Resonance FM interview:

• research project - looking at weaving as a technical mode of existence. Looking at ancient weaving as being a technology. Looking at ancient weaving patterns as a technology. So much of algorithmic music is based on really recent history... its good to get a more culturally grounded view.... interference patterns... amazing properties... beyond a metaphor - computation is a kind of weaving
• Dave Griffiths - work for the ZX spectrum chip... low level operation are things like shifting, combining, multiply in binary... these are pattern elements very similar to weaving... ups and downs instead of 1s and 0s... to create something much greater than the sum of its parts... this approach to patterns making runs through human history.... currently learning konnokol... vc mdjsifj talks about coming to complexity through simple ways of exploring rhythms... its nice to embrace as an alogrithmic musician... what your doing is very simple
• algorithmic composition - different ways of describing algo music... I've always been a bit unsatisfied with how its usually described... there are always the same touch points... john cage (dice)... brian eno... steve reich... those are 2 interesting starting points... random numbers... and phase patterns... a way to have repetition that take a long time to reach resolution.... to me these are both kinds of patterns... one is glitch (breaking of pattern) one is a kind of weaving.... if we rely on randomness for change but if we have too much randomness it doesn't change... in practice white noise is static....where algorithmic composition gets interesting is where you embrace symmetry... at multiple scales... poly meter... combining things... fundamental definition of composition... when your working with algorithms there is a huge world to explore...synonymous with pattern making... its a way of looking at composition... you could apply it to any kind of composition (pen and paper)... there is something special about thinking about the higher level structure... its a trade off... im jealous of percussionists who can hit something and then change their minds right away... you get distance from the notes... in traditional scores you don't get this.... AC is stepping back from that... a notation that is about higherlevel structure rather than individual sounds.... a trade off... you open yourself up to surprise bc you are working with a higherlevel, almost chaotic notation... any approximation of the notation gives you a very different result (chaos)... it becomes less about the code and more about listening to the results... as you are writing it, you are hearing the results... once you feel what thats doing, its possible to read what you have written in the context of the music... code doesn't describe music it describes how to make it... walking the footsteps of morton feldman... disinterest in the status quo of how music is notated (in the west)... interested in other ways of doing it... we are stuck in the idea of music as being a notated form that describes the notes... its really limiting to me...
• cult of the written score - I don't read so I'm criticizing something that I don't understand... but its interesting how much pushback you get... there is a whole institutional framework protecting it. I can understand how writing music down supports interesting ways of change... if you write it down you can write other pieces based on it...
• Live coding - usually in front of an audience... screen projected behind them... writing code to make music live... not about the notation but how its changes... blank editor at the beginning and the end... reacting to the audience... sometimes it crashes... it becomes more like speech because (even though its written and formal) you write and manipulate it live... its more of an oral tradition... people in the audience might be livecoders who could use bits of what your writing... some livecoders come with with ready made tracks that they manipulate... but i like a really hands on improvised approach
• algorave - 10 years ago... i had been making algorithmic dance music since the year 2000... 2012 when we put a name on it... i was living in london doing an event called dorkbot... electronic art meeting... I really like how that worked... people just go and show their electric and electronic art subheaders (people doing strange things with electricity).. i really liked it ... it was international... it wasn't centrally controlled... it was called dorkbot so you couldn't go to one and take yourself seriously which was really important to me at the time... we were making it more of a thing... naming it was all it took really... in rave you don't foreground the performer... its about the crowd enjoying themselves... we put on lots of events and people started doing things... strong livecoding scene in mexico city... algoraves and algorumba... its spread around the world and changed as it spread... some places its nocompleit some places more organized... gave it a name and it became real ... I wouldn't claim algorave is anything new... we are sitting in sheffield which is the home of warp records... people like autechre, mark fell... what algorave contributes is an event that focuses on the algorithmic aspect... its nice having this event or culture where algorithmic music is the event.. the thing you go there for.. what happens when code becomes embedded in the culture... if you go to a knitting circle you see bits of code everywhere.. why don't we see that in music... it can be distracting... i don't read the code when i'm watching a live coder...
• livecoding - when the coder runs something it flashes... seeing decision points... making them visible builds connections with the audience... when this came about there was a standard way of performing where you sit at a desk and stare at a screen... this was set up as an alternative... its definitely not a panacea... I like having a small projection or having people look over my shoulder...
• dancing is a way of thinking - if your dancing you can comprehend more complex music
• tidalcycles - language is really good for combining things together at a high level.. I'm using language to combine musical ideas together and I find that really fun... relationship between determinism and predictability... its deterministic but the results of combination are complex... its hard to predict... its about unpredictability exploration creativity...
• beginnings - generative manifesto... super inspired by autechre... warp records... (like really inspired...) ... i got intro it by listening to electronic music... going to parties... idea of a programmer who is creative and makes all their own stuff... at the time the idea of a computer programmer being creative was a joke... so i wanted to push back... we wanted to make interfaces for ourselves to use but share what we were doing...
• UK RA future leaders fellowship - algorithmic pattern project - 4-7 year project full time... its fundamental research looking at algorithmic patterns... hosted by then try this... (non-profit)... small open access open source organization... looking at pattern in weaving, juggling, architecture... looking for ways these heritage algorithms can inform new tech... out current view of tech is based off of cold ware military tech... but there is another tradition of computation that is based in weaving that is more grounded, open to possibility and change... working with Kate Sicchio... robot dance notation... algorithmic pattern for dance... incan knots for keeping track of numbers... paula minya sound artist using kipu in her work... hoping to work with her on textile based programming languages where you write code by tying knots in string...

