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From: mcnamara@vixvax.mgi.com
Newsgroups: comp.music,alt.fractals
Subject: Re: Fractal Music Generation (summary)
Message-ID: <118.26264d98@vixvax.mgi.com>
Date: 3 Jun 90 07:25:56 GMT
References: <562@bilver.UUCP>
Organization: Management Graphics, Inc.
Lines: 43

In article <562@bilver.UUCP>, alex@bilver.UUCP (Alex Matulich) writes:
> Several weeks ago I posted an a plea for help in comp.music and
> comp.sources.wanted for an algorithm to generate fractal music.  I lost the
> original text of my posting, but the gist of it was this:
> 
> A fugue is a piece of music rich in self-similar structure.  J. S. Bach, a
> master at writing fugues, was able to maintain up to six instrumental parts
> playing a short theme in different ways -- at different pitches, different
> speeds, inverted, upside-down, backwards, and so on -- and it all fit
> together too!
> 
> Fractals also are rich in self-similar structure.  By definition, after all,
> a fractal IS a self-similar object.  The parallels between fractals and
> fugues seem so close, I thought, that maybe a MUSICAL fractal generator
> could be developed as an aid in writing fugues.
> 
> I tried an experiment based on the generation of a Koch curve, assigning
> a relationship between note pitch and line angle, and another relationship
> between note duration and line length.  My experimented generated a
> sequence of notes that sounded interesting.  The problem is that it was
> a single monotonic sequence.  How can a fractal music generator be made
> to create overlapping sequences of notes which have harmonically correct
> relations to each other?
> 
	In 1988 or thereabouts Charles Dodge (_Earths' Magnetic Field_) came
to Mpls. to lecture about computer music.  He brought with him a tape of 
several pieces of music, one generated using fractal relationships between
the parts of the composition.  As I recall, he generated an initial fractal
sequence, and then used fractal relations to generate the other parts from
the original one.
	The music was interesting.  Sort of like 101 Strings does Phillip
Glass.  As he put it:  "This is the first computer music I've heard which
sounds like bad music(previous attempts didn't sound like music at all)."
	There were several other interesting pieces on the tape.  The best 
one was by Curtis Braun, titled _Brontosaurus_.  It was a child's poem, read
by a computer voice synthesis program, and then modified by the composer into
a sort of self-similar composition.
	I think he would send you the tape, and/or provide details of his 
algorithms.  He is at the Brooklyn College Center for Computer Music.  
Phone (718) 780-5582.

Curt McNamara
mcnamara@mgi.com