Artful Devices, Music for Piano and Computers (review)

Artful Devices contains six pieces by Christopher Dobrian, each of which incorporates a substantial degree of computer performance. The composer states that "the intention is not for the programs to emulate traditional musical behavior, but rather to explore new musical possibilities implicit in certain paradigms of computation or computer decision-making." Although it's not clear what "traditional" behavior is avoided (or at least not sought), each piece does realize a different mode of computer decision-making and subsequent or concurrent computer performance. Three of the works utilize algorithmically generated scores which are then performed by a computer-controlled piano or, in one work, a Music-N-style software synthesis language. The other pieces each incorporate a live performer who generates data for a computer program to operate on. The performance paradigms range from the seen but unheard guitar-controller performer to the traditional electronic concerto for MIDI-equipped piano and computer-controlled electronic sounds. There is a sense of play present in most of these pieces and even the cover art playfully reveals the phrase "art vices" within the title.

The first piece on the CD is Entropy, "performed by a Macintosh computer playing a Yamaha Disklavier piano." In Entropy, "the algorithm takes as its input a description of some beginning and ending characteristics of a musical phrase, and outputs the note information necessary to realize a continuous transformation from the beginning to the ending state." Although the composer emphasizes computer decision-making in the opening remarks of the liner notes, what makes this piece really work are the decisions made by the composer about the parameters of each phrase and the succession of phrases. Mr. Dobrian engages here in a kind of metacomposition that is becoming a familiar paradigm not only in algorithmic composition but also in the "remix" phenomenon in popular music.

The opening gesture of the piece is one of scattered pointillistic notes in a nervously varying rhythm that builds from single notes to chords. Those chords give way to wide-ranging linear runs in a steady rhythm which then dissolve, creating a cadence point before moving on to the next phrase. This is a very satisfying juxtaposition of materials and the temporal scope of each phrase component feels appropriate. Satisfying successions such as this one are the piece's strongest attribute. Although it is possible to discern an overall shape of sorts, with specific gestures and phrases returning later on in the piece, Entropy seems to work best when one focuses on the local changes on the level of the two-or three-minute section, letting the work flow by with a general appreciation of the return of materials. This is true of many works whose rhythmic or harmonic grammar is determined probabilistically. This is not a bad thing, but it does prohibit the kind of motivic listening that one usually engages in when experiencing a work that sets out specific motivic or harmonic relations whose manipulation and transformation become the business of the piece.

The second and fourth tracks are two versions of the same work, Un-natural Selection, with the second being approximately half as long as the first. The separation of these two versions by an intervening work is a smart programming move as it forces the linear listener to hear the second version with fresh ears—this despite the fact that the intervening work is anything but a sonic sorbet!

The first version of Unnatural Selection features the composer playing a MIDI guitar providing information to a genetic algorithm which in turn improvises the computer-controlled response. The most interesting part of this performance model is that the direct output of the MIDI guitar is not heard, only the computer's response to the generated...