Tutorial

MUME Tutorial at Goldsmiths, University of London Monday 30th of June 2014.

The slides for the tutorial are available for download, links in the program below.

MUME Tutorial at NIME 2014 (3 hours)

Monday 30th of June 2014, 2pm-5pm.

The MUME tutorial is free of charge for NIME attendees. If you donï¿½t wish to register for the full conference you can register for a single day pass (ï¿½75 students, ï¿½135). This gets you access to one day of the conference (1st-3rd July), plus free access to the workshops (30th June), e.g., the MUME tutorial in the afternoon and another workshop of your choice in the morning (see workshop list here: http://www.nime2014.org/technical-programme/workshops/). Of course, this also applies for those who are registered for more than one day of the main conference.

Register for the conference: http://www.nime2014.org/registration/. In addition to registering for the conference please email Nicolas Gonzalez Thomas to secure your place at the MUME tutorial.

Speakers

Philippe Pasquier, School of Interactive Arts and Technology (SIAT), Simon Fraser University (SFU)
Arne Eigenfeldt, School for the Contemporary Arts (SIAT), Simon Fraser University (SFU)
Oliver Bown, Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning, University of Sydney

Description

This three hour tutorial aims at introducing the field of musical metacreation (MUME) and its current developments, promises, and challenges, with a particular focus on NIME-relevant aspects of the field.

Thanks to continued progress in artistic and scientific research, a new possibility has emerged in our musical relationship with technology: Musical Metacreation. MUME involves using tools and techniques from artificial intelligence, artificial life, and machine learning, themselves often inspired by cognitive and life sciences, to endow machines with musical creativity. Concretely, it brings together artists, practitioners and researchers interested in developing systems that autonomously (or interactively) recognize, learn, represent, compose, complete, accompany, or interpret musical data.

Besides introducing the field of musical metacreation (MUME) and its current developments, the tutorial will bring to the front NIME-relevant aspects of the field, such as: musical interfaces for the collaboration between human performers and creative software “partners”, the development of interfaces and instrument that foster and support computer-assisted musical creativity.

Program

Talks will take the form of State of the Art presentations followed by Q&A and discussion time.

Name that MuMe: Introduction to Musical Metacreation (20 mins)
- Philippe Pasquier, Arne Eigenfeldt, Oliver Bown
MuMe and Variation: Classification, Ontology and Autonomy (20 mins + 10 mins Q&A)
With examples of concert works and other generative systems from the MUME-WE concert series.
- Arne Eigenfeldt
Walking on the MuMe: Interfaces for Design, Performance and Creative MuMeing (20 mins + 10 mins Q&A)
- Oliver Bown

[10 minute break]

Fruits of the MuMe:: Current approaches, including Evolutionary Computation, Machine Learning and Statistical Methods, Heuristic and Expert Systems (30 mins + 10 mins Q&A)
- Philippe Pasquier, Oliver Bown
A Kind of MuMe: Evaluation of MuMe Systems, Present and Future (20 mins + 10 mins Q&A)
- Presentation of Evaluation methods and trends based on concrete examples
- Philippe Pasquier, Arne Eigenfeldt, Oliver Bown

MuMe Over (20 mins)
- Critical discussion and future directions (open discussion led by tutorial organisers)

Audience and Registration:

The tutorial is meant to be equally appealing to experienced researchers that are dealing with generative systems, as well as those who are less familiar with the field of generative music.

Register for the conference: http://www.nime2014.org/registration/. In addition to registering for the conference please email Nicolas Gonzalez Thomas to secure your place at the MUME tutorial.

Speakers

Dr. Oliver Bown
Lecturer, in the Design Lab,
The University of Sydney
Email Dr. Bown.

Ollie Bown is a researcher, programmer and electronic music maker. He creates and performs music as one half of the duo Icarus, and performs regularly as a laptop improviser in electronic and electroacoustic ensembles. He has worked with musicians such as Tom Arthurs, Lothar Ohlmeier and Maurizio Ravalico of the Not Applicable Artists, and Brigid Burke and Adem Ilhan of Fridge. Icarus’ 2012 album Fake Fish Distribution was released in 1000 unique digital variations. The band have produced remixes for electronic music pioneers such as Four Tet, Murcof and Caribou and recently produced software for an experimental live performance by Aphex Twin, premiered at the Barbican Hall in London in 2012. Ollie has performed at international festivals such as Sonic Acts (Amsterdam), the Sonic Arts Network Expo (UK) and AudioVisiva (Milan). He has designed interactive sound for installation projects by Squidsoup and Robococo, at venues such as the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, the Oslo Lux, the Vivid Festival, Sydney, and the Kinetica Art Fair, London. In his research role he was recently local co-chair of the 2013 International Conference on Computational Creativity and on the organising committee of the Musical Metacreation Workshop and events series, and is on the program committee for a number of conferences concerned with computers and creativity. He has a special interest in the evolution of human musical behaviour. He developed and maintains the Beads computer music library, a set of low-level tools for creating interactive and generative audio for Processing/Java.

Dr. Philippe Pasquier
Associate Professor, School of Interactive Arts + Technology (SIAT),
Simon Fraser University
Email Dr. Pasquier, or visit his website.

Philippe Pasquier is Associate Professor and Graduate Program Chair at Simon Fraser University’s School of Interactive Arts and Technology. He is both a scientist specialized in artificial intelligence and a multi-disciplinary artist. His contributions ranges from theoretical research in artificial intelligence, multi-agent systems and machine learning to applied artistic research and practice in digital art, computer music, and generative art. Philippe is the Chair and investigator of the AAAI series of international workshop on Musical Metacreation (MUME), the MUME-WE concerts series and the International workshop on Movement and Computation (MOCO). He has co-authored over 100 peer-reviewed contributions, presented in forums ranging from the most scientifically rigorous to the most creatively arty.

Dr. Arne Eigenfeldt
Associate Professor, The School for the Contemporary Arts,
Simon Fraser University
Email Dr. Eigenfeldt, or visit his website.

Arne Eigenfeldt is a composer of live electroacoustic music, and a researcher into intelligent generative music systems. His music has been performed around the world, and his collaborations range from Persian Tar masters to contemporary dance companies to musical robots. He has presented his research at conferences and festivals such as ICMC, SMC, ICCC, EMS, EvoMusArt, GECCO, and NIME. He teaches music technology at Simon Fraser University, and is the co-director of the MAMAS (Metacreation Agent and Multi-Agent Systems) Lab.

Publicity and Web chair:

Nicolas Gonzalez Thomas
MSc Student, School of Interactive Arts + Technology (SIAT),
Simon Fraser University
Email Nicolas..