KVR Audio

vurt · Post by **vurt** » Wed Jan 24, 2018 5:40 pm

if beethoven programmed the computer to do it, then id say it could be argued to be a beethoven composition.

if i programmed it then it would be me doing work in his style.

annode · Post by **annode** » Wed Jan 24, 2018 6:35 pm

Good point.
So what we are attempting to isolate is that which comes from the artist but is more or less elusive.
Maybe it's the artists style? But that can be pinned down or represented depending on the amount of data available. Music is a representation of decisions. The odd thing about musical decisions is that it is based on a personal collection of templates with which the artist uses as they assemble their music. I'll guess these templates might represent influences over their lifetime. How can a program assume that? I don't think it can unless the resultant decisions from these templates are put there by the artist.

CircuitEYE · Post by **CircuitEYE** » Wed Jan 24, 2018 7:04 pm

Finally, the grammys get it right.

jancivil · Post by **jancivil** » Wed Jan 24, 2018 8:33 pm

annode wrote:style? [] can be pinned down or represented depending on the amount of data available. Music is a representation of decisions. The odd thing about musical decisions is that it is based on a personal collection of templates with which the artist uses as they assemble their music. I'll guess these templates might represent influences over their lifetime. How can a program assume that? I don't think it can unless the resultant decisions from these templates are put there by the artist.

PRECISELY. An algorithm cannot think. It's beyond my pay grade to understand to what extent it's machinations can be guided in the abstract but until we get AI that believes it has experiences and memories (which cause it to emote), the human decision in time is what's happening as far as I'm concerned. This is a statement of a predisposition but it means my interest in 'generative' is never going to be deep I'm afraid.

CrystalWizard · Post by **CrystalWizard** » Wed Jan 24, 2018 10:34 pm

There is software that can analyze compositions and generate similar pieces. I don't have the references but i've seen a few article in Computer Music Journal about it. There are programs that can analyze and mix music. These are somewhat simple but will eventually become commonplace i think. I prefer humans doing those thing.
As for generative music i think the lines are somewhat blurry. As posted what if Eno designed the program he used to generate the music, then he edited it, then mixed it? (Evidently he did.) I would say he created the music, not that he composed it. That could be said about a lot of stuff that he has done.
He should have gotten a grammy for Another Green World IMO.

Steve Roach is "new age?" Hahaha

annode · Post by **annode** » Wed Jan 24, 2018 11:11 pm

@CrystalWizard - "Another Green World", that's reaching way back in time but certainly a fave LP.
I just found this on computer assisted composer style analysis;
http://artsites.ucsc.edu/faculty/cope/experiments.htm
EDIT : in addition - Emily Howell, a program that models musical creativity based on the types of creativity outlined by Margaret Boden in her book The Creative Mind: Myths and Mechanisms.
I posted the above for curiosity sake. Please don't start comments in this thread. Thanx.

CrystalWizard · Post by **CrystalWizard** » Thu Jan 25, 2018 1:04 am

annode wrote:@CrystalWizard - "Another Green World", that's reaching way back in time but certainly a fave LP.

Yes, it's older than some members of KVR. Not new age though.

I just found this on computer assisted composer style analysis;
http://artsites.ucsc.edu/faculty/cope/experiments.htm

Yes, he was mentioned in CMJ.

Back on topic- Does it make a difference that Eno used a computer to generate the content of Reflections but used older gear to do Discreet Music?

do_androids_dream · Post by **do_androids_dream** » Thu Jan 25, 2018 11:53 am

annode wrote:Putting Roach in the box with New Age is just sightless.
He makes and is well known for Tribal Ambient, Space Ambient and general Atmospheric Ambient.

I've never heard of Ambient being split into subgenres like that! I'm not saying I agree with the New Age tag, I'm saying that Steve Roach seems to have been labelled as New Age by many hence why I associate it with him (whether true or not).

do_androids_dream · Post by **do_androids_dream** » Thu Jan 25, 2018 11:56 am

And I have no problem with a generative piece being nominated. As long as there is a thinking mind behind setting it in motion then it's still just as valid. Think how many use a bit of generative stuff in their music - you could argue that a random LFO being used to control anything is similar. Many VSTi's have generative components or pre-sequenced stuff that the user has no control over.

jancivil · Post by **jancivil** » Thu Jan 25, 2018 11:08 pm

'New Age' functions as a bin in the record store. A lot of things will get tossed in there. Still, even though I can't imagine it's still a thing.

vurt · Post by **vurt** » Thu Jan 25, 2018 11:58 pm

anything with pan pipes, anything else there can be debate.
one note from a pan pipe your entire catalogue - new age.

(unless you are actually peruvian, then you get lumped in "world music" an even worse genre, in both name and definition. like justin bieber or depeche mode (to pick two random examples) aren't from the same world as king sunny ade or omar souleyman, although I have always suspected bieber was an alien...)

jancivil · Post by **jancivil** » Fri Jan 26, 2018 12:51 am

vurt wrote: one note from a pan pipe your entire catalogue - new age.

bieber is from canada if my understanding is correct. doesn't that make it british music or something

CrystalWizard · Post by **CrystalWizard** » Fri Jan 26, 2018 2:51 am

Hahaha last three posts.
And one before that is valid i think.

SODDI · Post by **SODDI** » Sat Jan 27, 2018 9:13 am

But it's a generative art work, meant to constantly evolve on its own. Freezing it into a 54 min, unchanging CD kind of changes the art form paradigm of generative art. If it should be awarded anything it should be for the generative music as it is presented - but then it isn't Grammy material.

I have not heard this for this very reason. Eno created it in formats that I do not have access to and I'm not going to buy a $700 phone so that I can play with Reflection ... It's OK. He's still interesting after listening to him 40+ years.

Winstontaneous · Post by **Winstontaneous** » Sun Jan 28, 2018 9:10 pm

Hey there Wizard!

My lovely wifey just bought me new re-mastered vinyl of Another Green World, Here Come the Warm Jets, and Before and After Science.

Eno is fond of saying that his approach is more gardening than architecture, and that his released work all the way back to the beginning is only a snapshot of how things sounded at that moment in time. So Reflection is just an extension of that method to a different medium (I have the app, not a CD or downloaded audio file).

CrystalWizard wrote:
annode wrote:@CrystalWizard - "Another Green World", that's reaching way back in time but certainly a fave LP.
Yes, it's older than some members of KVR. Not new age though.

I just found this on computer assisted composer style analysis;
http://artsites.ucsc.edu/faculty/cope/experiments.htm
Yes, he was mentioned in CMJ.

Back on topic- Does it make a difference that Eno used a computer to generate the content of Reflections but used older gear to do Discreet Music?

Brian Eno's generative recording 'Reflection' nominated for Grammy?!