the first European to describe
in detail the process of making gunpowder, and he proposed
flying machines and motorized ships and carriages. He won
a place in popular literature as a kind of wonder worker.
Born into a wealthy family. He devoted himself wholeheartedly
to the cultivation of those new branches of learning to which
he was introduced at Oxford--languages, optics, and alchemy--
and to further studies in astronomy and mathematics. He
seriously studied the problem of lying in a machine with flapping
wings (ornicopter?). He described spectacles, which soon came
into use. He wrote several encyclopediae of known, proven
knowledge for the pope and general use. He was not a humble
mad, very outspoken and hypercritical of all establishments.
Later, as a friar, he was condemned to prison by his fellow
Franciscans because of dertain "suspected novelties" in his
teaching, but was probably issued because of his bitter attacks
on the theologians and scholars of his day. Though he was
widely regarded as extremely talented, it seems he thought
himself much more than that, and let everyone know it.
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