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Music Media Technology

Resurrecting Performers Via Computer Performance 137

Posted by Zonk from the let-them-lie dept.
putko writes "The NYT has an article entitled 'Play It Again, Vladimir (via Computer)' that discusses efforts to transform old recordings into new, computer played performances (reg. required), by determining how the previous performer made the sounds and redoing it. Further efforts attempt to distill the 'style' of a performer and play other scores with the same style. As can be expected, musicologists argue over whether or not the new musical artifact is really 'a performance'. Philip K. Dick would be proud."
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Resurrecting Performers Via Computer Performance More

Resurrecting Performers Via Computer Performance

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  • How about no... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 05, 2005 @12:52AM (#12727351)
    Ask a piano player if a digital piano is a passable substitute. Yes it's pretty damn good... but still not the same...

    • Re:How about no... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by NanoGator ( 522640 )
      "Ask a piano player if a digital piano is a passable substitute. Yes it's pretty damn good... but still not the same..."

      It beats the silence played by a decomposing musician.
    • I think i'd be the first to bring up copyright issues.

      Will the remakes be copyright by the remakers, or the original authors of the song? (long since dead)

      This is definately a grey area as you're ripping off someone elses score (albiet they're dead) and you have no right to claim the reproducted score as your own.
    • Digital instruments cannot sound like the real thing, and they never will. As an organist, it annoys me to no end to hear companies like Allen and Rodgers claim that their "instruments" sound as good as real pipes. I like the analogy that using an electronic organ in church instead of a pipe organ is like replacing your pastor with a recorded sermon.
      • The analogy sounds flawed to me. After all, the instrument is not playing back a recording, whether it is analog or digital. A human is required to play the instrument regardless of the exact technology between the player and the listener; in itself it will just sit there and be silent.

        I also fail to understand what makes digital systems inherently incapable of sounding exactly the same as analog systems. But I've got no trouble with the idea that the choice of technology in itself is a matter of personal
    • As they're using a Yamaha Disklavier, it isn't a digitally reproduced sound, it is a regular hammers/strings/soundboard/pedals piano where the actions are computer-controlled.

      As a pianist who has attended the Piano e-Competitions http://www.piano-e-competition.com/ [piano-e-competition.com] I can tell you that the technology faithfully reproduces both recorded performances and live performances transmitted digitally over long distances.
    • A digital piano consists of the sounds of a piano incorporated into a silicon chip. Either as a recording or sampled recording of the actual instrument, or the parameters needed to drive a synthesizer into producing a piano sound. Every year brings the chips closer in sound to the real instrument.

      What makes the chip a 'passable substitue' for a piano is that a chip weighs at most a hundred grams while a piano weighs several hundred pounds.

      And, a chip that reproduces the sound of a piano costs at m

  • And the Point is??? (Score:4, Funny)

    by schestowitz ( 843559 ) on Sunday June 05, 2005 @12:53AM (#12727353) Homepage Journal
    Sinatra singing Oops I did it Again?

    There are some innovations which are novel, but aren't quite built to be of use.
    • Sinatra singing Oops I did it Again?

      Well, Richard Thompson has done a folksy Britney so there is precedent.

      This guy's quest seems a bit eccentric, so I say, "Good for him!" But I don't see a large market demographic or the same potential for TV ads as James Dean selling Polident.

  • Tester (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Mattygfunk1 ( 596840 ) on Sunday June 05, 2005 @12:53AM (#12727355)

    Yeah but can it do hardcore gangster rap?

    __
    Funny Adult Videos [laughdaily.com]
    • Imho, "hardcore gangster rap" should cease to exist.

    • You must mean hardcore gangsta rap. The term "gangster rap" just doesn't sound as hardcore as gangsta does.

    • Re:Tester (Score:2, Insightful)

      by AmberBlackCat ( 829689 )
      I guess if it works, it could reproduce the music exactly, since the music was probably done on synthesizers equipment anyway. But if it were trying to do non-rap vocals n a rap style (or any vocals in a style different from what was intended), it will probably sound really strange because the attitude of the vocals won't match the attitude of the music.

