Trends of Music Composition on Computer by WU, Dye

[中文]

1. Stepping on the road of ancestors to go on our way

The birth of computer has been directing the entire social development, and accomplishments are fond from technology to all levels of social applications.

Back in the early 50's, composition on computer has been started in Cologne Music Center to search new sounds with the electronic devices and to bring new life in composition. Computer has become a new device in music composition over these decades. Like the IRCAM (Institut de recherche et coordination acoustique/musique) at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the CIDMA (Creation inqenerie diffusion des musiques d'aujour'hui) of the ?cole nationale de musique de Pantin in Paris, the Institute of Sonology at Hague in the Netherlands; the New Music and Musicology Research Center at Darmstadt in Germany, the CCRMA (Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics at Stanford University and the computer music research centers at various US university. They focus on computer composition and bring music to the forefront of times.

It is evident that composition on computer is a future trend. If you want to catch up with times and to possess a world musical view, you music give Up the prejudice of the non-human device of computer and thereby to adapt to and combine with computer while composing.

2. Review the history of music and develop new musical concepts

From a historical approach of music composition, the style, the representation, the spirit and attitude of music have been changing from time to time; and the search for arts of different times never stops, it is the spirit to change and to be difference that create the bright history of music. Technological development also brings positive reinforcement to music. Modern musicians or musicologists should ease the worry that music will turu stiff when synthesizer or computer are used as devices in musical composition.

Hence, we should abandon the conservative attitudes and concepts, and to think about the future trend of music composition from the review of history to readjust the pace of musical advancement.

2.1 Changes--the natural development of music

From the evolution of music, it is easy to discover that ancient music is simply monophony with focus on human voices or rhythic instruments. It is not until the appearance of polyphonic organum in the Renaissance that other instrumrnts were added to musical works, though harmonious acoustics was still the focus, and dissonance or rather complex effect was rare. The structural elements of musical insturments no longer sastisfy the needs of musical works, and to reengineer the sound of musical instruments has been the goal at the monent. Arcangelo Corelli gave a new life to viol and redefined the string instruments of modern days.

Corelli not only revolutionized the technique of violin playing, but also established the formal structure of musical works, and paved way for the formalism in the classical period. The changes in music in a product of the changes of the thoughts of musicians, l'air du temps, and social style. Thouh formalism is the central of the classical period, Ludwig van Beethoven changed the fate of classicism to make music speak the me of the composer.

The wheel of time endlessly runs through the times and brings up Changes to music, enables the 'authentic music school' to rule the musical world for over two centuries. To most people 'authentic music school' refers to 'traditional music', 'authentic music', it sets up the standars for tonality, rudiments of music and central of music. However, Just when music grows in its high, Arnold Schoenberg breaks all ruleswith his dodecaphony, and tonality thus becomes a historical term.

Sound is the basic element of music, the changes in social environment altered the 'musicians' appeal for musical representation. They depict the quietude and simplicity in peaceful music, they scream out their troubles in romantic music, and modern musicians even chaseafter noise in music and begin to think what noise could bring to audiences. They started to search for diversified timber changes and musical texture. Traditional musical instruments no longer satisfy their desires for timber and effect, and computer thus become an easy-to-use device.

2.2 Novelty--musical representation

When noise is the target of modern music, it is not difficult to discover that novel music has been used in the revolution for the novel age. In face of the impacts of these consciousness, we must feel the necessity of computer in music composition, and it is a breakthrough of the traditional concepts.

To enable music to express the sense of times, futurist music makes use of the noises of machines or factories together with the rhythms to convey the pace of modern life, some musicians even create noise instruments of the city. French composer Edgard Var?se is one of the most eminent figures who dedicates in this field immersing in the magic and mystery of science.

The effort of Var?se alone is difficult to emancipate noise, to develop electronic music and to promote urban sounds. American composer John Cage is a good partner to continue these concepts. His attempt is shown in the prepared piano in the late 30's by putting different objects such as metal plates, wood blocks or rubber between the strings of the piano, in hopes to create 'sounds of indeterminacy' and to test new timbers.

Besides changes of timbers, the prepared piano is an imitation of percussion timber to express the rhythm of music with both hands without the need of a huge and complex percussion band. It is the same way as conducting a huge orchestra with a computer.

French composer Olivier Messiaen is another musician who puts much emphasis on rhythm. He considers rhythm is kind of number and continuous change. In his grammar of composing, he puts special focus on changes of dotted note value, expansion and reduction of rhythm, and irreversible rhythm and compound rhythm. He uses numeric calculation as changes of these rhythms, which resembles the calculation functions of computer, and it is the specialty of computer.

Dissatisfaction of the timber of traditional musical instrument and the search of new timbers is the mission of this period. The birth of magnetic tape after the 40's has added a new device in music creation and has given way to 'electronic music'. Just before that, the idea to change and to process natural sounds have been a fact in the test of sounds. In following the discovery of sound wave, musicians, produce some special sounds they want to bring to music.

