5 ms·

For a fairer comparison, on the second page of the article there are some clips that sound much less wretched. It's hard to be sure whether a piece of music is

by gjm11 16y ago

For a fairer comparison, on the second page of the article there are some clips that sound much less wretched. It's hard to be sure whether a piece of music is any good on the basis of a sample less than a minute long, but FWIW I'd say they're fantastically impressive as productions of a computer program and distinctly unimpressive as serious musical compositions.

jacquesm 16y ago
They sound mostly like 'variations', not really compositions. I'm not sure if I can make the distinction clear because I'm not a composer and the difference is subtle, but a variation on a theme will not be the same as the theme but is a fairly logical derivative of one, whereas a composition takes place on a 'blank slate'. Now, of course this program - just like a real composer - works against a backdrop of the knowledge available about music of a given era. But when Bach wrote his first fugue it was a breakthrough, and even if after that each and every other fugue was linked back to that first one in a more or less direct way (some sound like close cousins, some are much further apart and some are different pieces altogether) then the act of creating such a variation is a composition of sorts. But when a composer speaks of a 'variation', he does so in a subtly different way than an ordinary person would, to a composer a variation is 'obvious' given the first few bars of the variation and the original piece. And that's what I'm getting at when I say these sound to me like variations. They're along an existing or at least familiar theme and they've changed. It's as though sampling has met classical music and it's bits of everything but not a 'whole' by itself. This is very tricky to put in to words. For a computer program though, it's definitely quite a step forward compared to the usual. Some of those pieces on the second page could have you fooled for a few seconds. The fact that some more modern composers make ear-splitting stuff doesn't help either because this computer program seems to be at least well ahead of some live humans :)
- eru 16y ago
  > But when Bach wrote his first fugue it was a breakthrough, and even if after that each and every other fugue was linked back to that first one [...] What makes you say that? Bach did not invent fugues, so why should his first fugue be a breakthrough--compared to other fugues--and why should every fugue henceforth go back to Bach's first fugue? (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugue#History http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugue#History)
  - jacquesm 16y ago
    I'm sorry, complete goof on my part, I was not aware of any fugues before the baroque period, and I saw Bach as their main proponent and originator, which was apparently completely wrong. As for the reference back, I meant to the principle of a fugue, as an original form. And not that original :) The wikipedia piece gives me a little bit of cover, it says "It was in the Baroque period that the writing of fugues became central to composition", but then goes on to list a whole slew of composers that got there before Bach did. So it's not even a fig-leaf. Thanks for the correction!
    - eru 16y ago
      Johann Sebastian Bach was even viewed as conservative and old-fashioned in his time. He was more well known as a teacher of music, but not as a great composer.
      - jacquesm 16y ago
        I guess that's some proof that you have to die first before you are appreciated fully. I'm sure grateful for all the works that 'mediocre' composer left for us to enjoy.

by gjm11 16y ago

jacquesm 16y ago

They sound mostly like 'variations', not really compositions. I'm not sure if I can make the distinction clear because I'm not a composer and the difference is subtle, but a variation on a theme will not be the same as the theme but is a fairly logical derivative of one, whereas a composition takes place on a 'blank slate'. Now, of course this program - just like a real composer - works against a backdrop of the knowledge available about music of a given era. But when Bach wrote his first fugue it was a breakthrough, and even if after that each and every other fugue was linked back to that first one in a more or less direct way (some sound like close cousins, some are much further apart and some are different pieces altogether) then the act of creating such a variation is a composition of sorts. But when a composer speaks of a 'variation', he does so in a subtly different way than an ordinary person would, to a composer a variation is 'obvious' given the first few bars of the variation and the original piece. And that's what I'm getting at when I say these sound to me like variations. They're along an existing or at least familiar theme and they've changed. It's as though sampling has met classical music and it's bits of everything but not a 'whole' by itself. This is very tricky to put in to words. For a computer program though, it's definitely quite a step forward compared to the usual. Some of those pieces on the second page could have you fooled for a few seconds. The fact that some more modern composers make ear-splitting stuff doesn't help either because this computer program seems to be at least well ahead of some live humans :)

eru 16y ago
> But when Bach wrote his first fugue it was a breakthrough, and even if after that each and every other fugue was linked back to that first one [...] What makes you say that? Bach did not invent fugues, so why should his first fugue be a breakthrough--compared to other fugues--and why should every fugue henceforth go back to Bach's first fugue? (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugue#History http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugue#History)
- jacquesm 16y ago
  I'm sorry, complete goof on my part, I was not aware of any fugues before the baroque period, and I saw Bach as their main proponent and originator, which was apparently completely wrong. As for the reference back, I meant to the principle of a fugue, as an original form. And not that original :) The wikipedia piece gives me a little bit of cover, it says "It was in the Baroque period that the writing of fugues became central to composition", but then goes on to list a whole slew of composers that got there before Bach did. So it's not even a fig-leaf. Thanks for the correction!
  - eru 16y ago
    Johann Sebastian Bach was even viewed as conservative and old-fashioned in his time. He was more well known as a teacher of music, but not as a great composer.
    - jacquesm 16y ago
      I guess that's some proof that you have to die first before you are appreciated fully. I'm sure grateful for all the works that 'mediocre' composer left for us to enjoy.