Kate Siccio and Alex ICLI -

• pattern is pejorative but we embrace it ---
  • repetition
  • symmetry/and breaking symmetry
  • interference/combination/layering... scale
• VC manjuneth - if your a musician trying to work in complexities your a failure
  • as an artist you should always be working with very simple ideas
  • for the audience it can be complex.. but for the artist simple
• Sicchio - one gesture can become a composition by repeating a pattern
• McLean - everything we have said about pattern could apply to computation... pattern and computation are the same thing
• Sicchio - what about error and pattern... McLean error is the feeling when a pattern in broken ... you notice it when it breaks
• Sicchio - somatic practices where you move with pattern and correct abad habits in your body... the body is already full of errors and we need
• Sicchio writes code for humans to execute... if you ask a human to do somthing impossible they will still do somthing... they may ignore your... one dancer grabbed th e mic and started giving their own instructions... humans have agency... this was an interesting error (moment of anarchy)
• Sicchio - robots --- covid has shifted how we work with humans in the room... robotics needs dance... you start from a blank slate with a robot... dancers are good at giving instructions for movement... systems need my expertise as a dancer.. instructions, rulesets, and algorithms for robot dance... their errors are more predictable..
• McLean - computation needs weaving not the other way around... computer programoing needs help from older crafts like textiles

