AI Methods in Algorithmic Composition: A Comprehensive Survey

Algorithmic composition is the partial or total automation of the process of music composition by using computers. Since the 1950s, different computational techniques related to Artificial Intelligence have been used for algorithmic composition, including grammatical representations, probabilistic methods, neural networks, symbolic rule-based systems, constraint programming and evolutionary algorithms. This survey aims to be a comprehensive account of research on algorithmic composition, presenting a thorough view of the field for researchers in Artificial Intelligence.This study was partially supported by a grant for the MELOMICS project (IPT-300000-2010-010) from the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, and a grant for the CAUCE project (TSI-090302-2011-8) from the Spanish Ministerio de Industria, Turismo y Comercio. The first author was supported by a grant for the GENEX project (P09-TIC- 5123) from the Consejería de Innovación y Ciencia de Andalucía

L-Music: uma abordagem para composição musical assistida usando L-Systems

Generative music systems have been researched for an extended period of time. The scientific corpus of this research field is translating, currently, into the world of the everyday musician and composer. With these tools, the creative process of writing music can be augmented or completely replaced by machines. The work in this document aims to contribute to research in assisted music composition systems. To do so, a review on the state of the art of these fields was performed and we found that a plethora of methodologies and approaches each provide their own interesting results (to name a few, neural networks, statistical models, and formal grammars). We identified Lindenmayer Systems, or L-Systems, as the most interesting and least explored approach to develop an assisted music composition system prototype, aptly named L-Music, due to the ability of producing complex outputs from simple structures. L-Systems were initially proposed as a parallel string rewriting grammar to model algae plant growth. Their applications soon turned graphical (e.g., drawing fractals), and eventually they were applied to music generation. Given that our prototype is assistive, we also took the user interface and user experience design into its well-deserved consideration. Our implemented interface is straightforward, simple to use with a structured visual hierarchy and flow and enables musicians and composers to select their desired instruments; select L-Systems for generating music or create their own custom ones and edit musical parameters (e.g., scale and octave range) to further control the outcome of L-Music, which is musical fragments that a musician or composer can then use in their own works. Three musical interpretations on L-Systems were implemented: a random interpretation, a scale-based interpretation, and a polyphonic interpretation. All three approaches produced interesting musical ideas, which we found to be potentially usable by musicians and composers in their own creative works. Although positive results were obtained, the developed prototype has many improvements for future work. Further musical interpretations can be added, as well as increasing the number of possible musical parameters that a user can edit. We also identified the possibility of giving the user control over what musical meaning L-Systems have as an interesting future challenge.Sistemas de geração de música têm sido alvo de investigação durante períodos alargados de tempo. Recentemente, tem havido esforços em passar o conhecimento adquirido de sistemas de geração de música autónomos e assistidos para as mãos do músico e compositor. Com estas ferramentas, o processo criativo pode ser enaltecido ou completamente substituído por máquinas. O presente trabalho visa contribuir para a investigação de sistemas de composição musical assistida. Para tal, foi efetuado um estudo do estado da arte destas temáticas, sendo que foram encontradas diversas metodologias que ofereciam resultados interessantes de um ponto de vista técnico e musical. Os sistemas de Lindenmayer, ou L-Systems, foram selecionados como a abordagem mais interessante, e menos explorada, para desenvolver um protótipo de um sistema de composição musical assistido com o nome L-Music, devido à sua capacidade de produzirem resultados complexos a partir de estruturas simples. Os L-Systems, inicialmente propostos para modelar o crescimento de plantas de algas, são gramáticas formais, cujo processo de reescrita de strings acontece de forma paralela. As suas aplicações rapidamente evoluíram para interpretações gráficas (p.e., desenhar fractais), e eventualmente também foram aplicados à geração de música. Dada a natureza assistida do protótipo desenvolvido, houve uma especial atenção dada ao design da interface e experiência do utilizador. Esta, é concisa e simples, tendo uma hierarquia visual estruturada para oferecer uma orientação coesa ao utilizador. Neste protótipo, os utilizadores podem selecionar instrumentos; selecionar L-Systems ou criar os seus próprios, e editar parâmetros musicais (p.e., escala e intervalo de oitavas) de forma a gerarem excertos musicais que possam usar nas suas próprias composições. Foram implementadas três interpretações musicais de L-Systems: uma interpretação aleatória, uma interpretação à base de escalas e uma interpretação polifónica. Todas as interpretações produziram resultados musicais interessantes, e provaram ter potencial para serem utilizadas por músicos e compositores nos seus trabalhos criativos. Embora tenham sido alcançados resultados positivos, o protótipo desenvolvido apresenta múltiplas melhorias para trabalho futuro. Entre elas estão, por exemplo, a adição de mais interpretações musicais e a adição de mais parâmetros musicais editáveis pelo utilizador. A possibilidade de um utilizador controlar o significado musical de um L-System também foi identificada como uma proposta futura relevante

