Inside computer music: analyzing the interaction of technology and musical creativity

This paper presents the final outcomes of the Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded project TaCEM (Technology and Creativity in Electroacoustic Music). It discusses how these outcomes combine very substantial text with extensive software and demonstration videos, and integrate historical and technical material with music analysis, using software to deliver an experience that is interactive, aural and playful. We discuss how further such analyses might be produced and outline tools being developed to facilitate this. We believe interactive aural analysis has a significant role to play as part of the future directions of electroacoustic music studies.

Central to our argument is the belief that electroacoustic music, or indeed any music, is best studied not in the abstract but in a way that directly links analytical ideas to aural experience, and one that incorporates playful interactive engagement with the music. In this spirit our paper is illustrated by a number of short video examples of interactive aural software in use. Links to these videos are provided at various places in this text. Alternatively, you can watch a video recording of the whole paper, with the video examples embedded.