      But this might work out nicely if the simulated artist performs a different musical style with a similar attitude, such as hard core rock being performed wi

      • I guess if it works, it could reproduce the music exactly, since the music was probably done on synthesizers equipment anyway.

        Some sounds have not yet been synthesized very well: take the nuances of bowed violin sound for example (a succession of transients). Still a long way, I'd guess, from re-doing an early performance of Joachim or Busch, or even a more recent but still early Heifetz or Menuhin performance ....

        -wb-

      • Re:Tester (Score:3, Funny)

        by Queer Boy ( 451309 ) *
        I think Run DMC and Aerosmith were the first and that was great.

        It was the shizzle for rizzle ma nizzle!

    • Re:Tester (Score:5, Funny)

      by VirtuaKnight ( 680220 ) on Sunday June 05, 2005 @03:57AM (#12727833)
      >Yeah but can it do hardcore gangster rap?

      int main()
      {
      for(int i=0;i10;i++)
      switch(rand()%3)
      {
      case 0:
      printf("Blew that sucka away with my nine.\n");
      case 1:
      printf("Slapped my ho' 'cause she didn't pay up.\n");
      case 2:
      printf("G-G-G-G-G-G-G-UNIT!!!\n");
      }
      }

    • Yeah but can it do hardcore gangster rap?

      MC Hawking [mchawking.com] could easily be re-performed with a computer, after all, most of the music was made on a computer...

      Seriously, I think it depends greatly on whatever definition of "performance" we use here. If we're talking about sound reproduction, most of the modern music is already recorded on quite high definition (hopefully decipherable by future generations). Aside of other performance-related things, well...

  • Interesting (Score:4, Interesting)

    by treff89 ( 874098 ) on Sunday June 05, 2005 @12:54AM (#12727358)
    This displays the power of modern computing. To be able to "replicate" a song by replicating human thought processes shows that, finally, there is a balance between fast systems, and complex software available to utilise them. After all, what use is a 10Ghz 512-bit 3Ghz FSB 1GB video RAM 10GB RAM machine - when you're running Word? Complex simulation programs are the way of the future.

    • Re:Interesting (Score:3, Informative)

      by prichardson ( 603676 )
      The computer doesn't replicate thought processes, it replicates the technical things that the player is doing. It would be impossible to replicate the player's thought processes because no one on the planet could know exactly what was going through someone's head.
      • Valid point, with one exception.

        Everyone knows what is going through Philip Glass' head when he composes or performs:

        # I
        # I can't
        # I can't believe
        # I can't believe I'm
        # I can't believe I'm getting
        # I can't believe I'm getting away
        # I can't believe I'm getting away with
        # I can't believe I'm getting away with this
        # I can't believe I'm getting away with this crap

        [Repeat until fade - make an adequate fortune]

        • That's like the old joke:
          -- Knock Knock.
          -- Who's there?
          -- Knock Knock.
          -- Who's there?
          -- Knock Knock.
          -- Who's there?
          -- Knock Knock.
          -- Who's there?
          -- Philip Glass.
        • That's hilarious, even though I like minimalism. And very little minimalism is actually like that. I like it because it's so anti-Wagner, anti-Beethoven, anti-Mahler... basically anti-Romantic. I don't think romantic music is bad, but I do find it overplayed and overrated.
          • I love Philip Glass. I listen to Glass Works and Solo Piano and Akhnaten all the time. I didn't mean to be disparaging. He's just an easy target. :-)

            His film work is very distinctive, by which I mean, lazy mass produced crap irrelevant to what is being portrayed on screen IMHO, but his proper solo stuff (not so much the operas) is great.