Adaptive music: Automated music composition and distribution

Creativity, or the ability to produce new useful ideas, is commonly associated to the human being; but there are many other examples in nature where this phenomenon can be observed. Inspired by this fact, in engineering, and particularly in computational sciences, many different models have been developed to tackle a number of problems. Music, a form of art broadly present along the human history, is the main field addressed in this thesis, taking advantage of the kind of ideas that bring diversity and creativity to nature and computation. We present Melomics, an algorithmic composition method based on evolutionary search, with a genetic encoding of the solutions, which are interpreted in a complex developmental process that leads to music in the standard formats. This bioinspired compositional system has exhibited a high creative power and versatility to produce music of different type, which in many occasions has proven to be indistinguishable from the music made by human composers. The system also has enabled the emergence of a set of completely novel applications: from effective tools to help anyone to easily obtain the precise music they need, to radically new uses like adaptive music for therapy, amusement or many other purposes. It is clear to us that there is much research work yet to do in this field; and that countless and new unimaginable uses will derive from it

A Functional Taxonomy of Music Generation Systems

Digital advances have transformed the face of automatic music generation since its beginnings at the dawn of computing. Despite the many breakthroughs, issues such as the musical tasks targeted by different machines and the degree to which they succeed remain open questions. We present a functional taxonomy for music generation systems with reference to existing systems. The taxonomy organizes systems according to the purposes for which they were designed. It also reveals the inter-relatedness amongst the systems. This design-centered approach contrasts with predominant methods-based surveys and facilitates the identification of grand challenges to set the stage for new breakthroughs.Comment: survey, music generation, taxonomy, functional survey, survey, automatic composition, algorithmic compositio

Non-Standard Sound Synthesis with Dynamic Models

Full version unavailable due to 3rd party copyright restrictions.This Thesis proposes three main objectives: (i) to provide the concept of a new generalized non-standard synthesis model that would provide the framework for incorporating other non-standard synthesis approaches; (ii) to explore dynamic sound modeling through the application of new non-standard synthesis techniques and procedures; and (iii) to experiment with dynamic sound synthesis for the creation of novel sound objects. In order to achieve these objectives, this Thesis introduces a new paradigm for non-standard synthesis that is based in the algorithmic assemblage of minute wave segments to form sound waveforms. This paradigm is called Extended Waveform Segment Synthesis (EWSS) and incorporates a hierarchy of algorithmic models for the generation of microsound structures. The concepts of EWSS are illustrated with the development and presentation of a novel non-standard synthesis system, the Dynamic Waveform Segment Synthesis (DWSS). DWSS features and combines a variety of algorithmic models for direct synthesis generation: list generation and permutation, tendency masks, trigonometric functions, stochastic functions, chaotic functions and grammars. The core mechanism of DWSS is based in an extended application of Cellular Automata. The potential of the synthetic capabilities of DWSS is explored in a series of Case Studies where a number of sound object were generated revealing (i) the capabilities of the system to generate sound morphologies belonging to other non-standard synthesis approaches and, (ii) the capabilities of the system of generating novel sound objects with dynamic morphologies. The introduction of EWSS and DWSS is preceded by an extensive and critical overview on the concepts of microsound synthesis, algorithmic composition, the two cultures of computer music, the heretical approach in composition, non- standard synthesis and sonic emergence along with the thorough examination of algorithmic models and their application in sound synthesis and electroacoustic composition. This Thesis also proposes (i) a new definition for “algorithmic composition”, (ii) the term “totalistic algorithmic composition”, and (iii) four discrete aspects of non-standard synthesis

