Computer Music

Lejaren Hiller, Robert Baker and John Melby - Computer Music

Lejaren Hiller and Robert Baker - Computer Cantata (1963)

Performers: University of Illinois Contemporary Chamber Players; Helen Hamm, soprano; Jack McKenzie, conductor

We wrote the COMPUTER CANTATA in 1963 to illustrate what we could do with the relatively few subroutines we had at that time.
The five main strophes are stochastic settings of five successive approximations of spoken English. These texts were generated by Professors Hultzen, Allen, and Miron of the University of Illinois as an experiment in speech research. The music is correlated to these texts and goes from a state of great disorder in Strophe I to some degree of order by Strophe V. The Prologs and Epilogs, in contrast to the Strophes themselves, are concerned with rhythmic organization for percussion, total serialism and scales of 9 to 15 tones per octave realized by a simple sound synthesis scheme devised for the CSX-1 computer. We deliberately left this synthetic sound crude.
Much nonsense has been written about computers 'thinking' and 'creating'. After all, a computer is really nothing more than a complex array of hardware. It can be tremendously useful hardware, however, but only if you know the limitations of programming logic and how to ask sensible and precisely formulated questions.
Should a person listen to this piece as he might 'ordinary music'? Yes, I think, but with this important qualification: It is much more didactic than expressive compared to most music. This piece is truly experimental because it is concerned with revealing process as well as being final product. It is an embodiment of objective research results. It is a laboratory notebook. Sometimes the results surprise us because a compositional routine seemed less effective than expected, sometimes more so. If I had deleted everything that disturbed me esthetically, I would have falsified the research record. So, at that time, my objective in composing music by means of computer programming was not the immediate realization of an esthetic unity, but the providing and evaluaton of techniques whereby this goal could eventually be realized. (Lejaren Hiller)

John Melby - 91 Plus 5 (1971)

Performers: Brass Quintet and Computer Contemporary Brass Quintet (Elin Frazier, Daniel Orlock, Edward Curenton, Robert Moore, Jonathan Dornblum) conducted by Roman Pawlowski

91 PLUS 5 (the title refers to nothing more than the fact that the piece is scored for an electronic tape realized on an IBM 360/91 digital computer and five brass instruments) is a composition in nine sections which combine to form one continuous movement. the first through eighth sections form a large arch-form, with the first related to the eighth, the second to the seventh, etc. The ninth section serves as a 'coda'. Each pair of related sections emphasizes a different aspect of the basic rhythmic/pitch materials. In addition, the related sections correspond in terms of tempo relationships, 'timbral' considerations, etc.
Composers who make use of digital computers in their pieces can be divided into two general categories: 1) those who use the computer as an aid to composition and 2) those for whom the computer serves as an incredibly flexible performing medium. My use of the computer falls into the latter class. In 91 PLUS 5 (and in all my other works for digital computer, either in combination with live performers or alone), the computer is programmed to produce a digital tape that contains a series of numbers which, when changed through the digital-to-analog conversion process, produce fluctuating voltages. These voltages, when recorded on an ordinary magnetic tape and amplified, produce musical sounds. Thus, while the computer is actively involved in the performance of the work, it is not involved in the compositional process. The great precision inherent in computer performance makes it possible to produce effects (such as accurate rendering of passages in simultaneous different tempi) which are impossible, or at best very difficult to achieve, with live instrumentalists. In addition, the unlimited 'timbral' possibilities offer much room for experimentation. In the case of 91 PLUS 5, I have purposely limited myself to relatively simple sounds in the computer part; this is due to a desire to obtain sounds which contrast with the 'richness' of the harmonic spectra of the brasses.
91 PLUS 5 was composed in late 1970 and early 1971. The computer tape was realized, using the MUSIC360 sound synthesis sprogram written by Barry Vercoe, at the Princeton University Computer Center, with digital-to-analog conversion at Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, New Jersey. The composition was first performed in April of 1972, by the performers on this record, at the National Conference of the American Society of University Composers in Baltimore, Maryland. (John Melby)

Tracklisting:

Side 1

1. Lejaren Hiller and Robert Baker - Computer Cantata: I. Prolog to Strope I; Strope I {6:25}

2. Lejaren Hiller and Robert Baker - Computer Cantata: II. Prolog to Strophe II; Strophe II {2:02}

3. Lejaren Hiller and Robert Baker - Computer Cantata: III. Prolog to Strophe III; Strophe III; Epilog to Strophe III {5:34}

4. Lejaren Hiller and Robert Baker - Computer Cantata: IV. Strophe IV; Epilog to Strophe IV {3:11}

5. Lejaren Hiller and Robert Baker - Computer Cantata: V. Strophe V; Epilog to Strophe V

Side 2

1. John Melby - 91 Plus 5 {19:49}

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