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PROGRAMME INFO |
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Quentin Cooper reports on developments across the sciences. Each week scientists describe their work, conveying the excitement they feel for their research projects.
material.world@bbc.co.uk
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LISTEN AGAIN 30 min |
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PRESENTER |
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"For me science isn't a subject, it's a perspective. There are fascinating scientific aspects to everything from ancient history to the latest gadgets, outer space to interior decorating; and each week on The Material World we try to reflect the excitement, ideas, uncertainties, collisions and collaborations as science continues its never-ending voyage into the unknown".
Quentin Cooper |
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BIOGRAPHY
INTERVIEW |
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PROGRAMME DETAILS |
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Electronic Music
Ever since Elisha Gray (who nearly gained fame by inventing the telephone, but lost out to the more acute Alexander Graham Bell) created the "musical telegraph" in 1876, scientists have been harnessing electricity for the services of music. Electric guitars and electronic synthesisers abound. But engineers are now trying to break free even of those relatively conventional instruments. Last weekend, the first international conference on "New Interfaces for Musical Expression" (NIME) held at the Media Lab Europe in Dublin brought together these electroacoustic mould-breakers. And Quentin Cooper joined them for Material World.
What's a Musical Interface?
According to conference organisers Joe Paradiso (MIT Media Lab, Cambridge Massachusetts) and Sile O'Modhrain (Media Lab Europe), it's whatever connects the performer to the sound-producing part of an instrument - the keyboard in the case of a piano. But at the NIME conference there were interfaces on show that could fit in the mouth, feel the electricity of the skin, or measure the waving of your whole body - and, via a computer, turn the result into a musical gesture. But that's only the start of it, says Sile O'Modhrain. The theme for the conference was how to make the gadgets musically expressive: "We need to stop being impressed by the technology, and start making it useful for the musician," she told Quentin Cooper.
The Performers' Perspective
David Wessel, Matthew Wright and John Schott are all musicians from Berkeley, California. But the first two are also academics at the Center for New Musical and Acoustic Technologies at the University of California in Berkeley, and together with Grammy nominee John Schott, they formed That Situated Trio for the NIME conference to show case the expressive possibilities of their computer instruments. They explained to Quentin Cooper how digital technology allows them to share musical material, grab guitar samples and transform them on the fly during their improvisations.
Musical Possibilities
Composer Tod Machover is coming to our shores this week, to take part in the BBC's Music Live festival, with a performance of his new Toy Symphony in Glasgow (to be broadcast on Radio 3 on Monday 3 June). Along with physicist Perry Cook of Princeton University, New Jersey, he describes how digital technology is pushing the boundaries of music, for the professional, the amateur and the young musician. |
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RELATED LINKS
New Interfaces for Musical Expression
Media Lab Europe
Dr. Joseph A. Paradiso
Center for New Music and Audio Technologies
John Schott
Toy Symphony
Perry Cook
BBC Music Live
BBC Science
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