Post millennial music is sux, it’s lost its magic. With the help of code. I can save it.

anarchyboyempire

I have an idea to save music from its post millennial dark age. Current music is stale, soulless, unexciting. I love music and I want to bring it back to life. I know how!

First, a little background.

Until 150 years ago music was magical because it was ephemeral. Weather we’re talking about Sudanese clave music of 1500bc or Wagners 1851 classic “Ride of the Valkyries”. All music belonged purely to moment it was being performed. After that it was gone. No, YouTube, no iTunes, no MP3s. A song could never be experienced the same way twice as no two performances could ever be exactly same. It was not uncommon for "songs" to be 45 + min long.

In 1877 recorded music changed all this, completely. For the first time in history music could be written then recorded once and that exact same recording could be replayed and experienced an INFANATE amount of times. People’s appreciation for music shrunk, songs became 3 min long.

Electronic music, the most popular music today, when “performed” what we are hearing is pre-recorded tracks being chopped up and manipulated to give the illusion of spontaneous performance. Each performance is almost exactly the same and the “performances” are freely available on online and can be listened to an infinite amount of times. Whats worse, electronic music and its "grid like" structure has become very very formulaic and predictable. This is BORING. I want spontaneity, chaos I want the moment back!

Where did the magic go? I want it back! What if we could reverse this? What if music could be created an infinite amount of times, yet only experienced once?

The music I want is:

A) Completely spontaneous.

B) Unrestricted by time constraints.

C) Personalized.

D) Does not demand FULL attention (can think over it).

E) Cannot be copied, replicated.

X) Chaotic, uu-predictable (by today's standards).

Now, on to my super genius revolutionary idea

My idea is to create an online (Cloud based?) service that streams an original collage of sounds specific to the users requirements. The user would log in, specify what they want (eg, I am going for a 45min run, or I am studying for 30 min). The code would process this information, compare it with the users past likes, (soundcloud, spotify ect), compare with uses environmental information (location, weather, season) Then pass this through a bunch of if/else statements, switch statements, trigger certain loops and sound effects in a completely random, unique way. Use Noise to shift through the notes of a scale? Chord structures nested inside four loops? Drum loops stored inside of tables? Certain classes based on locations and seasons? I want to craft an intimate musical experience that could only be experienced ONE time, next time the user logs in the algorithm may be similar but completely different.

Using and automated system to compose, or “Generative Music”, is nothing new. Most processing users know that using a few very simple rules can create something infinitely complex, Steve Reichs “its gonna rain” for example. Creating a constantly changing un unpredictable musical texture. One could look at it as an underlying “background feature” to ones environment. It would be like having a personalized soundtrack to your life.

I’ve had this idea for ages, and it wont go away, (Dammit!). I don’t think this could ever be the next big thing” or whatever I don’t really care about that… I wish to explore this out of curiosity just to see if it can be done and what happens when. My main concern is the development side of things. I am a musician and sound technologist. Also an amature coder, I have intermediate knowledge of processing, puredata and max/MSP. I could get the ball rolling but, I lack the experience to develop this from start to end, I would need to employ a few developers to get this done. From January I’m taking 1 year off, I have enough money. The challenge would be to get the thing online before I run out of time and money. Lol.

So yeah, I’m interested in getting others opinion on this.

How difficult would this beast be to develop?

How much time roughly would I require?

What would be the best language/IDE to code in?

What people with what skills would I need to find?

Where would I find them?

What would be a fair price to pay them?

Is this a good idea?

Am I completely crazy?

Gracciiis!!

mcspud

This is a good idea. I have had similar ideas. However, it would be pretty hard to make it actually sound good.

Here's some pretty good music: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/

Chrisir

it's an AI-based composer who works immediately and streams the play

Chrisir

http://on1.zkm.de/zkm/stories/storyReader$7309

Chrisir

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algorithmic_composition

tobor

go for in-depth maxMSP it will answer to all these needs

A) Completely spontaneous.

B) Unrestricted by time constraints.

C) Personalized.

D) Does not demand FULL attention (can think over it).

E) Cannot be copied, replicated.

X) Chaotic, uu-predictable (by today's standards).

Chrisir

Did you see this one:

http://forum.processing.org/two/discussion/4023/loligo-music-from-pixels/p1

tobor

Also Open Music could help you. From my point of view (14 years with Max and Open Music) you better start with a language that is dedicated to music rather than Processing. Algorithmic/experimental music can be worked out with any language, but the tools readily available in languages like max, oM, pd and super collider, are many and very complex and it would be meaningless to rewrite from scratch stuff that is already there. (example, how to make a canon for imitation, or, create rhythmic cells, or work with serial stuff, or analyse birdsongs with fft, and transform that data into a musical score)..

I see processing a step further and not a place to start with, generative music.

Open music is very music oriented, it's a graphical language coming from common Lisp and quite easy to work with (easier than max). Of course it asks musical knowledge.

I suggest you to take your time and learn those language and not rely on other people to write your code. Once you will master these softwares you will be able to make your music anyway you want :)

Electronic music, the most popular music today, when “performed” what we are hearing is pre-recorded tracks being chopped up and manipulated to give the illusion of spontaneous performance. Each performance is almost exactly the same and the “performances” are freely available on online and can be listened to an infinite amount of times. Whats worse, electronic music and its "grid like" structure has become very very formulaic and predictable. This is BORING. I want spontaneity, chaos I want the moment back!>

this is true for dance but not for experimental music, which from the very beginning avoided repetition (i mean real experimental music, not DJs or kids with ableton live) In my work music I always create algorithms, never work with sequencers. the literature of experimental music is very vast it could help you to see and hear the state of the art.

(ps Open Music is free)

http://repmus.ircam.fr/openmusic/overview