Recent ucimusic_icit items

Thinking Telematically: Improvising Music Worlds Under COVID and Beyond

Sat, 10 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The COVID-19 pandemic lockdown brought much attention to live music making via the internet, amplifying the previously marginal fields of livestream concertizing and networked music performance. Drawing connections among recent publications, artists' creative strategies, and his own experiences, the author surveys questions about musical telepresence that arose in this process, including reflections on the nature of musical liveness in an increasingly digital industry, the creative potentials of networked music making, and the value of “thinking telematically” about cultural production and social change.

Relational Music: A Participatory Approach Towards Live Experimental Electronic Music

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Audience participation has appeared prominently as a critical response to spectatorship in various artistic fields since the second half of the twentieth century. In music, a variety of participatory approaches have been developed that provide the audience with varying degrees ofcreative agency. Each approach fosters certain relationships and communications among the participants, giving rise to a range of social dynamics and politics. The objective of this dissertation was, first, to develop a new approach that involved audience members interacting with a limited number of objects placed in a concert space to affect sonic characteristics and theperformance of an ensemble that consisted of featured musicians, and second, to analyze the social dynamics and politics such an approach gave rise to.

Literature and creative works in the fields of music, visual arts, and theater were used todevelop a method of viewing and assessing the politics of participation that was used...

Time, Virtuosity, and Ethics Otherwise: Queer Resonances for Diasporic Play

Fri, 3 Feb 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This dissertation enacts the dialogue between my creative work as an improviser-composer and my critical engagements with scholarship. Both creative and academic streams of my work have converged on core themes, which have accompanied me as I experiment with my practice as a composer and as an improviser on the mrudangam (South Indian drum): (1) queering rhythm and temporality in relation to ensemble dynamics and score-based practices; (2) imagining counterpoint to received socio-aesthetic hierarchies; and (3) the transformative possibilities in alternative mappings of the body in music— as related to perception, collectivity, and pleasure. Substantive creative responses to these themes have been, and continue to be reflected in the following projects: (1) two works — Of Agency and Abstraction and Apertures — written for RAJAS, an ensemble I lead, and which embodies a convergence of cross-cultural improvisational approaches; (2) a handful of commissions of through-composed music...

Improvising in a different clave: Steve Coleman and AfroCuba de Matanzas

Fri, 2 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Improvising in a different clave: Steve Coleman and AfroCuba de Matanzas

Asian Americans and Creative Music Legacies

Fri, 2 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

This essay is an introduction to what has been called the Asian American Creative Music Movement, focusing especially on musicians based in the San Francisco Bay area. It examines the history of those musicians' networks and situates their work as both musicians and activists in relation to African American creative music legacies.

Face to Face, Byte to Byte: Approaches to Human Interaction in a Digital Music Ensemble

Wed, 7 Sep 2022 00:00:00 +0000

As a composer and performer of improvised music, I find my interest drawn to the relationships formed during the act of music-making. These relationships take shape inside an ensemble, between the performers and the composer, and between the ensemble and the audience. Using Digital Musical Instruments in musical performance affords us new ways of thinking about and exploring these relationships. These instruments also provide performative and compositional challenges which need to be overcome in order to realize a successful performance.

This paper draws on concepts from the Physical Computing community in order to present instruments that solve these challenges while also describing new strategies for musical collaboration. These strategies are examined in the work of early digital music ensembles The Hub and Sensor Band, in the recent work of the Princeton Laptop Orkestra, and in work I have completed with the Physical Computing Ensemble at UC Irvine. These ensembles...

Ritualized Performance in the Networked Era

Tue, 8 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

In this essay, I present a concept of ritualized performance as an ideal way to approach the telematic medium, arguing that many longstanding performance rituals share characteristics that can be exploited in networked performance. After delimiting a notion of ritual, I introduce three aspects of this performative mode that make it a valuable approach to networked environments: 1) democratization of the space (a concept I explore through Victor Turner’s ideas on liminality and communitas), including integrating audience participation as well as moving beyond single-author models, 2) hybridization of media, merging audio and visual technologies, and 3) interculturalism and collaboration across geographically-defined cultures and traditions. Many artists in the 20th century have explored these ideas to create alternative approaches to performance, and in this essay I argue that they can be extended in new ways within the telematic realm. Drawing on theoretical and philosophical...

Ritualized Performance in the Networked Era: Alternative Models for New Artistic Media

Tue, 8 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The author presents a concept of ritualized performance as an ideal way to approach the telematic medium, arguing that many longstanding performance rituals share characteristics that can be exploited in networked performance. The author situates these ideas in relation to his project Spatia, seeking to illustrate how the model of ritualized performance can be applied to the networked medium.