Ecomusicology: Bridging the Sciences, Arts, and Humanities

Paul Ehrlich is a key figure in modern environmental studies. In addition to ecological research, Ehrlich is known for his warnings about human overpopulation (Ehrlich, 1968). In the 1970s, he made a well-known wager with economist Julian Simon: Ehrlich contended that natural resource prices would increase continually during the 1980s, indicating increased scarcity and human suffering brought about by overpopulation, while Simon believed that prices would decline. Ehrlich was a good sport, and because his neo-Malthusian concerns lost to Simon's cornucopianism, he paid up and admitted he was wrong—but he was wrong only for that decade. Considering a longer time scale, from 1900 to 2008, we see that Ehrlich's perspicacious concerns were indeed correct (Kiel, Matheson, & Golembiewski, 2010). In the inaugural edition of the Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Ehrlich (2011) provided his “personal view” of environmental education. Considering his role as an important and respected environmental thinker and leader, and given the presentation of his ideas in such an auspicious forum, Ehrlich's advice merits our consideration

GenoMus: Representing Procedural Musical Structures with an Encoded Functional Grammar Optimized for Metaprogramming and Machine Learning

We present GenoMus, a new model for artificial musical creativity based on a procedural approach, able to represent compositional techniques behind a musical score. This model aims to build a framework for automatic creativity, that is easily adaptable to other domains beyond music. The core of GenoMus is a functional grammar designed to cover a wide range of styles, integrating traditional and contemporary composing techniques. In its encoded form, both composing methods and music scores are represented as one-dimensional arrays of normalized values. On the other hand, the decoded form of GenoMus grammar is human-readable, allowing for manual editing and the implementation of user-defined processes. Musical procedures (genotypes) are functional trees, able to generate musical scores (phenotypes). Each subprocess uses the same generic functional structure, regardless of the time scale, polyphonic structure, or traditional or algorithmic process being employed. Some works produced with the algorithm have been already published. This highly homogeneous and modular approach simplifies metaprogramming and maximizes search space. Its abstract and compact representation of musical knowledge as pure numeric arrays is optimized for the application of different machine learning paradigms.FEDER/Junta de Andalucia A.TIC.244.UGR20 Spanish GovernmentEuropean Commission PID2021-125537NA-I0

How Insights from the Humanities Shaped the Twentieth Century

What have the humanities brought us during the last century? Once the pinnacle of intellectual fulfillment, today the humanities suffer from an image problem. Disciplines like philology, art history, linguistics and musicology are seen as a luxury pastime which is of little use to society and less to the economy. Arguments in favour of the humanities emphasize their importance for critical thinking, historical responsibility and for creating competent democratic citizens. While these arguments may all be true, humanities scholars seem to overlook the possibility that the very assumption behind the image problem is wrong. Many scholars stress that the humanities do not solve concrete problems and that their value lies elsewhere. Yet a closer look at the history of the humanities shows a rather different picture. In my talk I will focus on the comparative history of the humanities during the long twentieth century. I will show how ideas and concepts from linguistics have led to the development of high-level programming languages in computer science. I will argue that methods from philology were incorporated by biology to analyze DNA sequences. And I will describe how the method of historical source criticism found its way into other disciplines for critically evaluating sources: from forensic science to evidence-based medicine and jurisprudence

How Insights from the Humanities Shaped the Twentieth Century

What have the humanities brought us during the last century? Once the pinnacle of intellectual fulfillment, today the humanities suffer from an image problem. Disciplines like philology, art history, linguistics and musicology are seen as a luxury pastime which is of little use to society and less to the economy. Arguments in favour of the humanities emphasize their importance for critical thinking, historical responsibility and for creating competent democratic citizens. While these arguments may all be true, humanities scholars seem to overlook the possibility that the very assumption behind the image problem is wrong. Many scholars stress that the humanities do not solve concrete problems and that their value lies elsewhere. Yet a closer look at the history of the humanities shows a rather different picture. In my talk I will focus on the comparative history of the humanities during the long twentieth century. I will show how ideas and concepts from linguistics have led to the development of high-level programming languages in computer science. I will argue that methods from philology were incorporated by biology to analyze DNA sequences. And I will describe how the method of historical source criticism found its way into other disciplines for critically evaluating sources: from forensic science to evidence-based medicine and jurisprudence