Electronic technology has thus become an important componention musical art and the drive to the computerization of music. Computer is a product of the USA in the 60's, and many American composers thereafter try to use computer to synthesize sounds or to change sound by using the calculation functions of the computer to process the values of sound wave, in order to produce the ideal sound on the musicians' mind. Computer even enables composers to enter the rules of composition to create a new work itself. In this sense, who or what is composing? The issue immediately arouses heated debate. In reality, computer simply follows the rules dictated by composers to write music, and it is still composers who created the rules. The modern Romanian composer Yannis Xenakis is a typical example. He uses computer as a calculation device in composing and thereby creates a milestone in music creation.

2.3 Search--changes in music

History tells us that all musicians follow the mainstream of their times, they seek changes and new things, aiming to broaden the scope of changes of music. Of course, to innovate and to change are the sole missions of a composer.

In addition, we discover that the trends of times and social changes are the voice of human beings. As a representation of soul, music needs changes to satisfy the needs of times and people. Internal changes require cooperation of the external structure, and the use of computer in analysis, logic calculation and integration will mean a piece of cake.

3. Computer--device of musical creation

In the 50's and the 60's, computer was an aide to composers and never took over the process of composing itself. The contents of creation have been defined within the human scope of thinking.

The process of composing is an act of acoustic organization, a logical arrangement, connection and grouping of sound. The surface structure of composing is a set of rules; however, it is the thoughts of composers in the deep structure which is conveyed and represented through the rules of organization.

Ideas are implicit and abstract, they must be represented by means of physical music, and the rules of musical representation are simply means of creation.Ideas and well-organized structure are the artistic requirements of a musical work . Musicians in the past followed these rules and attempted to make changes to create new rules, and it is the same to modern composers; to seek new musical grammar and new direction out of the tradition. At the turn of the century when technology is so advanced, the use of computer as a device in composition will be a natural trend. When composers take the advantage of calculation of computer to express their ideas, it will be mean to kill to birds with one stone. When computer is a helpful hand to composers, it can do things far and wide. Besides composing, it can perform and create the novel timbers to open a new door of creation for composers.

However, there are many technical problems to solve to let computer Participate in composing. A composer must cultivate his programming ability before he can convert his thoughts into programs; he must think his ideas well before he can assign the task to the computer.

Musical creation is a process of sound arrangement and grouping; calculation is the specialty of computer, the conception of sound and the calculation of computer will be a perfect match,when a composer is able to tell the computer his rules. In other words, when a composer can convert all the rules into programs, the computer can compose itself. Therefore, one must get ready the following points before composing with a computer:

(1) Establishment of a musical grammar database, including

Interval date: all kinds of natural intervals, changes, harmonious intervals, dissonant intervals, monophonic intervals, polyphonic intervals, melodic intervals and harmony intervals.

Rhythm data: to collect all kinds of simple rhythms, compound rhythms, aboriginal rhythms and changeable rhythms.

Register data: to analysis the register of each part of mixed voices, child voice and the register of all instruments.

Musical pattern data: to categorize all kinds of musical patterns that represent different musical thoughts to let the computer to access. It is a rather important item, because it presents the ideas of creation and musicial thoughts of a composer, and it is a tough work.

Sound progression data: different sound progression represent different sentiments, if we can categorize these rules and store them in a database, it will be a good reference for the computer.

(2) Polyphony method

Contrapuntal technique requires a set of rules, a composer should create a these rules in the database to enable the computer to follow and thereby to establish a good discourse.

(3) Melodic music method

It is a harmony technique. As harmony rules are very strict, when we use computer to composer, we must create such sets of rules to enable the computer to follow. The categories are:

rule database establishment;

use of simulation;

trail of new harmoney effect.

(4) Multi-tonality method

Multi-tonality is different from polyphony,though it is sometimes a complex of multiple melodies, each melody has its own tonality and grammar. Bela Batok and Darius Milhaud are few of the very best of this technique after Arnold Schoenberg. After one has understaood the basic concepts of multi-tonality, he can use it on the computer to link up melodies of related tonality.In fact, the organization of parts is a coordination of tonal relations Therefore, tonal relationship is the focus of establishment of multi-tonality technique, and its technique can be accomplished by the coordination of the previous musical grammars.

(5) Atonal music technique

The result of multi-tonality is atonality. When there are too many of them, it becomes a chaos, and the subject will disappear. Single tonality requires the emphasis on the tonic, around which everything runs. When there are more than one tonics, any note will be equally important, and the tonic and dominant relationship will collapse, and tonality will become atonality.

Capture of sound organization and rhythmic changes are the prerequisites to the use of computer in atonal music composition.

The full use of all items in the musical grammar database, the creation of free arrangement of atonal rules, a composer may modify the product from the simulation to complete an atonal work.

(6) Serial music technique

Serial music, technically speaking, is different from atonal music. The latter emphasizes on no tonal center and free groupings of tone rows; while the former must strictly follows the non-repetition principle of dodecaphony and allows only retrograde, inversion, and inverted retrograde of the original. Such technique is the product of the second Viennese school: Arnold Schoenberg, Alban Berg and Anton von Webern. It is the foundation of the search for composition with computer.