Intentional Inclusion :Promoting Diversity in Graduate Study of Music Technology

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

A lack of diversity among faculty and students in graduate programs that focus on music technology and computer music may unwittingly discourage participation by certain segments of the population, and thus may hinder the development of a potentially wide variety of ideas andaesthetics. Graduate student numbers of women and minorities in the field are proportionally low. In the absence of any concerted plan of action to diversify such programs, this state of affairs is not likely to change. What can be done to increase diversity among people succeedingin the academic fields of music technology, in the interest of hybrid vigor and social justice? By pursuing a conscientious policy of intentional inclusivity, some progress may be made toward rectifying imbalances, thus enhancing diversity of scholarship and creative work. This article makes an assessment of demographic imbalances and proposes some concrete steps facultymay be able to take toward improvement.

Cycles Interrupted

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score and audio recording of: Cycles Interrupted by Christopher Dobrian

For soprano, tenor saxophone, and piano.

Acoustic chamber version of the 2006 computer music piece of the same name.

Recorded in 2007 by Tamara Matthews, Matt Olson, and Daniel Koppelman

Upon Reflection

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score and audio recording of: Upon Reflection by Christopher Dobrian

For piano four hands

Written for and premiered by Mari Akagi and Kei Akagi in Sendai, Japan.

This recording is a solo version for Disklavier piano and interactive computer system, performed by Daniel Koppelman.

Score includes a dedicatory statement by the composer.

The ‘E’ in NIME: Musical Expression with New Computer Interfaces

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Is there a distinction between New Interfaces for Musical Expression and New Interfaces for Controlling Sound? Thisarticle begins with a brief overview of expression in musical performance, and examines some of the characteristics ofeffective “expressive” computer music instruments. It becomes apparent that sophisticated musical expressionrequires not only a good control interface but also virtuosic mastery of the instrument it controls. By studying effective acoustic instruments, choosing intuitive but complexgesture-sound mappings that take advantage of established instrumental skills, designing intelligent characterizationsof performance gestures, and promoting long-term dedicated practice on a new interface, computer music instrumentdesigners can enhance the expressive quality of computer music performance.

Somewhere In The Upstream, in memory of Yusef Lateef (1920-2013)

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Score notations and software diagrams for a concert length work for trombone, bass, drums and computer, taking the form of a "scorestream," a dynamic, screen-displayed score.

In Tongues (Interproviplaytion IV)

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: In Tongues (Interproviplaytion IV) by Christopher Dobrian

For flute and interactive computer audio processing

Composed in collaboration with James Newton.

Premiered by James Newton in the Primavera en la Habana 2002 festival of computer music, Museo de las Bellas Artes, Havana, Cuba

Point of No Arrival

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score and audio recording of: Point of No Arrival by Christopher Dobrian

For cello and computer

Premiered by Margaret Parkins

Mannam (Interproviplaytion VI)

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: Mannam (Interproviplaytion VI) by Christopher Dobrian

For daegum (Korean flute) and interactive computer audio processing.

Premiered by Serin Hong

Programming New Realtime DSP Possibilities with MSP

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The new MSP extension to the Max programming environmentprovides an easily comprehensible and versatile way to programrealtime DSP applications. Because of its full integration intoMax, MSP allows one to combine MIDI data and audio datareadily in any program, and to hear the results immediately. Thismakes it an excellent environment for experimenting with newDSP algorithms and for designing music performances with arealtime DSP component.This paper presents some algorithms for time-domain audioprocessing in MSP which are not commonly found in therepertoire of included effects for commercially available audioprocessors. These algorithms—which use the realtimesegmentation of captured audio—are computationallyinexpensive, yet are capable of producing a variety of interestingsonic effects. They include simulated time-compression andpitch-shifting of audio samples, segmentation of audio samplesfor use as “notes” in another rhythmic structure, and modulationto extreme rates of sample...

Realtime Stochastic Decision Making for Music Composition and Improvisation

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Realtime Stochastic Decision Making for Music Composition and Improvisation

Cultural ‘Content’ in Korean Music Made with Computers

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Computers are ubiquitous in the process of music recording and distribution, andincreasingly also in the process of music composition and performance. This tool has a considerable effect on the music itself, especially when the computer is pressed into service in the actual role of performer or composer. Since music is assumed to be a form of human emotional expression, one may wonder how a computer can effectivelycontribute to its creation and performance. What can a computer have to “say” in music? By taking a look at its use and influence in Korean music, we see some examples of how the technology affects musical content.