    • Hah! If you've ever performed, you'd know that there's absolutely NO thought process going on in the traditional sense. A lot of it is muscle memory, and the conscious mind is left to wonder. If you tapped into my brain when I'm playing the violin and hit record, you'd see "ok I'm gunna hold this note a little longer... hmm what's for dinner?" not "this finger goes down 1.324 mm in 0.3495 seconds, and I'm gunna do this EXACT thing with my bow arm."
    • "After all, what use is a 10Ghz 512-bit 3Ghz FSB 1GB video RAM 10GB RAM machine - when you're running Word?"

      Crappier code technique, now you can code an app slower and bigger and the user won't notice.

  • See Also (Score:5, Informative)

    by stuffman64 ( 208233 ) <stuffman@[ ]il.com ['gma' in gap]> on Sunday June 05, 2005 @12:54AM (#12727360)
    See more information about it here [slashdot.org], from (*ahem*) an older Slashdot article...

  • Great work (Score:2, Informative)

    by karvind ( 833059 )
    I think these effort should be well appreciated.

    Cutting Archives [cuttingarchives.com] does a lot of restoration work. Check their faq [cuttingarchives.com]

    We also had a cool story on slashdot before about Concert to be Performed from Beyond the Grave [slashdot.org]

    • I agree that it should be appreciated. While it is easy to call it as bad as black velvet paintings of Elvis, there is a place for this.

      I, for one, would be interested in hearing more performances in the style of Horowitz or Heifitz. I think it's important to bear in mind that the artists themselves, especially ones with enough stature so anyone would want to do this with their work, would have had enough freedom in recording that they likely recorded what they wanted to in the style they wanted to, so

  • Not really. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by aussersterne ( 212916 ) on Sunday June 05, 2005 @01:00AM (#12727382) Homepage
    The humanity is in the variability (think of them as "mistakes" in a flawless performance) not in the perfection. And a perfect imitation of a specific instance of humanity is still not human, because the mistakes are out of context. This is the same reason that random computer-generated mistakes, even perfectly random ones, still don't sound human.

    When a human performs, the performance is subtly affected by the things that affect humans: the weather outside and whether it's gloomy or not; the fact that it's the holiday season; the fact that a leader has been assassinated or the performer's daughter has been ill; the musty mugginess of the air in the auditorium... these subtle types of phenomenological data affect human performances in ways that the audience and performer can share as a kind of unconscious communication, at least so long as they are from the same culture.

    A computer that reproduces a previous performance, even if it does so perfectly, does so out of context. It is making all the wrong mistakes for the current situation, so it's playing just doesn't ring true. Until computers can feel gloomy because of gloomy weather, or can be thrilled because the millenium dawns at midnight, five minutes from now, they won't be able to produce performances that truly move us in the same way that human performances do, because that element of unconscious situational communication and solidarity in shared experience is missing.

    • Re:Not really. (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I think your line of reasoning is incorrect. The fact that a CD recording of music by an actual human performer is recogniseable as that specific performer by a knowledgeable music buff(despite the fact that the surrounding environment and atmosphere of the perfornce is unkown by the listener) is proof against your assertions. The music buff would pick that the recording was a human and a specific human at that.

      The fact that a music buff can pick characteristic signs of who the performer is(despite the per
      • The "very vague emotional undercurrents" that you dismiss are precisely what make the greatest and most inexplicably moving works of art, in any medium.

        • Re:Not really. (Score:1, Interesting)

          by Anonymous Coward
          I am not dismissing the "vague emotional undercurrents" at all, rather pointing out the vagueness of the communication that is taking place, as opposed to the very specific communications you seemed to be asserting were possible such as "my daughter is ill." Remember we're talking about the recreation/replaying of a pre-defined/written piece of art, not the creation of art, which means that there is far less room for the personal expression of the artist.

          • Ah, but I said that these factors in the performer's life "affect" the performance, not that the performance conveys this information. Anyone who has attended their share of performances knows, without being about to explain precisely why, when the tenor of a performance is unexpectedly "dark" or "brooding" or on the other hand unusually "airy" or sometimes just "too cerebral."

