WHY

Looking deeper into the subject of turntablism,
I noticed that there are many great turntablists
but no further material that actually breaks down
scratching into its very basic elements. Turntablism
has neither a long history (compared to classical
music or even modern genres such as jazz or
rock) nor a fundamental philosophy, but I believe
that this technique of creating sounds or musical
compositions is not too different from the traditional
way of creating music.

The turnablist acts like a Guitarist or a Pianist
where certain sounds are improvised in form of
rhythmic or even melodic patterns. Thus through
this kind of improvisation a turtablist creates an
unique interplay of the individual sounds.

To be able to create such a philosophical approach
to turntablism I analysed song after song in order
to find out whether there is a semiotic meaning
to turntablism that could hold the spirit of the
ScratchBook. I realised that there is a pattern in-
volved just like in traditional music making, speech
or even poetry (Theo van Leeuwen). Ranging from
stress, pitched tones or voices, to the very similar
pattern of old prosody, turntablsim evolved out of
a vast range of creative activities and interllectual
thought process.

In this believe I want to introduce the ScratchBook
that displays all the basic pattern making to the
point where scratching may be used creatively
and enables you to expand your skills by yourself.
But before that, just like learning a new language
or a musical instrument, there is a certain knowledge
needed, which is achieved by a combination between
practice and theory.