Alex McLean, Antonio Roberts, Abhinay Khoparzi and Melody Loveless

• Roberts - Algorave
• Loveless - started Codie with Kate Sicchio ... live codes solo with live singing
• Khoparzi - from north of india... algorave india started 3 years ago.. plays in network bands --- supercontinent (japan , hamilton).. we practice every week... a band with a person in argentina - the rest are from south east asia
• McLean - livecoding since 2003 -- organized lots of algoraves... algomech festival - recently working on connections with algorithmic music and weaving... the first algorave between london and sheffield... the first one was really cold and no-one danced.... this was a way to get people to dance to the music... in acedemia they dont dance... we made a label called chord punch to make this music and not a research interest... in the end it was making up a dorky word that got people doing it...
• Loveless - teaches livecoding at NYU.. the first day of class we look at other people discussing it and demonstrate that there is no one way to do it... "live coding is the act of maniputlating algorithms in real time to change music or visuals"
• Khoparzi - we are writing words on a screen that can be interepreted by computers or humans they could be messages... the way I use it is a way of getting folks interested in algorithmic art... the concept if you know programming your working for corporate software dev makign big bucks... the way I have engaged with it as a way of expanding my practice... doing repetitive tasks better.. but it also lets you break out of patterns ... as technical people we get fixated on even numbers and lines.. we want it to fix in to visual structures... livecoding you are always trying to humanize it... live coding is a way of talking and communicating with folks
• Roberts - im not a programmer... live coding give me instantaneous feedback of it all ... its very intentional typing... i want to type these words at this time to get this kind of feedback from the audience.. for me to be a thing in my life and work doing all these events makes it a real thing for me... when the other people aren't there... the algorave is what live coding is for me...
• McLean- its nice to define livecoding as a kind of situation - music or visuals coming out.. person typing ... a configuration of people and technology... i like that its open and continually changing itself... its a way of communicating and expressing yourself. ... programming is part of the program... usually these are separated... the program can change at any moment because you are writing it.. you are also being changed by the program... its a feedback process of creativity... it makes it a 2 way communication... its a negotiation where you are listening -how does live coding feel?
• Loveless - i didn;t like it at first... i come out of classical music so i was jugemental coming in.. there are negative thought about certain kinds of music in that community ... but then i realized it was process music.... Its using communication to explore somthing visual or sound based which it really interesting
• Roberts - is it stressful or high energy? I like high pressure situations.. i have to make all these decisions... if I run this code will my computer crash... when I do it i feel sweaty and shaky... i don't come from a music background... i listen to it... I'm aware of the stigma around electronic music ... there is so much that can go wrong
• Khoparzi - it used to be mostly people standing around... because we were not showing what were doing... harder sounds breakcore... happended to be in UK and saw livecoding as a way of making it visuble/understandable... if it breaks it becomes this kind of improvisational theater. -Roberts - what about music genres? what is everyone making?
• McLean- im making electronic music but I freely collaborate with percussionists... drum machine players... collaborating is really nice... I'm curious what its like to collaborate over networks? Super Continent, Codie?
• Loveless - Katlin and Sarah are elsewhere... sunday morning we 'go to church' and make music together over a secure vpn using Troop... we are doing more with synchronisation between machine and live human
• Khoparzi - with algorave india ... i come from a percussion background.. I navigate around my collaborators taking turns who is going to be weird and who is going to keep the beat... for Supercontinent we have strategies for rehearsing... anihilation where we make anihilation sounds... virus where take sounds from each other and mutate them... i take vocal chops from one artist and im dong some microsound things with it.. I like about integrating different systems and see what comes out...
• Roberts - i like the idea of annihilation
• Roberts - My collaboration with Maria - Bad Circulation ... we are both in the same city but with the pandemic we had to collaborate online... livecoding is part of the programming world... So many livecoders are also percussionists... I'm drawn toward percussion... everyone takes on roles.. we each have sounds that we like. browser tools... its not like we are typing more things... Startign up a scene in your local city
• McLean - anyone is free to make an algorave... you can get logos online.. there are guidelines...avoiding hierarchies.. setting up a meetup..
• Loveless - ramsey nassar, sichhio, others started livecode NYC .. there is a very active discord.. so many shows happening... I'm lucky to be in a place where there are so many shows... there was once a week for a while... Dan Gorlick goes and travels he is organizign one in california... if you are trying to organize one where you are, then don't make it all about livecoding... I love algorave but i want it to be less special... im interested when its oblitterated in 50 years and normalized...
• Roberts - i used to be curator at a gallery... there is a long history of heavy metal, industrial... the gallery I worked for took a chance on it... try to normalize it.. try to do a live coding set in a "normal" event... there is no algorave company you just build up interest and go fro there...
• Khoparzi - i used algorave as a way to sneak experimental music into the scene... gigs in bombay... people wouldnt show up... I would throw in harder sounds... Im from a small town.. Ive had to go to bigger cities... Bombay... did an all women algorave in New Dehli... computation_mama she did a lot of work normalizing it and breaking stereotypes that it has to be about nerdy boys in dark rooms... During the lockdowns we would do sessions on Jitsi and take up a tool and teach each other... its less about livecoding and more about spreading the compuational arts... the idea is to take it to smaller cities... Do you think livecoding environments lend themselves to different genres..
• McLean - I think livecoding environments has a sound... you can work with it or against it... Algorave doesn't have one genre... we think of genre as being about the sound but its more about the culture around it... algorave is more about the culture around it... you could replace all the sounds...
• Khoparzi - yeah we did one with dhol sounds.. we made techno/dance music and connect it to different ideas.. make ambient... connect it to modular..
• Loveless - I like talking about afordances and classes based on your tool.. we look at what is easier to set up and what is more difficult to do... this is interesting to compare for young people... the genre aspect is social... music is art but also has a function or role... it is social or for one person.. code and tools are similar... what is music's role?... in worship, socially, propaganda... that could be fun to think about .. maybe we will have an answer... there is so much of a social aspect embedded in algorave....
• McLean - its often introduced as something futuristic.. there is a history of futurism of replacing the past.. which is obviously a facist ideology... i like the idea of making it less special.. connecting live-coding with cultural practice.. how do we slow down technology and bring it into everyday life in a more human way..
• Roberts - humans are making computers

