Customer Reviews

Essentials of Music Technology

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I have used sections of this book to teach electroacoustic music courses. Overall, it is very good, well organized, and detailed in its treatment. There are, however, a few factual errors, and at least one misconception in the text. Following are the problems I've encountered so far:

Ch. 5 - Representing Numbers

p. 50 - No definition of 'word' as 16, 24, 32, or 64 bit sequence, dependent on design of processor or software system.

p. 51 - The explanation of hexadecimal makes several references to "hexadecimal bits" which should be "hexadecimal digits." The term 'bit' is defined as a 'binary digit', and so is not appropriate in reference to hexadecimal.

p. 52 - Equations at the top of the page are mixed up. Should be:

6(base10) = 01102

-6(base10) = 10012 + 1 = 10102

p. 52 - Sentence that begins, "Numbers that include a decimal point..." is not accurate. There are fixed-point decimal representations as well as floating-point. In fact, the following explanation of floating-point seems rather to be explaining fixed-point decimal representation by focusing on the need to use a certain number of digits (relegating the exponent to 1 byte, for example), rather than explaining how floating-point representation moves (and keeps track of) the decimal point as needed. Also, this discussion leaves the impression that decimal representations are inherently less accurate than integer representation, which is not true.

Ch. 9 - Digital Audio

p. 106 - The sentence which continues after the aliasing equation, "where the minus sign..." should read, "...the frequency is phase inverted."

This book is an excellent resource, particularly for those with technical orientations in math and science. It requires a basic understanding of physics and calculus, and an understanding of some recording principles. Mark Ballora comes from a very strong background - New York University and McGill University are the top schools in North America for Music Technology - and the information is presented in a logical, straight-forward and easy-to-undertand format. I am currently using the text as a resource for my physics research project, and would recommend it to any music technology student with an understanding of physics and calculus.