10:00 Keynote, Cheever Hall

A theory of electronic instruments — Joel Chadabe

With a historical perspective in mind and knowing that original electronic instruments are often inseparable from the music they produce, one might ask what are the possibilities in designing new instruments. One answer can emerge from a taxonomy of instrumental behavior from deterministic to interactive. Another answer might focus on performance, taking into account general system principles such as the connections between controls and variables. Yet another answer might speculate on the benefits to the performer in performing with a specific instrument. This talk, including stories, will attempt to describe the universe of choice in electronic instrument design.

11:30 Morning Session, Cheever Hall

Cybernetic Traces: Video Games as Dynamic Musical Scores — Paul Turowski

This presentation examines various aspects of the use of video games as a model for reactive musical scores. First, I contextualize such a practice by presenting relevant precedents, concepts, and terminology. I then focus on the development process and discuss motivations, methods, and various technical considerations—including the utilization of Kyma for real-time sound generation. Finally, I discuss the performance process and beyond, including possibilities and plans for future development.

The Relationship between Cinematic Design and Performative Actions in Interactive Music Performance — Chi Wang

In this presentation, I will analyze and contrast performances between the movements of the pen, hand and fingers during a musical performance that employs a Wacom tablet and the different strokes of the brush during the process of creating a Chinese calligraphy composition. I will also demonstrate and reveal the expressivity and nuance of the visual and cinematic drama that is executed in the rectangular performance space provided by the tablet.

14:00 Afternoon Session I, Cheever Hall

The Cinematics of Musical Performance with Data-driven Instruments — Jeffrey Stolet

15:30 Afternoon Session II, Cheever Hall

The Orrery beneath Returning to Unknown Worlds — Scott Miller

The concept of an orrery—which is a mechanical model of the solar system—provides a sturdy yet flexible structure for improvisational works that incorporate interactive and dynamic audio processing, as well as other variable or unknown elements. Our (Miller, Monhart, and Wiessinger) approach to creating Returning to Unknown Worlds required this. In addition to incorporating improvisation and interactive processing, it is a work of live cinema, involving an unknown visual structure with a “secret” narrative, known only to the film creator. The orrery approach enables improvisers to perform such as this based on a structural narrative of exploration, sonically revealing an unknown world they’ve also created, exploiting coincidental parallels with the visual elements and creating a counterpoint between sight and sound.

Generative algorithms in AQULAQUTAQU — Madison Heying & Kristin Erickson

In this presentation we will detail our implementation of three generative algorithms in Kyma. The first is a multi-dimensional cellular automata based on Conway’s Game of Life. The second is a polyphonic sequencer that utilizes an algorithmic model of a Koch Curve. The third is a Kyma sound based on the Mandelbrot Set. We will also discuss our use of L-systems parallel re-writing algorithms to generate the text.

17:00 Concert, Black Box Theatre

Voyage to the other shore — Churan Feng. Churan Feng, Kyma

Voyage to the Other Shore is an interactive music piece. I am an international student and I come from South China coast line, studying here in the Northwest America coast line. The meaning of “other shore” for me could be either to the further land or homeland. Through more than two years, I have learned and experienced things from my school, daily life, social media and culture here in U.S. All of these interest me and also are the motivations of this piece.

Using the Microsoft Xbox 360 Kinect sensor to be the interface of performing, this will be a live performance piece. The device reads human body as different dots which have their own spatial data. With this advance, musical parameters will be triggered by the input data.

Voices, instruments and field recordings in both U.S. and China are used as samples for the music. Seeking to create an ambience that how different cultures impact me, this piece is more like a timeline of the almost three years story, closing with the end of my journey in America, and voyaging back to the other shore of homeland.

Mind Meld — Samuel Pellman. Samuel Pellman, Kyma; Ella Gant, video artist

A collaboration can occur when the patterns of thought in one mind first find resonance in the patterns of thought of another mind. As these patterns of thought converge a unity of expression emerges, and the constituent minds become indistinguishable. Artists Gant and Pellman have collaborated on a number of image/sound works over the years and have team-taught several classes. Often they complete one another’s sentences. In the piece MindMeld they seek to bring the members of the audience as well as the all-encompassing Mind of Kyma into a state of unitary consciousness. (Obligatory music theory blurb: the sounds are tuned in 7-limit just intonation and the piece is infested with polymetric Euclidean rhythms.)

Cut-Up — Glen Hall & Katie Mullen. Glen Hall, saxophone, flute, Kyma; Catherine Mullen, video

Cut-Up: The Terminal Beach is a visual/audio interpretation of a cut-up poem by Glen Hall based on a J. G. Ballard story. The Terminal Beach is an elegy to nuclear test sites and their ‘irradiation’ of our collective subconscious. A montage of archival video and photo images by Catherine Mullen and live improvised instrumental and electroacoustic sound by Glen Hall (Kyma, bass flute, tenor saxophone, percussion): their artistic imaginations encounter the geographic locales of unimaginable releases of energy.

Decay — Franz Danksagmüller & Jim Joyce. Franz Danksagmüller, Kyma; Pat Strange, violin; Rich O’Donnell, percussion; Jim Brashear, voice; Jim Joyce, video

For a long time, I’ve been fascinated by the poetry, the beauty but also the repulsiveness of decaying things. Therefore I was very happy that James Joyce agreed to make a film about this theme.

The score for this film is a mixture of traditional and graphic notation and improvisation.

Bugger — Jim Brashear. Jim Brashear, voice & Kyma

This is Bugger’s first appearance. He likes you and thanks you for listening. Feel free to tap a toe, shake a booty, upload a video, make a face, or take a nap. You deserve it. Bears welcome! (No, not the animal kind.)

Bugger = Kyma + Live + Avenue + voice. Also = www.soundslikebugger.com.

 

Biographies of Presenters and Performers