I’ve held off commenting on this for obvious reasons since I’ve been called a “purist” on here several times.

The article itself is well written and manages to firmly straddle the fence in regards to the use of Auto Tune, at least until the author relates a personal experience of using it with friends and family on a recording and she is amazed at how much better they all sound with the application of AT.

So is sonic perfection the goal of music, even if it’s achieved by artificial means through the electronic alteration of a bad performance in order to make it sound like a good performance?

If we accept that electronic alteration, then why should anyone bother developing the skills needed to execute a good performance? Being close to the proper pitch and time should be enough, … especially since we can fix both electronically.

After all, since a tone deaf little cutie like Taylor Swift can sell gazillions of records by using AT or another type of electronic alteration, why should we put all of the time and effort into learning to sing or play our instruments? There’s an electronic “fix” for all of our mistakes!

No more sweating those scales, chords and arpeggios! No more working on timing with that incessant CLICK-CLICK-CLICK of a metronome!

Who needs REAL musical skills when we have electronic alternatives and an ignorant populace who can’t tell the difference?

Bob
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http://soundcloud.com/bobcflatpicke/music-in-the-mountains