Baker

A baker is someone who makes, bakes and sells breads, rolls, biscuits or cookies, and/or crackers using an oven or other concentrated heat source. Cakes and similar foods may also be produced, as the traditional boundaries between what is produced by a baker as opposed to a pastry chef have blurred in recent decades. The place where a baker works is called a bakery.

Origin

The first group of people to bake bread were ancient Egyptians, around 8000 BC. During the Middle Ages, it was common for each landlord to have a bakery, which was actually a public oven; housewives would bring dough that they had prepared to the baker, who would tend the oven and bake them into bread. As time went on, bakers would also sell their own goods, and in that some bakers acted dishonestly, tricks emerged: for example, a baker might have trap door(s) in the oven or other obscured areas, that would allow a hidden small boy or other apprentice to take off some of the dough brought in for baking. Then the dishonest baker would sell bread made with the stolen dough as their own. This practice and others eventually lead to the famous regulation known as Assize of Bread and Ale, which prescribed harsh penalties for bakers that were found cheating their clients or customers. As a safeguard against cheating, under-filled orders, or any appearance of impropriety, bakers commonly began to throw in one more loaf of bread; this tradition now exists in the phrase "baker's dozen", which is 13.

Hatsune Miku

Hatsune Miku (Japanese: 初音ミク), sometimes referred to as Miku Hatsune, is a humanoid persona voiced by a singing synthesizer application developed by Crypton Future Media. Hatsune Miku is portrayed as a 16-year-old girl with long turquoise twintails. She uses Yamaha Corporation's Vocaloid 2 and Vocaloid 3 singing synthesizing technologies. She also uses Crypton Future Media's Piapro Studio, a singing synthesizer VSTi Plugin. She was the second Vocaloid sold using the Vocaloid 2 engine, and the first Japanese Vocaloid to use the Japanese version of the Vocaloid 2 engine. Her voice is sampled from Japanese voice actress Saki Fujita. Hatsune Miku has performed at her concerts onstage as an animated projection.

The name of the character comes from merging the Japanese words for first (初, hatsu), sound (音, ne) and future (ミク, miku), thus meaning "the first sound from the future," referring to her position as the first of Crypton's "Character Vocal Series."

Development

Hatsune Miku was the first Vocaloid developed by Crypton Future Media after they handled the release of the Yamaha vocal Meiko and Kaito. She was built using Yamaha's Vocaloid 2 technology, and later updated over time to newer engine versions. She was created by taking vocal samples from voice actress Saki Fujita at a controlled pitch and tone and those different samples all contain a single Japanese or English phonic which, when strung together, create full lyrics and phrases. The pitch of the samples was to be altered by the synthesizer engine itself, and was constructed into a keyboard style instrument within the Vocaloid software.

Exit Tunes, Inc.

Exit Tunes, Inc. (エグジットチューンズ株式会社) is a Japanese media company that acts primarily as a music publisher. The company was originally founded as a printing company in 2001, however later became a music company known as Quake Records in 2003. In 2005, the company was renamed to Quake Holdings. The company became a subsidiary of Pony Canyon in 2009, and was renamed Exit Tunes in 2011.

The company's label Exit Tunes was responsible for the release of the trance album series Exit Trance. Exit Tunes has also released albums featuring Vocaloid music. In 2010, the compilation album Exit Tunes Presents Vocalogenesis feat. Hatsune Miku topped Japan's Oricon weekly album charts, becoming the first Vocaloid album to top the charts in its history. The following released album, Exit Tunes Presents Vocalonexus feat. Hatsune Miku, became the second Vocaloid album to top the weekly charts in January 2011.

Exit Trance

Exit Trance is a series of compilation albums released in Japan specializing in Japanese trance artists. It is regularly released by Quake Holdings and each volume is mixed by DJ UTO, a prolific DJ in the Japanese music scene. Many of the albums are compilations of remixed anime music, while other albums feature remixed dance music. There are also some albums that feature music from video games or films. As of August 2010, Quake has released ten volumes of the series. Thanks to the success of DJ UTO and the compilation series, Quake introduced the Exit Trance presents Aerodynamic series, specializing in a more 'underground' and harder sound than that of the original Exit Trance series.