Boynstye

Hello, my name is not Boynstye.

I am president and simultaneous people of Boynstyestan. It is very small country in Birmingham, England. Do not tell Birmingham City Council. People of Boynstyestan are known for their intemperence and intellectual intensity. You have been warned. Boynstye.

Explanation of word "Boynstye"

Boynstye everybody.

The word "Boynstye" is just a musical sound that I invented for fun. I like the sounds that different languages make; their different tones and rhythms.

The word can potentially be used in conversation, but take care, as one might be judged mad or Polish. Pronounciation and meaning is up to the speaker. It is the expression that counts.

In semantic terms, as defined by Noam Chomsky, the meaning of "Boynstye" is entirely context dependent, which I think means that the word is useless. And so it should be. Boynstye.

Personal interests

I like to work in several intellectual fields, mostly engineering, software programming, mathematics and music, and preferably all at the same time. Music is the core to this, and Hermann von Helmholtz is one of my heroes in this area, as the founder of the science of musical acoustics.

Music and guitar playing

I taught myself the to play the guitar when I was at school, and I have played in various little-known bands since then. I mostly play blues, rock, and jazz. I like to throw in some improvised classical-style parts from time to time. My top guitar hero is Jimi Hendrix.

I do not generally listen to much recorded music, but when I do, it is most often J.S. Bach, or much later composers such as Debussy and Stravinsky.

Since I started playing the guitar, I have had an interest in exploring alternative scales and time signatures. Various modal scales can be employed in jazz and blues contexts. I have also experimented with what I understand to be Indian or Arabic scales, and the whole tone scale, as used by Debussy. Working within such "odd" scales gives a particular flavour to the music, but this only lasts as long as one does not accidentally plonk in a "normal" note in the wrong place.

Sound synthesis

A long-standing interest, since my school days, is the field of sound synthesis using electronics, and lately using software. It is worth remarking here that Helmholtz made the beginings of a voice synthesiser around the mid 19th century, using the addition of sine waves at harmonically related frequencies, produced by electro-magnetic generators amplified with acoustic resonators. Helmholtz was also a pioneer in the development of electro-magnetic theory and practice.

My current software synthesiser project is based, very loosely, on the Helmholtz idea of adding sine waves to make tones of particular characters. The concept is obviously not novel as it stands, but I am hoping that my simultaneous studies in music might shape the development to provide something musically useful and perhaps significant.

I use the term musically useful quite frequently in the context of sound synthesis. Some sound sample synth might claim to use the recorded sound of a Stradivarius for the violin, but if the notes do not articulate properly, it might as well be an accordion, and will often sound like one. Therefore exact replication of a sound is not musically useful, but good articulation is.

Written English

I enjoy technical writing, particularly the difficult task of conveying useful knowledge (not just buzzwords) to non-technical readers, especially where correct understanding may have a material effect on important business decisions. Clarity and honesty are the key to this. And humility. Amongst our weapons are clarity, honesty and humility. And humour. Oh blow it, can we just come in again?