From the principles of tone row, it is an easy work for the computer. A composer simply converts the tone row rules into programs, he can compose anything on the computer, even take advantage on the float-point calculation feature of the computer to facilitate the task.

(7) Experiment and application of timber changes

Different forms of arts have different textual elements and manners of representations, and it is no difference to music. It is its sound nature which makes it an art of invisibility and time, no sound no music (the 4'33" by John Cage is an exception, it is a recollection of the indeterminacy). Sound is therefore the basic element of music.

If we are observant enough, it is no difficult to discover sounds are everywhere. If we can make full use of them with careful processing, they will turn out to be wonderful music.

Same sounds appear in this world in different forms since the ancient time, whether pleasant or not, it is a subject to the view of times. Changes of environment will change the views of sounds, which enables much variation in music. Review on traditional technique to match with new sounds, new texture and new structure will be the subject of modern composers.

Life itself is an art, and environment is the source of condensation of art. Modern composers should understand we are immersing in the endless resources of creation. With the caress of technology, we can turn any impossibilities to possibilities. Sound is the gift of God to composers, and how to combine them with the computer in a reasonable way and turn it into an true art of music will be the central concern.

Sounds in the nature are in fact a systematic and well-organized single-tone grouping , if we can sample and analyze them with the computer, it is easy to discover that they are grouping of different single sounds. From the viewpoint of music, simple sound line resembles different parts of a work. A reasonable arrangement of these simple sound lines can make beautiful music.

If computer is the qateway to see the wonder of noise, how to integrate them to formulate a logical musical structure will need some efforts:

A. All single line sounds can be treated as different parts of a work, e.g, we hear bird calls, vehicle sounds and crowd noises in everyday life, if we can mix each of them together life different parts of a musical work, it is the same as we hear them in the nature.

B. The basic component of different sounds can be treated as a sound pattern of a work; each individual sound has its own way of grouping, i.e. they may be cyclic, continuously repeated or changed repetitions. Each cycle resembles different sound pattern in a musical work, and continuous expansion of the line will form different musical lines. For examples, the calls of a certain kind of bird is simple and clean, if it is a regular call, it will become a kind of pattern. Like the hammering of a blacksmith or the sound of a machine, the regularity will form a certain kind of element.

C. The distance and strength of sounds in nature are the dynamics in music; within an acoustic space, the utterance of sound has a sense of distance, man hear weaker sound when he is far away from the source, and the closer the louder. Additionally, the sound itself has its strength, it will cause tension on hearing, and it is indispensable from musical expressions.

D. The tension and relaxation of sound are the structural features of rhythmic and tempo tension of music: different sounds have different paces, from the viewpoint of tension, it resembles the changes in note value and tempo and thus forms the tension and of time and creates the agogic in music.

E. Intermittent strong sound means the staccato in music, if a sound is intermittent, it resembles the staccato in music, like staccatissmo, mezzo staccato, portato, these resemble to intermittent sounds.

F. Synergic strong sound resembles the forte of harmony: if we put all the single sounds together, the effect is like a harmony of thick texture.

Besides collecting sounds from the nature, modern composers can use the sounds from a synthesizer to show the special effect in a musical work, or like what Richard Wagner did when he created the Ring--he even created new instruments for the special sound effects. It can be achieved on a computer. Microtone is the special feature of computer, and it is irreplaceable by any instrument.

4. An account for Phenomena and Concepts 1001--for voice and computer

This is the product of physical life experience and music interaction, with an attempt to express the truth of life through tone rows and to tell the philosophy of life. Music is a reflection of human life and a representation of everyday life. Through the combination of music and media, it may be able to reveal the truth of life. We often think that life is a time machine, musicians feel that and music is the pulse of the time machine.

Phenomena in daily life have their own time and space, and music is the variables such times and spaces.

Music is a continuation of sound and time, the leaps and floats of sound form a music line, then row and space. Bagatelles in daily life are different points in time,and thus forms endless concepts. The changeability of these concepts turns into endless sounds, which help stimulate the eternal dreams and associations audiences.

Music is the basic element of the work, after individual creation of the music, it is combined with multimedia and voices and actions on the stage.

The work is inspired by pointillism, besides hearing, these points give an visual effect to create an endlessly deep space.

Points on the surface is extended with different instruments on different tracks, the pitch is expressed horizontal on the picture, and the size of the points represent the dynamics of sound to reflect the sense of space in the float of time.

Hardware media: Macintosh computer, PROTEUS/2XR Orchestral mixer, computer overhead projector, stage projection backdrop, Midi interface, amplifier, stereo speakers.

Software media: Max and external form IRCAM, integrated with HyperCard.

5.Conclusion

Modern man has modern mind to create the new times; modern scientists have modern wisdom to reveal world miracles; modern musicians should have modern views to accept impacts of new thoughts, to establish new musical environment and to review new direction of music creation.

In this diversified society, different phenomena have condensed countless concepts and have brought endless space of thinking.