Voyager

Still reflecting on George E. Lewis’ remarkable history of the AACM and American Experimental Music, A Power Stronger Than Itself, came across this text from a few years back about his composition/computer program:

Voyager is a nonhierarchical, interactive musical environment that privileges improvisation. In Voyager, improvisers engage in dialogue with a computer-driven, interactive “virtual improvising orchestra.” A computer program analyzes aspects of a human improviser’s performance in real time, using that analysis to guide an automatic composition (or, if you will, improvisation) program that generates both complex responses to the musician’s playing and independent behavior that arises from its own internal processes.

You can read the whole article about context and operation here. Playing in a version of this piece you get a sense of just how intriguing (beguiling?) a musical conversation can be. George is currently a professor in the Music Department at Columbia University.