            Just what in the performance these characterizations refer to in mechanical terms may not always be clear, but there are times when

    • When a human performs, the performance is subtly affected by the things that affect humans: the weather outside and whether it's gloomy or not; the fact that it's ...

      It's really a matter of how good your similation is and how far you're prepared to go to do it. Fake Shakespearean style insults can be done with a simple perl script - and in the context of a single written line it works. Lem wrote a great and funny short story about how to build an automatic poet capable of composing entire poems with mea

    • Re:Not really. (Score:3, Insightful)

      by timeOday ( 582209 )

      Until computers can feel gloomy because of gloomy weather, or can be thrilled because the millenium dawns at midnight, five minutes from now, they won't be able to produce performances that truly move us in the same way that human performances do, because that element of unconscious situational communication and solidarity in shared experience is missing.

      I guess we'll find out, because I'm sure somebody will do a study to validate this new technology. It shouldn't be too hard to do a Turing-test sort o

      • Personally I think much of the beauty of art is sociological.

        Absolutely! "Beauty" is not a physical or objective quality or quantity that can be measured (or even defined--"what does it mean to be 'beautiful'?") outside of the context of human interaction and meaning-making.

        We know beauty only by its meaning-making effects--by how it causes us to feel or what it causes us to think or remember, all quantities that themsevles are intimately and inextricably linked to each personal history of social interac
        • And of course, computers are not currently able to traffic in "meaning," "experience," or "identity" in any way that humans find to be believable. Once they are, they'll start being able to regularly turn out works and performances that will wow us emotionally, but until then for the most part they're limited to being able to wow us intellectually.
          Wouldn't the ability to generate artistic masterworks at will destroy the concept?
          • Tautological.

            I'm saying "computers will not be able to generate artistic masterworks until they have meaning, experience, and identity"

            and you are saying "when computers are able to generate artistic masterworks, we'll know they have meaning, experience, and identity"

            essentially the same statement.
            • No, I meant, isn't the value of art partly in its scarcity? Would we appeciate it anymore if it were everywhere, all the time?
              • I'd argue that this, too, is a meaningless question.

                If we did, we would. If not, we wouldn't. If nobody anywhere is moved by it, then it's not art, not matter how much of it there is. Conversely, if there's an endless stream of works, more than anyone could ever see or hear in a lifetime, but each one moves anyone who comes in contact with it to tears, then I'd have to say that it's still very much appreciated even if it isn't scarce.

                Really, my personal guess is that a relativistic evaluation is intrinsic
                • Yes, I suppose you're right. I used to imagine what would happen if somebody discovered the ultimate song or joke that never got old, but of course I realized that's like discovering an ice cream sandwich that can be eaten but is never consumed - nonsensical.
  • Will we see covers of new material by long-departed artists? E.g. Lemon Tree performed by the Beatles.

    The music companies would have a field day with this. Push a button and you can have a cover of everything by everyone. Not to sell, just to flood P2p networks.
  • This is a cute idea. However, without constant communication and feedback between the audience and performer, as well as introspection on the part of the performer, I'd hesitate before calling it a performance, but rather a presentation.

  • Disklavier (Score:4, Interesting)

    by rookworm ( 822550 ) <horace7945@@@yahoo...ca> on Sunday June 05, 2005 @01:01AM (#12727385)
    I am a musician, and I have heard these things in person. For performances recorded directly on a Disklavier, the recording is indistinguishable from the original to my ears (and to every other musiciain I have talked to about this). If the technique in the article is indeed accurate, then this could mean great things. However, as the article mentioned, it is much more difficult to determine when the notes stop sounding, and pedalling, than the attacks. There is the interesting question of copyright: for ancient recordings ressurrected, who owns what? and is it possible to just tweak a few notes and then do what you want with the thing? (remember, the piece, and the recording are P.D.)

    • "musicologists argue over whether or not the new musical artifact is really 'a performance'"

      I say who cares? If it sounds good, and the parent suggests it does, then I'll listen to it.

      • I say who cares? If it sounds good, and the parent suggests it does, then I'll listen to it.

