
Moonlight Sonata Visualized (2012) [video] - netgusto
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yojDu3E9jls
======
szemet
Offtopic, but this sonata is connected to one of the most witful naming (in my
opinion) in IT industry:

The Silverlight clone was named to Moonlight (a Mono project - RIP), which on
the surface seems like just a simple association, but Moonlight is a sonata in
C#! :)

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ohthehugemanate
This is the gold standard as far as I'm concerned:

[http://www.musanim.com/ArtOfFugue/](http://www.musanim.com/ArtOfFugue/)

This guy does visualizations of lots of pieces, using a variety of techniques.
He did the entire Open Source Art Of The Fugue (Kimiko Ishizaka), and explains
his choices of viz tools for each one.

This playlist contains his favorite version of each piece:

[https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtj_HurkS7Zy5ocS2jbmtgk...](https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtj_HurkS7Zy5ocS2jbmtgk-
muF8h0hnN)

~~~
netgusto
What do the highlighted blocks and moving "pistons" within mean (see [1])?

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tybs1T9OLBg&list=PLtj_HurkS7...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tybs1T9OLBg&list=PLtj_HurkS7Zy5ocS2jbmtgk-
muF8h0hnN&index=1)

~~~
pierrec
It's explained on his website, though perhaps not super clearly. The
composition is a fugue, so it has a subject (main recurring melody). Each
occurrence of the subject is represented by a large box on the timeline, and
when it plays, a slow column moves along the box.

Also notice the many countersubjects (secondary recurring melodies). They are
made clearly visible in the video: wherever they appear, their notes are
highlighted and connected so that each occurrence looks like a small,
recognizable constellation.

It might have been interesting to treat all subject and countersubjects
equally with the "constellation" style (which I find clearer than the weird
box-and-column), then try representing harmonic aspects of the composition,
which are so far completely left out of the visualization. Not that it would
be an easy task, of course...

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baddox
This is a very cool take on the piano roll visualization. I’d love to see
something similar that focuses on harmonic relationships rather than linear
pitch relationships, perhaps using something like the lattice:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lattice_(music)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lattice_\(music\))

The only lattice visualizations I know of are Gary Garrett’s:
[http://www.garygarrett.me/](http://www.garygarrett.me/)

~~~
musanim
I've done a few experiments in visualizing pitch-class relationships.

The one I use regularly is to map the color wheel to the circle of fifths (for
a fuller description, see
[http://www.musanim.com/HarmonicColoring/](http://www.musanim.com/HarmonicColoring/)
).

y MIDI Player has a hexagonal pitch grid mode (for a list of features, see
[http://www.musanim.com/Player/](http://www.musanim.com/Player/) ).

I've done some experiments in showing interval classes (to highlight
differences between consonance and dissonance), but the techniques don't work
well for most pieces, and this is the only sample I've published:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Xu2cSEko6M](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Xu2cSEko6M)

When I learned more about auditory neurology, I did some experiments with that
(see this page in my project timeline
[http://www.musanim.com/mam/hist33.html](http://www.musanim.com/mam/hist33.html)
).

But mostly, I don't think any of these approaches (or anybody else's, for that
matter), really do the job.

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deckarep
This is really cool to see:

I’ve always wondered if such a visualization can help folks learn music better
and more intuitively by stimulating their visual cortex.

The base notes are the darker notes. The red notes are the treble. The ring
shows the notes from low to high (left side to right.) The lines look to
indicate the sustain.

Chords are easily shown when multiple notes are hit at the same time. It also
looks like the measure shows up as an outer ring.

Also what’s cool is how future notes/chords are illustrated by the up and
coming items from the middle.

~~~
mannykannot
They are very cool - I have just spent the best part of an hour watching /
listening to several of them.

Now I am wondering if there is some way to map the consonance / dissonance /
diatonic / chromatic structure of a piece of music visually, in addition to
(or instead of) pitch. I know next to nothing about music, so I cannot begin
to imagine how one might do that.

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emerged
I'd also like to see visualizations which aren't based on the standard linear
mapping of increasing semitones. For example, following the circle of fifths
instead, and/or contextualizing to the subset of notes used in the song's
musical key. Making the root note visually more dominant and the others in
proportion according to mode, etc.

I don't mean to take anything away from this beautiful visualization, just
something which I think would take it to the next level.

~~~
zodiac
As baddox mentioned - gary garrett does this! eg
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jA1C9VFqJKo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jA1C9VFqJKo)

I have been wondering for a while if it's possible to show both harmonic and
melodic relationships at the same time - garett's visualization shows the b7
to 1 movement as a large harmonic leap, but hides the fact that it's a small
melodic movement

~~~
williamdclt
I understood more about music watching this than in 2 years of (casual)
musical training

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RGS1811
I've often enjoyed smalin's visualizations, which I find a little easier to
follow visually than andy filebrown's. E.g.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlvUepMa31o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlvUepMa31o)

~~~
thinkpad20
Seconded! I remember being wowed by his Debussy Arabesque visualization many
years ago. Still worth a watch/listen!
[https://youtu.be/A6s49OKp6aE](https://youtu.be/A6s49OKp6aE)

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chx
Moonlight Sonata has a special place in my heart. Early 2000s I was listening
to an Internet radio called Gotham Radio - The Dark Side of Metal, it kind of
matched my music interests. And then Sirenia - Seven sirens and a silver tear
comes up and it's totally not metal and it's the best music I have ever heard.
And I have been looking for similar music ever since, more than fifteen years
now. And then Reddit tells me all of them are derivatives, sort of, of
Midnight Sonata and they are right. Mind blown!

If you are curious, the collection is at
[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvL3SharHGKut2spUcOB0...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvL3SharHGKut2spUcOB0zvHW0zYLadhd)

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dpflan
I like the infinite space view. Continuing with the theme of the post: this is
a clever music video visualization for J.S. Bach Cello Suite No. 1 - Prelude:

> [https://vimeo.com/31179423](https://vimeo.com/31179423)

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8bitsrule
As visualizations these are pretty, and relaxing. They're less informative
than piano-roll displays. The space taken up by the '3rd dimension' pretty
much limits them to solo instrumentals.

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misil
This (highly stylized) rendering of the opening of Bach's Matthew Passion has
helped me appreciate the structure of this extraordinary piece of music:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAafyK44fCc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAafyK44fCc)

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meri_dian
andy fillebrown's visualizations are so captivating, his video of Bach's
Toccata and Fugue in D minor is particularly excellent:
[https://youtu.be/f5vRrt0Q9Ew](https://youtu.be/f5vRrt0Q9Ew)

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shmerl
Very interesting. Did they publish the code that takes MIDI and turns it into
such visualization, or it's hand crafted?

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JonasJSchreiber
Sweet! They should do the third movement!

~~~
rrauenza
The whole piece's playlist:

[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9CSjAx04SPvTyIBZpE2S...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9CSjAx04SPvTyIBZpE2SwVP1YFVyN6IR)

~~~
JonasJSchreiber
Awesome! Always get bored by the first movement, that one is so much better!

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vinchuco
idea: wearable music: bracelet (refer to visualization in parent link) for
deaf people to listen through skin interaction

