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Giles Bowkett gave a standing-ovation receiving talk at RubyFringe in 2008 on his Ruby-based algorithmic MIDI generation framework, Archaeopteryx. http://www.i

Giles Bowkett gave a standing-ovation receiving talk at RubyFringe in 2008 on his Ruby-based algorithmic MIDI generation framework, Archaeopteryx. http://www.infoq.com/presentations/archaeopteryx-bowkett http://www.infoq.com/presentations/archaeopteryx-bowkett I cannot recommend this talk enough. First off, he was way ahead of the curve on this, tech-wise. For this article to not mention him is frustrating. Secondly, Giles was both hilarious and inspiring. His presentation kept people in rapture; 10 minutes into lunch, not one person in the room left.

xutopia 13y ago
That talk capture the feeling of the entire conference so well. If only more conferences were as good as that one.
adw 13y ago
I've met one of the performers in the article; he was doing this (in SuperCollider, largely) back in at least 2004 if not earlier. Not diminishing how awesome Giles is, but it wasn't original in '08. It may not have been original in '98.
- yaxu 13y ago
  Yes we've been doing it since 2000 (http://slub.org http://slub.org), I haven't actually used supercollider in performance though I don't think, I just used it for a perl.com article once. This is not the future of electronic music, but now we've given it a stupid name people seem to be more interested..
  - lewispollard 13y ago
    Just want to say you were awesome at algorave - wish I was good enough/fast enough in emacs to start doing stuff like this!
    - yaxu 13y ago
      Thanks, it went pretty well although I wasn't expecting to play solo, was supposed to be working with a live drummer but he had troubles finding the venue.
      - lewispollard 13y ago
        I wondered what had happened to him - was looking forward to seeing him play, would have been an incredible result I reckon. Any chance of that actually happening?
        yaxu 13y ago
        Yes, tonight in Sheffield at prism 15 http://www.prismsheffield.co.uk http://www.prismsheffield.co.uk
  - adw 13y ago
    Yeah, I was referring to Nick. (I really admire what you guys do, but when I played out I was an Ableton guy, I'm afraid...)
AlgoBLAH 13y ago
https://ccrma.stanford.edu/~blackrse/algorithm.html https://ccrma.stanford.edu/~blackrse/algorithm.html Oh please; there is a very long history of algorithmic derived music before computers and just after they appeared up to present day.... "All this has happened before, and all of it will happen again." The YouTube audio links in that article sound just like what it sounded like 10 years ago. I ralphed when the live coding manifesto was released... I've been a long time SuperCollider user too.... I mean continue... It's just nothing new or that compelling in this format / live coding, etc.. edit: Giles can be fun though, but it's been a while.. I attended a presentation of his back around then on his efforts.. :)
- jamesbritt 13y ago
  * It's just nothing new or that compelling in this format / live coding, etc..* It's interesting because some things have changed. There are more tools like SuperCollider, and they have become easier to install and on more platforms. And devices have become more powerful, reducing latency and unintended glitches due to processing requirements. There also seems to be more languages people can use for this. And more people seem to know about it. So with all that you would expect to hear of more interesting things being done. It feels, though, that the practitioners are prone to getting caught up in the pseudo-novelty (novel, at least, to them) of how it is done at the expense of creating music that presents some engaging development arc. Reminds me of music created by some aleatoric process (Cage's I Ching stuff, perhaps). Interesting to think about and to discuss, less interesting to actually listen to for very long.
  - AlgoBLAH 13y ago
    >Reminds me of music created by some aleatoric process (Cage's I Ching stuff, perhaps). Interesting to think about... It probably wouldn't come with any surprise that I favor Harry Partch over Cage as far as modern American iconoclast composers go.. :) >It feels, though, that the practitioners are prone to getting caught up in the pseudo-novelty (novel, at least, to them) of how it is done at the expense of creating music that presents some engaging development arc. Indeed, this is the crux of the matter / critique as that was very apparent from the get go of the live coding (LC) movement. I think LC is a tool which can be useful at times for exploring different sounds, but is not well suited as a performance mechanism. There is no or little apparent composition process involved in what I have seen over 10 years of LC. The mechanism in itself does not make lasting art, but if used at bare minimum via the process of selection as part of a larger compositional process it is valid. I'm sure somewhere in the LC community this is happening, but it certainly isn't how the status quo operates or how LC is presented at large. In regard to TOPLAP et al; if you need to lead a "movement" with a manifesto to justify the musical output you're doing it wrong... Or in other words this movement like many before with leanings toward the avant-garde does not address that at the end of the day it's a handful of folks performing for other LC aficionados and no one else. One shouldn't need to buy into the manifesto to appreciate LC as art. In many ways by elevating LC to "movement status" it can capture and beguile a generation of computer musicians including HN readers who are new to computer music concepts & generative / algorithmic music. It's not the only game in town so to speak though I do have general respect for the immediatism aspect of LC as far as it aligns with the mechanism and performance in regard to just getting out there and "doing it". My experience and lifes work on the coding / performance side could be considered an antithesis to the LC movement; it's been a solo journey for me so far. My work has not been released yet though I may have been one of the first to build an alternative client / framework for SuperCollider ('02). It all started there and work continues today though it's branched beyond solely music / audio control, but I do hope to get back to music / performance applications and heck performing once the larger effort is released (and shock / gasp perhaps I'll make income to support the art side of things and future music-tech efforts).

