Category: Technologies

Algorithmic Composition by Autonomous Systems with Multiple Time-Scales

Dynamic systems have found their use in sound synthesis as well as score synthesis. These levels can be integrated in monolithic autonomous systems in a novel approach to algorithmic composition that shares certain aesthetic motivations with some work with autonomous music systems, such as the search for emergence. We discuss various strategies for achieving variation on multiple time-scales by using slow-fast, hybrid dynamic systems, and statistical feedback. The ideas are illustrated with a case study.

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Resonances and Responses

The idea of resonances and responses as a fundamental compositional principle is found in many of my compositions. I have used it in instrumental pieces both with and without electronics, in theatre contexts, in conceptual works and in intertextual and intermusical referential structures. In Terpsichord, a piece for percussion and pre-recorded sounds, the resonances from the acoustic instruments form sonic bridges to the pre-recorded electronic sounds, that, in turn, prolong the resonances, re-shaping them into new sonic gestures. A dialogue of actions and reactions is created that drives the trajectory of the music.

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Reinventing Harmony in Splintered Echoes (2014)

This paper discusses the new harmonic possibilities enabled through the implementation of Sethares’ theory of the dissonance curve in MAX and its use in a live electronic composition Splintered Echoes with Monty Adkins (composer), Jonny Axelsson (composer and percussionist) and Adrian Gierakowski (programmer).

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Patterns in Radical Spectra

This paper contextualises my creative practice produced over the past 20 years and discuss how some of the themes arising from this work relate to some of my contemporaries and wider musical and cultural thinking. These works have little or no percussive content yet are still loosely defined as, or considered to be, ‘post-techno’ (I discuss this term below). Here I describe these works, consider my relationships to them, and reflect upon my responses to those works – leading to the installation ‘The Moment of Impact’ (exhibited as part of the Beyond Pythagoras Symposium, March 2014).

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The Harmonic Sequencer: Mapping the Harmonic Series to a Sequencer

This paper discusses a software tool created by the author in MAX. I have created a sequencer that mimics (in reverse) the relationship between the harmonic series and the equal temperament tuning in terms of temporal timing. I will discuss the theory underpinning the software and its implementation.

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Strategies for spatial music performance: the practicalities and aesthetics of responsive systems design

This article will explore practical and aesthetic questions concerning spatial music performance by interrogating new developments within an emerging hyperinstrumental practice. The performance system is based on an electric guitar with individuated audio outputs per string and multichannel loudspeaker array. A series of spatial music mapping strategies will explore in-kind relationships between a formal melodic syntax model and an ecological flocking simulator, exploiting broader notions of embodiment underpinning the metaphorical basis for the experience and understanding of musical structure. 

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An alternative approach to 3D audio recording and reproduction

The following paper provides an overview of an alternative method of recording 3D sound scenes using several separate SD card microphones as opposed to using single multi capsule ambisonic or surround sound microphones. Instructions are provided on how to set the microphones up, appropriate directivity and positioning, and speaker setup for reproduction.

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Exploded sounds: spatialised partials in two recent multi-channel installations

I discuss two recent sound installations that both explore a spectral sound diffusion technique based on partial tracking that allows individual partials of a sampled sound to occupy individual locations in space. The two installations, The Exploded Sound (60 channels) and Significant Birds (12 channels), use similar techniques and modes of presentation to different ends.

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