hack circus podcast

• McLean - I really enjoyed programming.. the escapism of it.. working with text.. I'm really interested in computers as language machines... lucky to grow up in the first internet boom and land a job in programming easily... I wanted to make music with this thing and have a social life with it... my friend adrian was making generative music... i didn't have a computer growing up but my brother had a sinclair spectrum... when i went to university i did a computing degree... they had a computing art lab but i wasn't allowed in... I always wondered what they were doing... I was always interested in making communities ... making bulliten board systems... adrian encouraged me to make music with code... encouraged me to enter a software art contest... fork bomb made patterns while it crashed your computer... people dont talk about software anymore... all apps ...software was a curiotorial fiction... people wanted there to be software art but it didnt exist... once people start calling you an artist you can start calling your self an artists... connect the abstrcat world of language with physical expressions of music...
• I had a guitar growing up... i wanted to play it but i never got on with it... i fell into playing the same thing over and over again.. there were synthesizers in school.. i would spend all lunchtimes there remaking blue monday over and over again on a dx7... the only read experience I have as a musician is writing code to make music...
• I went to rough trade in london looking through all the CD's for algorithmic music... farmers manual, autechre, aphex twin... autechre, mark fell... are the pioneers here... there are people who did this but there wasn't a community around it.. the point of it wasn't the code it was the music which isn't bad... for me its nice to have a community around the technology.. that what I've tried to do is create a community around algorithmic music worldwide and creating something like a scene...
• dorkbot - albert, adrian, and i ran dorkbot in london... we didn't want any one person or venue feeling like they owned it.. very much a collaboration... moved it around... it was nice to create these things that seemed like and anarchic thing that just appeared but behind the scenes there are one or two people organizing things.. dork bot is still going...
• interdicipinary work is not aboutdoing somthing in the middle... its about creating somthing new in the middle ... it can be frustrating .. i want to do something in the community but the community doesn't exist yet so i have to make the community... you go out to do somthing like make th emusic but you realize that you need to make the software... then you need to make the computer and sooner or later you find yourself (shaving the yak)... i think thats a good thing to do a good way to spend your life...
• technology is a fabricated layer on top of what technology is... technology doesn't mean any thing... its an expression of power.. tech is elon musk is interested in... thats not what technology is... the idea of an iphone being advanced even though its only been around for a tiny bit of time when a loom has been developed for thousands of year... as soon as there is an expert in it... its just gatekeeping... digital seems to mean the internet and AI, and internet banking... you can't come to a definition that makes sense unless you open that... its aout counting, discrete words... the distinction between analog and digital fall apart... its a shame that these interesting and useful words get co-opted into something meaningless.. the idea of traveling concepts... the idea that ideas move around but actually lose meaning as they do..
• algomech - a digital art festival but without any seamless approaches.. the idea of seamlessness is a problem in the digital world... you want to pick apart the seams.. all the work i pick for algomech has to be shoddy... you need to see the human hand
• you cant go to dorkbot and take yourself too seriously
• maypole dance... we think we make robots to help us but we actually end up helping them...when they fall over... we care for them...
• music is in a generally inert period of nostalgia... its not even nostalgia... its hard to imagine something radically different
• the art scene isn't supported well by the local government... gives artist freedom
• there is space -- people doing things that don't make very much money which are the most interesting things...
• algorave - stupid enough that people don't take themselves too seriously... WIRED publish an algorave every 6 years or so saying we are the future of music... they get the wrong idea..
• tidal isn't a recipe.. its about patterns... when you look at how a computer chip works... it is more in common with a weaving loom that you might expect... the history of technology is much more about the history of textiles than you might think.... people immediately think of jacquard loom (lovelace, babbage)... there is much more history than that... it was a complete misunderstanding of the connection between ... mathematics of weaving ... interference of warp and weft... have something new emerges... interference pattern... inputs -> magic -> outputs... repeat...
• i think about tidal as a language.. you have words and you can combine them in infinite ways and see meaning in it that wasn't there before.. its a weird formal language ... when i'm performing i do feel as though i'm not using my body at all.. i lose a certain physical sense.. i'm not thinking about the typing... i'm using my ears a lot... hearing is a sense of touch.. nodding my head... pretty unaware of my surroundings... i'm aware if people are dancing...