From Experiments in Musical Intelligence to Emily Howell

FROM EXPERIMENTS IN MUSICAL

INTELLIGENCE TO EMILY HOWELL

The Work of David Cope

CAREER CONTEXT

The composer

… Professor at UC Santa Cruz

… Author of books on

Musical intelligence (6)

Twentieth-century music (2)

… Teacher Algorithmic composition

20th-century analytical methods

… Composer Uses several mediums

Writes works in groups, cycles

Recent works are assisted by Emily Howell

The programs… EMI (Exp Mus Int)

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EXPERIMENTS IN MUSICAL INTELLIGENCE

1990-2006

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DATA ANALYSIS PHASE

Select a repertory (one composer, one genre)

Encode several pieces

Parse them into five elements of musical grammar

… Statements

… Preparations

… Extensions

… Antecedents

… Consequents

Discover and store “signatures” (identify “earmarks”)

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SIGNATURES IN THE SPEAC GRAMMAR

Are relatively short (2-5 events)

Are shorter than themes

Are stored with approach and departure info

Are described by intervallic relationships

Are not described by key or mode

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LISTENING TO SPEAC EXAMPLES

Bach invention

Joplin rag

Mozart Violin Concerto, movement 3

Gershwin

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COMPOSING NEW WORKS

User selects a composer

User selects a genre

User selects a key and mode

User selects a meter

Emmy generates one (or many) new work(s)

User discards what he does not want

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WAYS OF EXPERIENCING EMMY

Listening to MIDI performances

Listening to live performances

Viewing the notated music

Performing the music

http://artsites.ucsc.edu/faculty/cope/mp3page.htm

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REACTIONS TO EMI

From MIDI files

“mechanical”

Too fast

Too slow

Too soft

Too loud

Not human

From live concerts

That’s by a computer?

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Emmy-Beethoven Symphony

COMPUTER MODELS AND HIDDEN STRUCTURE

2005-2009

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COMPUTER MODELS OF MUSICAL CREATIVITY

Initiates process of signature capture from interactive user responses

Evolves its own lexicons

Models broader processes of grammatically-founded processes including

… Speech

… Poetry

… Lyrics

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HIDDEN STRUCTURE

Takes comprehensive view of 20th-century analytical concepts

Makes them available for compositional algorithms

… Post-tonal music

… Generative algorithms

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EMILY HOWELL2010—

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EMILY HOWELL

Debuted in March 2010

Represents the second incarnation of Emmy

Composes modern, original music

http://www.miller-mccune.com/culture-society/triumph-of-the-cyborg-composer-8507/

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PIECES BY EMILY HOWELL

From Darkness, Light

Land of Stone

Shadow Worlds

http://www.centaurrecords.com/

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