Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-v2bm5 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-11T11:41:41.890Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Weak Interactions, Strong Bonds: Live electronics as a complex system

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2023

Oded Ben-Tal*
Affiliation:
Kingston University, Kingston, UK

Abstract

This article examines works for live, interactive electronics from the perspective of complex dynamic systems, placing the human–computer interaction within a wider set of relationships. From this perspective, composing equates to constructing a complex system with the performer(s) and the computer as key players within a wider network of interdependence. Using the author’s own compositions as examples, this article investigates the utility of a system view on interactive, live electronics.

Type
Review Article
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ben-Tal, O. 2012. Characterising Musical Gestures. Musicae Scientiae 16(3): 247–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ben-Tal, O. and Wilkins, C. 2013. Improvisation as a Creative Dialogue. Perspectives of New Music 51(1): 2139.Google Scholar
Bonardi, A. and Barthélemy, J. 2008. The Preservation, Emulation, Migration, and Virtualization of Live Electronics for Performing Arts: An Overview of Musical and Technical Issues. Journal on Computing and Cultural Héritage (JOCCH) 1(1): 116.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collins, N. 2011. Machine Listening in SuperCollider. In Wilson, S., Cottle, D. and Collins, N. (eds.) The SuperCollider Book. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 439–62.Google Scholar
Cook, N. 2000. Analysing Musical Multimedia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Croft, J. 2007. Theses on Liveness. Organised Sound 12(1): 5966.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Csikszentmihalyi, M. 1996. Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics.Google Scholar
Drummond, J. 2009. Understanding Interactive Systems. Organised Sound 14(2): 124–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Emmerson, S. 2017. Living Electronic Music. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hartmann, W. M. 1985. The frequency-domain grating. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 78(4): 1421–5.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hoffman, G. and Weinberg, G. 2010. Shimon: An Interactive Improvisational Robotic Marimba Player. CHI’10 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 3097–102.Google Scholar
Hsu, W. 2010. Strategies for Managing Timbre and Interaction in Automatic Improvisation Systems. Leonardo Music Journal 20: 33–9. https://doi.org/10.1162/LMJ_a_00010 (accessed 25 November 2022).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, G. E. 2000. Too Many Notes: Computers, Complexity and Culture in Voyager. Leonardo Music Journal 10: 33–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marr, D. 1982. Vision: A Computational Investigation into the Human Representation and Processing of Visual Information. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Marsden, A. 2016. Music Analysis by Computer: Ontology and Epistemology. In Meredith, D. (ed.) Computational Music Analysis. Heidelberg: Springer, 328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McClamrock, R. 1991. Marr’s Three Levels: A Re-Evaluation. Minds and Machines 1(2): 185–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reybrouck, M. 2020. Music as Epistemic Construct: From Sonic Experience to Musical Sense-Making. Leonardo Music Journal 30: 19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ribeiro, M. I. 2004. Kalman and Extended Kalman Filters: Concept, Derivation and Properties. Institute for Systems and Robotics 43: 46.Google Scholar
Risset, J. C. 1999. Composing in real-time? Contemporary Music Review 18(3): 31–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rowe, R. 1996. Incrementally Improving Interactive Music Systems. Contemporary Music Review 13(2): 4762.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Savery, R., Zahray, L. and Weinberg, G. 2021. Shimon Sings-Robotic Musicianship Finds Its Voice. In Miranda, E. R. (ed.) Handbook of Artificial Intelligence for Music: Foundations, Advanced Approaches, and Developments for Creativity. Springer International Publishing, 823–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stroppa, M. 1999. Live Electronics or… Live Music? Towards a Critique of Interaction. Contemporary Music Review 18(3): 4177.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sturm, B. L. 2017. The “Horse” Inside: Seeking Causes Behind the Behaviors of Music Content Analysis Systems. Computers in Entertainment (CIE) 14(2): 132.Google Scholar
van der Schyff, D., Schiavio, A., Walton, A., Velardo, V. and Chemero, A. 2018. Musical Creativity and the Embodied Mind: Exploring the Possibilities of 4E Cognition and Dynamical Systems Theory. Music and Science, 1. https://doi.org/10.1177/2059204318792319 (accessed 25 November 2022).CrossRefGoogle Scholar