        I second that. I have a Yamaha XG sound module. A lot of people have put their piano masterpieces online as a MIDI. I enjoy them more that most CD's of the same piano masterpieces. I can't complain about the fidelety. A CD uses 16 bit sampling. The Yamama module uses 18 bit. It has none of the artifacts of an MP3.

        My module is a converted DB50XG.

  • Yamaha does this with Disklavier (Score:3, Interesting)

    by DigitalRaptor ( 815681 ) on Sunday June 05, 2005 @01:01AM (#12727386)
    Yamaha has done this with their Disklavier player pianos, so that you can listen to an artists song as the artist actually played it.

    It is neat to look at a nice grand piano playing, without anyone sitting at it, keys moving and everything, knowing that if Gershwin [yamahamusicsoft.com] were here to play it himself, it would sound just the same.

    That, personally, had far more of an impact than just hearing the same piano play the same song.

    • knowing that if Gershwin were here to play it himself, it would sound just the same.

      But that's not how it would sound if Gershwin himself were here to play it. Rather, you've heard a replication of his dynamics, attacks, and tempi. If he were to play it today, it would sound different. No two performances are the same. As a performer, I'll take things in wildly different styles depending on what kind of day I'm having, the acoustics of the hall, the vibe of the audience. Not to mention that anything
      • The name of the disk is "Gershwin Plays Again", which of course does not imply he's been resurrected and is really playing again.

        And no, it's not a new performance BY Gershwin, it is a faithful recreation of one of Gershwins songs as performed by him, as determined by the best efforts of man an machine.

        Is it exact or perfect? Of course not. I'm simply saying, for me, a non-musician, it was much more inspirational and moving than hearing someone else play the exact same song.

        Kind of like some idiot payi
  • Think of the possibilities! When actors and singers can be recreated through computer reproductions, we could end up putting live actors out of work, or force them to sit in front of a computer or microphone more than they already do to perform in a high-tech production.

    We could see a resurgence in the popularity of live stage productions, as people grow weary of computer generated reproductions. And we could see a whole new way of recreating old TV shows like Star Trek. Instead of http://www.newvoyages [newvoyages.com]
    • Why, all we have to do is lobby to extend copyright for *another* fifty years, and we can keep milking more money out of long-dead artists, now using their acts even after their body has given out!

  • At last they recognize superiority of MIDI format.

    Indeed, MIDI mixed for surround-sound would be divine musical perfection.

  • I think Sousa said it best in his comments that recording would kill off live music.

    This technology brings up two points:
    1: Are we now trying to eliminate the performer from the loop altogether?
    2: Have listeners become so detached from good performances, as predicted by Sousa, that we can't tell the difference between a live performance and a replication in the style of one particular live performance from long ago?
    • if you think about it for two seconds instead of rushing to reference Sousa you'd realise that
      1. you still need a performer to imitate
      2. this is being done because listners are *very much attached* to good performances from the past and would like more of the same.
      • Riiight...because big bands are SO popular these days.

        If there were no such thing as recorded music, EVERY bar in town, in every town, would have piano players or other musicians employed.

        And people would sing the songs, instead of just passively listening like they do today.

    • I wouldn't be too worried. People who go to live performances will know the difference and realize that there is something in a live performance that doesn't translate to a recording.

      In fact, I'd say that live performances are very important to the perception of a musician.

      Two of my recent favorites are Jamie Cullum and Madelein Peyroux. They both recently played here in Portland, and I saw both.

      I wasn't very familiar with Cullum when I went to his show, but it was one of the most dynamic and amazing p
    • Listeners nowadays can't tell the difference between a grand piano and a drum synth, you expect them to spot the difference between a live performance and a simulated copy?

  • PKD "inventions" (Score:3, Informative)

    by putko ( 753330 ) on Sunday June 05, 2005 @01:12AM (#12727425) Homepage Journal
    Here's some inventions of Philip K. Dick (via technovelgy.com [technovelgy.com]).

