The turntable and scratching
These are some of my most important papers on scratching, DJs, turntablism and the relevant technologies. All are available for download below, either as Open Access or as institutional self-archiving PDF. Follow the DiVA or DOI link for a public record.
General turntablism, DJs and scratching | |
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DJs and Turntablism, The Cambridge Companion to Hip-hop, 2015. DOI | 2013-hansencctohh.pdf This is an introduction to turntablism for a general audience. It was published in Cambridge's companion series. |
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S-notation: A complete musical notation system for scratching and sample music..., TENOR 2016. DOI | Open access S-notation for sample-based music, rooted in Sonnenfeld's Theory of Motion, depicts scratch music as concurrent gestures through detailed traditional-inspired notation, serving modern needs, live performance, composer expression, diverse styles, and sound analysis, applicable to documentation and education. |
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Expressivity and musical shape in turntablism..., Empirical Musicology Review, 2013:8(1). DOI | In this commentary, I address issues about expressivity in scratching. |
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Analysis | |
Analysis of the acoustics and playing strategies of turntable scratching, Acta Acoustica u/w Acustica, 2011:97(2). DOI Analysis of scratch music was done in close collaboration with Marco Fabiani. Contains novel methods for analysing complex music. |
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Analysis of a genuine scratch performance, Gesture Workshop 2003. DOI | analysis_of_scratch.pdf A musical analysis of scratch techniques used in a typical scratch performance. |
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The basics of scratching, Journal of New Music Research, 2002:31(4). DOI The first academic paper with a more technical description of DJ scratching. |
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Modelling | |
The Skipproof virtual turntable for high-level control of scratching, Computer Music Journal, 2010:34(2). DOI | Open access The Skipproof system, written in Pure data. It was used for instance on the Reactable. |
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More DJ techniques on the reactable, NIME 2008. DiVA | Open access Skipproof scratching on the Reactable, allowing high-level control. |
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Mapping and control | |
Combining DJ Scratching, Tangible Interfaces And A Physics-Based Model of Friction Sounds, ICMC 2007. DiVA | Open access First paper combining scratching and the Reactable together with Smilen Dimitrov and Marcos Alonso. |
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Mapping strategies in DJ scratching, NIME 2006. DiVA | 2006_hansen_nime.pdf An overview of the mapping of control and output parameters in the traditional DJ turntable/mixer setup. |
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PhD and Master theses | |
The acoustics and performance of DJ scratching, Analysis and modelling, PhD thesis, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, 2010. DiVA | WWW My PhD thesis web page with full texts and sound examples. |
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Turntablisme - His Master's Voice: The Art of the Record Player, Master's thesis, Department of Music, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, 1999. DiVA | The thesis will be scanned one rainy day. Written in Norwegian. |