xutopia 13y ago

That talk capture the feeling of the entire conference so well. If only more conferences were as good as that one.

adw 13y ago

I've met one of the performers in the article; he was doing this (in SuperCollider, largely) back in at least 2004 if not earlier. Not diminishing how awesome Giles is, but it wasn't original in '08. It may not have been original in '98.

yaxu 13y ago
Yes we've been doing it since 2000 (http://slub.org http://slub.org), I haven't actually used supercollider in performance though I don't think, I just used it for a perl.com article once. This is not the future of electronic music, but now we've given it a stupid name people seem to be more interested..
- lewispollard 13y ago
  Just want to say you were awesome at algorave - wish I was good enough/fast enough in emacs to start doing stuff like this!
  - yaxu 13y ago
    Thanks, it went pretty well although I wasn't expecting to play solo, was supposed to be working with a live drummer but he had troubles finding the venue.
    - lewispollard 13y ago
      I wondered what had happened to him - was looking forward to seeing him play, would have been an incredible result I reckon. Any chance of that actually happening?
      - yaxu 13y ago
        Yes, tonight in Sheffield at prism 15 http://www.prismsheffield.co.uk http://www.prismsheffield.co.uk
- adw 13y ago
  Yeah, I was referring to Nick. (I really admire what you guys do, but when I played out I was an Ableton guy, I'm afraid...)

AlgoBLAH 13y ago

https://ccrma.stanford.edu/~blackrse/algorithm.html https://ccrma.stanford.edu/~blackrse/algorithm.html Oh please; there is a very long history of algorithmic derived music before computers and just after they appeared up to present day.... "All this has happened before, and all of it will happen again." The YouTube audio links in that article sound just like what it sounded like 10 years ago. I ralphed when the live coding manifesto was released... I've been a long time SuperCollider user too.... I mean continue... It's just nothing new or that compelling in this format / live coding, etc.. edit: Giles can be fun though, but it's been a while.. I attended a presentation of his back around then on his efforts.. :)

jamesbritt 13y ago
* It's just nothing new or that compelling in this format / live coding, etc..* It's interesting because some things have changed. There are more tools like SuperCollider, and they have become easier to install and on more platforms. And devices have become more powerful, reducing latency and unintended glitches due to processing requirements. There also seems to be more languages people can use for this. And more people seem to know about it. So with all that you would expect to hear of more interesting things being done. It feels, though, that the practitioners are prone to getting caught up in the pseudo-novelty (novel, at least, to them) of how it is done at the expense of creating music that presents some engaging development arc. Reminds me of music created by some aleatoric process (Cage's I Ching stuff, perhaps). Interesting to think about and to discuss, less interesting to actually listen to for very long.
- AlgoBLAH 13y ago
  >Reminds me of music created by some aleatoric process (Cage's I Ching stuff, perhaps). Interesting to think about... It probably wouldn't come with any surprise that I favor Harry Partch over Cage as far as modern American iconoclast composers go.. :) >It feels, though, that the practitioners are prone to getting caught up in the pseudo-novelty (novel, at least, to them) of how it is done at the expense of creating music that presents some engaging development arc. Indeed, this is the crux of the matter / critique as that was very apparent from the get go of the live coding (LC) movement. I think LC is a tool which can be useful at times for exploring different sounds, but is not well suited as a performance mechanism. There is no or little apparent composition process involved in what I have seen over 10 years of LC. The mechanism in itself does not make lasting art, but if used at bare minimum via the process of selection as part of a larger compositional process it is valid. I'm sure somewhere in the LC community this is happening, but it certainly isn't how the status quo operates or how LC is presented at large. In regard to TOPLAP et al; if you need to lead a "movement" with a manifesto to justify the musical output you're doing it wrong... Or in other words this movement like many before with leanings toward the avant-garde does not address that at the end of the day it's a handful of folks performing for other LC aficionados and no one else. One shouldn't need to buy into the manifesto to appreciate LC as art. In many ways by elevating LC to "movement status" it can capture and beguile a generation of computer musicians including HN readers who are new to computer music concepts & generative / algorithmic music. It's not the only game in town so to speak though I do have general respect for the immediatism aspect of LC as far as it aligns with the mechanism and performance in regard to just getting out there and "doing it". My experience and lifes work on the coding / performance side could be considered an antithesis to the LC movement; it's been a solo journey for me so far. My work has not been released yet though I may have been one of the first to build an alternative client / framework for SuperCollider ('02). It all started there and work continues today though it's branched beyond solely music / audio control, but I do hope to get back to music / performance applications and heck performing once the larger effort is released (and shock / gasp perhaps I'll make income to support the art side of things and future music-tech efforts).