    The technology described by Philip is definitely not in this list; the article's submitter is either lazy or cleverly attempting to sneak the dupe past the editors via his absurd PKD reference.

    Andy - an artificial human [technovelgy.com]
    Autofac (Nanorobots) - a factory that can replicate itself [technovelgy.com]
    Bubblehead - big-head brainiacs [technovelgy.com]
    Claws (Guard Robot) [technovelgy.com]
    Commuter Cooling Unit - portable air conditioning [technovelgy.com]
    Dr. Smile - psychiatrist in a suitcase [technovelgy.com]
    Electric Sheep - livestock as consumer electronics [technovelgy.com]
    Embryonic Robots - early scifi nanobots? [technovelgy.com]
    Empathy Box - TV for your emotional brain [technovelgy.com]
    Extra-Factual Memory - an implanted memory [technovelgy.com]
    Homeopape - news just you can use [technovelgy.com]
    Kipple - non-recycled paper. [technovelgy.com]
    Mood Organ - play your partner [technovelgy.com]
    Nanny - child-care robot with punch [technovelgy.com]
    Nexus-6 Brain Unit - meet my friend Roy [technovelgy.com]
    Penfield Wave Transmitter - an emotional brain remote control [technovelgy.com]
    Perky Pat Microworld - playset for grownups [technovelgy.com]
    Precrime Analytical Wing - precogs babble, machines tabulate [technovelgy.com]
    Replicant - an artificial human [technovelgy.com]
    Robot Cab Driver- everybody's got problems [technovelgy.com]
    • He wrote a story (``preserving machine'') about a mad scientist who turned old scores into animals in attempt to preserve the music. Unfortunately, the animals adapted, and when the process was reversed, they turned back into nonsensical cacophany.
    • The technology described by Philip is definitely not in this list; the article's submitter is ... lazy
      >p>Actually, in PKD's book The Divine Invasion, there is an female musician who all of the lonely settlers of other planets love to listen to; she is secretly an AI program created to perfectly comfort through audio and video streams.

      TFA is like this in that it involves connecting emotionally to music produced by AI.

    • <BadAttemptAtHumour>
      I think if you view the movie version of Minority Report again and take a close look at the interface of the computer used (with the glove extension) and bear in mind the story was published in The Little Black Box in 1987, and maybe before that as welll, I can see a case for attributing Philip K. Dick with the invention of Playstation 2 dance mats as a first step toward this thinkium-like interface and confusing screen.
      </BadAttemptAtHumour>

      How much did he invent those thin

  • But if it attempts to produce the famous work of john Cage and his 4:33 - I am sure it will cause the machine to go into a run condition and crash....

    • The idea of 4:33 was not to listen to the performer, or lament the lack of any performance, but to listen to the sounds around us. Absolute silence practically doesn't exist.

      You could, of course, make it a bit more johncagey by sticking speakers in the computer's on-board audio output cranking up the volume really loud, and play 4 minutes 33 seconds of extremely well-crafted 0-bits. If rush of the blood in your veins was the point of 4:33, well, so might be the faint chirping of your disk controller. Actu

  • This would be great if a lot of Tagore's poetry recitals could be converted to a digital medium. After all he was really 100 years before his time let's digitze his voice and keep it as true as we can to the essence of the man.

    Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high; Where knowledge is free; Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls; Where words come out from the depth of truth; Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;

    Rabindr

  • Creed is broken up. Let's keep it that way. There will be enough terrible bands in the future. The last thing we need is future generations resurrecting our terrible bands.
  • This is a "digitally resurrected recreation" of a previous slashdot post.
  • I've heard one of the Telarc recordings of Rachmaninoff reconstructed from player piano rolls. It didn't do a whole lot for me, but then again, it might be that I don't really like how Telarc discs (or Deutsche Grammophon, for that matter) are engineered...
    • Yes, I've heard it too. It probably lacked the dynamic range and resolution of a real recording because of the digital extrapolation that must be done from the piano rolls. I have also heard a piano roll transcription of Scott Joplin playing his own music too. That was a little more interesting to hear.

