Looking Outwards-04-Section B

Experiments in Musical Intelligence, EMI or EMMY, is a program that analyzes musical compositions and generates entirely new compositions that emulate the sound, style, mood, and emotion of the original. Written by composer, author, and scientist, David Cope, this project allows entirely new compositions to be algorithmically generated in the style of any composer. Compositions have been generated in the styles of Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, and many more, including Cope himself. In fact, Cope’s original inspiration for the software project was writer’s block. He was stuck and wanted to identify his own compositional style.

Although the software is data driven and bases its compositions on works by the original composer, it never repeats or copies the original work. The compositions generated are unique. Cope’s software deconstructs the original works; then records their time signatures. The final step runs the data through a recombinant algorithm for which Cope holds a patent.

This project was truly revolutionary for its time. It inspires questions about creativity and the mind. Originally written in the LISP programming language in the 1980s, it has been modified to use AI techniques as they have advanced. Interestingly, the generative compositions have been used in a type of Turing Test. One particular test set out to see if audiences could identify which of three compositions was actually composed by Bach, which was an emulated composition written by a human, and which was generated by a computer. Audiences chose the EMMY generated composition as the actual Bach. Perhaps EMMY is the first piece of software to pass the Turing Test.

To learn more about David Cope and EMMY click here and here.