bradr@bartok.Eng.Sun.COM (Brad Rubenstein) (07/18/90)
Music-Research Digest Mon, 16 Jul 90 Volume 5 : Issue 69
Today's Topics:
ASTN meeting at SIGGRAPH
Music-Research Digest Vol. 5, #64: IRCAM research papers
response to Smoliar
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Date: Sun, 15 Jul 90 13:09:00 PDT
From: rmalina <(Roger F. Malina)rmalina%edu.berkeley.ssl@edu.berkeley.jade>
Subject: ASTN meeting at SIGGRAPH
To: BR1H+@edu.cmu.andrew, CONSERVA@it.cnr.fi.ifiidg, Music-Research@prg
Message-ID: <9007152009.AA01548@sag2.ssl.berkeley.edu>
To: ASTB Board members, ASTN members, interested organisations
From: Rroger Malina. ISAST
I append an announcement of the upcoming ASTB "birds or a feather
meeting" at SIGGRAPH. Any organisation wishing to present
plans of their activities is welcome to have time on the
agenda. Please also diffuse this announcement. The meeting is
an open meeting to anyone interested in networking among art
and technology groups.
If you plan to attend please RSVP to this mail so we can make
sure we have enough chairs.
ASTN/SISEA/TISEA meeting at SIGGRAPH
The Art, Science Technology Network is holding
a meeting of representatives of art and technology
groups during SIGGRAPH in Dallas, Texas
The moderator will be Mark Resch, member of
the advisory board, ASTN
The meeting details are;
Date: Wednesday Aug 8 1990
Time: 10:30 -12:15 pm
Location: Dallas Convention Center Room W 104
The agenda is:
Presentation on the Second Internaitional Symposium on the
Electronic Arts - Groningen, Holland, Nov 1990
Presentation on the Third International Symposium on the
Electronic Arts, Australian Network for Art and Technology,
Australia 1992
Information on plans for San Francisco Festival of the
Sonic Arts, October 1992
Any organisations wishing to make presentations to the group
should send email to Roger Malina at rmalina@soc1.ssl.berkeley.edu
or isast@garnet.berkeley.edu or isast on the WELL
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Date: 14 Jul 90 15:34:57 GMT
From: Stephen Smoliar <smoliar%venera.isi.edu%usc%zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu@edu.
Subject: Music-Research Digest Vol. 5, #64: IRCAM research papers
To: music-research@prg
Message-ID: <14293@venera.isi.edu>
In article <1359@philmtl.philips.ca> vo@philmtl.philips.ca (Vladimir Orlt)
writes:
> I was in Paris recently and I picked up a summary of IRCAM research
>papers; this is probably too small to be an exhaustive list, but I think
>it dates back to the mid 70s or so. If there is enough interest, I'll
>post it.
I am surprised this has not prompted any response. I, for one, would very much
like to see as much information about IRCAM publications as you can provide
before fatigue and/or boredom set in. By all rights, IRCAM should be providing
this information by their own efforts. (I am pretty sure they are connected to
our net.) However, if they are going to be that way, then the rest of us
should be allowed to benefit from the kindness of strangers.
=========================================================================
USPS: Stephen Smoliar
USC Information Sciences Institute
4676 Admiralty Way Suite 1001
Marina del Rey, California 90292-6695
Internet: smoliar@vaxa.isi.edu
"It's only words . . . unless they're true."--David Mamet
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Date: Fri Jul 13 06:34:26 1990
From: hku!ray@relay.EU.net
Subject: response to Smoliar
To: hp4nl!music-research@relay.EU.net
I feel as if I must respond to Stephen Smoliar's letter of Tue, 29 May 90.
It would be much more interesting to discuss some theoretical issues, but
it seems that the discussions in MRD have been reduced to knitting club
gossip and personal attacks. In keeping with this attitude, I will try to
keep the discussion personal, if only to simplify things.
If Laske had never written a word, his contributions would be
"outstanding". I am overwhelmed by the lack of appreciation for the
effort which he has put forth to organize conferences and organizations to
support research in computer music. Fifteen years ago, he was an active
participant in what came to be known as the Institute for Sonology, an
organization which spawned several music research organizations
over the past decade. Similarly, his efforts to arrange international
meeting places where researchers in the subject can meet has been
significant. Some of you seem to think that conferences and workshops
are irrelevant, now that you have e-mail. What a pitifully sad life must
have led you to this thought. I am sorry for you.
As for getting rich from organizing conferences, you must be kidding!
Bernard Bel addressed this issue articulately in his letter of Thu, 31 May.
By the way, editing/publishing academic journals and newsletters won't
get you rich either. A word to the wise is sufficient, they say. One
question remains: Why haven't you attacked Laurie Anderson, Brian Eno,
Steve Jobs and the Apple executives, who HAVE lined their swimming
pools with dollars by capitalizing on music research? I know that this is
too obvious to be worthy of discussion, but what was the purpose of
attacking Laske in the first place?
As for Laske's writings. I haven't read much of his recent stuff. I'm
not interested in the recent work in expert systems, neural nets, and other
pop-AI. Most of this stuff is nonsense, anyway. Laske seems to have
gotten on the band-wagon, and fallen into the same trap as thousands other peopl
e. I can forgive him because there is one book "Introduction to a Generative The
ory of Music" (originally entitled "In Search of a Generative Theory of Music")
which is definitely worth (re)reading.
Certainly, Jackendorf and Lerdahl exposition is richer, clearer and more
complete. But, Laske struggled with many of the same concepts, and he
wasn't afraid to let the world know what he was thinking about. Maybe,
you don't care, but I do. I don't really know much about music (theory).
I've only been studying the subject for about four months, but it seems to
me that Jackendorff and Lerdahl are closest to a formal critical theory for
music.Laske seems to be to have written a prior book which opens the
door on the methodology. I think it was the first exposition of a
generative grammar for musical composition. If you know of an earlier
reference, I'd really like to know what it is. If there is one, I'll read it!
As for "correctness" in (scientific) literature: Far less than 10% of what
has been written in academic journals could satisfy your criteria of
correctness. This doesn't mean that it's all bullshit, either. Inquiry must
always be dominated by (in)correctness. Otherwise, what is the point?
So, Stephen, if this is not so clear to you, why have you been doing so
much complaining about Laske? Must be something going on, if it gets
you so upset. It seems to me that you are making an identical kind of
contribution by maintaining MRD.
By the way, since you seem to like to get personal. What is it that you
are trying to understand? Is it some kind of behavioral analysis that you
are doing? Are you working on a musical problem or a psychology
problem? Or do you conceive of musical composition as psychological
problem solving? Or, I hope, is it some sort of formal music problem,
like "What constitutes a minimum song?", or "Is it possible to create
non-narrative music?". Or is it a traditional kind of question, like
"How can I create music which is as relevant to my times as was
Bach's or Puccini's?". I honestly do not understand what your
interests and motivations are? If I did, maybe I'd understand why you
hate Laske so much.
I hope it's not one of those nonsense pop-AI questions, like "How do
people understand music?". Much too undecidable for my taste.
By the way, I love coding in LISP (I spend most of my time doing it; it's
one of my favorite hobbies); but there is no substitute for getting down and dir
ty with some theory and philosophy. If , as you say, many of your readers take a
n interest in contemporary philosophy, I'll leave you
with this:
"Deconstruction is not a critical response, the critical is its object;
deconstruction is deconstruction of critical dogma."
Jacques Derrida, Digraphe 11(March), 1973
- Ray
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