      Deutsche Grammophon used to put out really good stuff up until the 80's, then sort of went cheapie mainstream sometime after that.
  • Well, let's see...

    re-create dead actors in the flesh...check...(SW movies)

    re-create dead performers playing...check...

    Hmm...what exactly do we need people for? W00t!!! Death to the humans, computers conquer all...wait a sec *looks down*...hey...I'm real flesh and blood...uhoh

  • All the Dicks in the RIAA, who won't have to pay those pesky royalties. Maybe they can finally elevate their standard of living to that of music producers...
    Oh, wait...
    • The RIAA isn't primarily in the business of selling music -- they sell identity. Spears, Eminem, whatever, its just a celebrity who plays a roll that people can latch onto a little at a time for something they can't get out of their own life. Do you know a big megapopstar who isn't flawlessly beautiful and plastered on every magazine and TV show when not making music? Do you know a single one who has a song which is more iconic than their persona? Nope. "Hear it like Beethoven himself was playing it!"
  • When there's an article on NYT, and you want to read it without registration, just search for the title [google.com] in Google News. Once you have Google News as the referrer, you get free access to the first page of the article - which is usually enough.
  • I just read the summary, not the articl, but it immediately reminds me of CPU Bach on 3DO. I wasn't a big Bach fan, and still prefer others, but it was pretty fascinating to see how it would compose classical music while explaining what it was doing and how the different parts were supposed to work.

  • Interesting, yes. Fascinating, yes.

    But... a concert pianist would not play the same work twice the exact same way. Interpretive training from a decent conservatory doesn't turn out robots. Room dynamics (acoustic, audience, time of day, etc.) often contribute heavily to a perceived "good" performance.

    In fact, such a synthesis program should really include an improvisatory component -- a "learning" program that offers slight deviations in appropriate moments. Of course, learning what those are is proba

    • In fact, such a synthesis program should really include an improvisatory component -- a "learning" program that offers slight deviations in appropriate moments. Of course, learning what those are is probably less quantitative than such a system might allow...

      Dude, Windows is not a real time OS. Use MIDI on Windows. Next..
  • Account #1
    login: wisterian
    password: wister

  • How Glenn Gould played "live" again (Score:3, Interesting)

    by mav[LAG] ( 31387 ) on Sunday June 05, 2005 @07:10AM (#12728378)
    Here [pragmaticprogrammer.com] is a pretty cool article on a similar project, but from the software development point of view.
    • Mrs Schmegma, Stand up Please
    • Gould hated performing live, and retired to the studio as soon as he was able. He irritated many purists because he had no compunction against splicing together pieces from different takes to arrive at what he decided was the "best" performance.

      If he were alive today he might very well choose to play his performances via a a synclavier.

  • I'd like to see how the software the analyzes the music would compare to a piano roll or Disklavier recording. Have a musician play a selection on a Disklavier and record it. At the same time, record the audio and use the s/w to try to replicated it. Play both the MIDI recorded version back as well as the reverse engineered MIDI version and compare both to the original recording.

    I bought the "Gershwin Plays Gershwin" http://www.keyboardwizards.com/billboar.htm [keyboardwizards.com] CD a few years back and really enjoyed it.
  • Do we really need computers taking over the arts too?
  • I'm wracking my brains for lasting excuses to value human performances over computer performances. You know, the kind of excuses that keep working no matter how good the computers get. AI is supremely cool stuff, but when I imagine the issues we'll inevitably have to deal with -- this century or next -- it scares the hell out of me. I'm gonna go struggle with my moral dilemma now.

  • Glen Gould (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Jambon ( 880922 )
    to make old recordings new...Glenn Gould without the mumbling

    Why? Part of what made Gould's performances so special was the fact that he did mumble during them. Hearing him mumble helped you understand his mind. I say it isn't Gould if I can hear any mumbling!

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