Resonating Abstractions

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Concert length work composed for trombone, computer, bass and drums

STRATEGIES FOR CONTINUOUS PITCH AND AMPLITUDE TRACKING IN REALTIME INTERACTIVE IMPROVISATION SOFTWARE

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

In a realtime interactive work for live performer and computer, the immanently human musical expression of the live performer is not easily equalled byalgorithmically generated artificial expression in the computer sound. In cases when we expect the computer to display interactivity in the context of improvisation,pre-programmed emulations of expressivity in the computer are often no match for the charisma of an experienced improviser. This article proposes to achieve expressivity in computer sound by “stealing” expressivity from the live performer. By capturing,analyzing, and storing expressive characteristics found in the audio signal received from the acoustic instrument,the computer can use those same characteristic expressive sound gestures, either verbatim or with modifications.This can lead to a more balanced sense of interactivity in works for live performer and computer.

A METHOD FOR COMPUTER CHARACTERIZATION OF "GESTURE" IN MUSICAL IMPROVISATION

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

In the design of interactive computer music systems and the composition of interactive computer music, the tracking and analysis of musical "gestures" — characteristic motions discerned within musical attributes — provides a promising challenge. There are in fact ways that one can clearly and empirically define and identify "gesture" in musical content, often with conceptual models and tools similar to those used fortracking and identifying physical gestures. The analysis of musical gesture as "significant motion" can be applied to many aspects of music: melodic contour, notespeed and density, loudness, level of dissonance, etc. Gestures can be characterized by the shapes producedby measuring changes in these aspects, and the derivation of data about change, rate of change, etc. within a particular feature or set of features.

Computer evaluation of gesture may be divided into the tasks of measurement, segmentation, identification, andtaxonomy. What are the elements of...

Play for Me (Interproviplaytion III)

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: Play for Me (Interproviplaytion III) by Christopher Dobrian

For flutes and interactive computer audio processing

Premiered by Beate-Gabriela Schmitt

Direct Current

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: Direct Current by Christopher Dobrian with Kei Akagai, for synthesizer

Networked music performance: An introduction for musicians and educators

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Networked music performance: An introduction for musicians and educators

Aesthetic Considerations in the Use of “Virtual” Music Instruments

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Computer-mediated music control devices compell us to reexaminethe relationship between performer and sound, thenature and complexity of which is theoretically unlimited.This essay attempts to formulate some of the key aestheticissues raised by the use of new control interfaces in thedevelopment of new musical works and new performanceparadigms: mapping the gesture-sound relationship,identifying successful uses of “virtual” instruments,questioning the role of “interactivity” in performance, andpositing future areas of exploration.

originally submitted for the CHI Workshop on New Interfaces for Musical Expression, April 1 & 2, 2001, Seattle, WA, USA, accepted for the Workshop on Current Research Directions in Computer Music, Institut Universitari de l'Audiovisual, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain, 2001, also presented in the national conference of the Society for Electro-Acoustic Music in the United States (SEAMUS), Iowa City, Iowa, USA, April 2002, and published...

Insta-pene-playtion (Interproviplaytion II)

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: Insta-pene-playtion (Interproviplaytion II) by Christopher Dobrian

For computer-processed flute

Features flute excerpts performed by James Newton

There's Just One Thing You Need To Know

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score and audio recording of: There's Just One Thing You Need To Know by Christopher Dobrian

For computer piano and computer-mediated synthesizer

Premiered by Daniel Koppelman

for instance, today

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Score composed for 2-site performance as part of Virtual Tour: A Reduced Carbon Footprint Concert Series (2013)

New Polyphonies: Score Streams, Improvisation and Telepresence

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The author discusses "score streams," a compositional method in which notations are displayed dynamically on computer screens and interpreted by improvisers. These works are informed by contemporary explorations in telematic performance and by the many methods devised over the past half century in composer-improviser traditions, where works by individuals are understood as catalysts for profoundly collaborative real-time acts of creation. Referencing polyphony both literally and metaphorically, the author points to a richly generative dialogue between recent histories of improvised music and new forms of digital networking technologies. ©2010 ISAST.

Line/Phase Minutiae

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: Line/Phase Minutiae by Christopher Dobrian

For Yamaha Disklavier (computer-controlled piano)

Determining the Feasibility of Networked Musical Performances over WANs, LANs, and WLANs (Part 1: MIDI)

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

In this study we combined empirical data about latency (delays) inherent in the transmission of information via the Internet with psychoacoustic information about the ability of musical performers to synchronize their playing and discern independent musical events. We used this information to determine the feasibility of conducting networked musical performances over local-area networks (LANs), wireless localareanetworks (WLANs), and even wide-areanetworks (WANs), including performance ofmusic that requires relatively tight synchrony of events. The experimental psychoacoustic and performance data we collected implies that successful rhythmically-synchronized networkedperformances can occur if the network latency is less than the time needed to perceive musical events as simultaneous, and less than the ability of the players to synchronize. These stipulations were usually met in performances involving MIDI transmission between two locations thatare less than 400 miles apart (where...

This and That

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score and audio recording of: This and That by Christopher Dobrian

Two pieces for trumpet, bass, and piano

Written for and premiered by Bobby Rodriguez, trumpet; Darek Oles, bass; and Kei Akagi, piano

Trans (Interproviplaytion V)

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: Trans (Interproviplaytion V) by Christopher Dobrian

For electric guitar and interactive computer audio processing

Premiered by the composer, Christopher Dobrian

all nearness pauses, while a star can grow

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score for 12 musicians at 2 locations, composed for Changing Tides 2: A telematic translocational concert, 2020, between San Diego, CA/USA and Seoul, South Korea

Entropy

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: Entropy by Christopher Dobrian

For Yamaha Disklavier (computer-controlled piano) and computer graphics

The Rumpus

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Score for tenor sax, trombone, bass and drums

Haibun

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: Haibun for shakuhachi and jazz trio

Written for and premiered by Kojiro Umezaki, shakuhachi; Kei Agai, piano; Darek Oles, bass; Tamaya Honda, drums

Includes notes on the formal and harmonic structure by the composer

(Cycles) America

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: (Cycles) America by Kojiro Umeaki

Written for Joseph Gramley

For vibraphone, cymbals, bass drum, and electronics

Includes: program notes and performance notes by the composer

Zipped file contains backing tracks

Gestural Control of Music Using the Vicon 8 Motion Capture System

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

This article reports on a project that uses unfettered gestural motion for expressive musical purposes. The project involvesthe development of, and experimentation with, software to receive data from a Vicon motion capture system, and to translate and map that data into data for the control of music and other media such as lighting. In addition to the commercially standard MIDI—which allows direct control ofexternal synthesizers, processors, and other devices—other mappings are used for direct software control of digital audio and video. This report describes the design and implementation of the software, discusses specific experiments performed with it, and evaluates its application in terms of aesthetic pros and cons.

Far Cries: Part 1, Ansan

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Telematic composition composed for the concert Changing Tides, 2016, between San Diego, CA/USA and Ansan, South Korea

In the In-Between

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score and audio recording of: In the In-Between by Christopher Dobrian

For trombone, bass, and piano.

Written for and premiered by Michael Dessen, trombone; Darek Oles, bass; and Kei Akagi, piano

For Zero

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: For Zero by Kojiro Umezaki

Commissioned by and written for Joseph Gramley

For vibraphone, cymbals, bass drum, electronics, and (optional) mobile devices

Includes: program notes and performance notes by the composer

Zipped file contains various backing tracks

EXPRESSIVE GESTURE : A TECHNIQUE FOR THE USE OF GESTURE DESCRIPTORS IN ALGORITHMIC IMPROVISATION

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music often conveys a sense of “gesture”, anevocation of motion and energy, which makes it dramatic, exciting, and expressive. One common challenge in the production of algorithmically-generated computer music is the question of how to imbue the sound with the excitement and vitality of liveperformance. In the case of interactive computer music, one has the additional challenge of programming the computer to interpret the expressive qualities of musicbeing performed in real time. This lecture presents an approach to automaticallyanalyzing and characterizing gesture in musical sound, as a way of improving a computer’s interaction with a human performer in a live improvisation. By describing music as patterns of changing parametric data, the computer can store and categorize descriptors of musical gestures. As an extension of that research, we can then consider how derivatives of that analysis data—the ways in which the data changes over time—characterize thegestural quality of...

Shadow Play

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: Shadow Play for piano trio by Christopher Dobrian

Written for and premiered by the Trio Céleste (Iryna Krechkovsky, violin; Ross Gasworth, violoncello; Kevin Loucks, piano)

For violin, violoncello, and piano

18 Points of Coincidence

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: 18 Points of Coincidence by Christopher Dobrian, with Kei Akagi.

For jazz piano and orchestra

Indignant Minority Scheme

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Audio recording of: Indignant Minority Scheme for flute and iPad by Christopher Dobrian, with Nicole Mitchell

For flute and iPad

Premiered by Nicole Mitchell and Christopher Dobrian

Falsetas Móviles

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: Falsetas Móviles by Christopher Dobrian

For solo guitar

Includes program notes by the composer

I, Alone

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: I, Alone by Christopher Dobrian

For violoncello solo

Riley's Revenge

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: Riley's Revenge by Christopher Dobrian

For alto sax, tenor sax, guitar, bass, piano, and drums

Now & Tomorrow

Fri, 13 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Music score of: Now & Tomorrow by Christopher Dobrian

For flute and guitar

Forget the Pixel

Tue, 20 Jul 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Concert length score for trombone, computer, bass and drums