Blog 06

Shimon is a musical improvisation robot developed at the Georgia Tech Center for Music Technology. The robot plays marimba following the performance of a human musician where, after hearing chords the musician plays, Shimon can then quickly take in the information and play a tune similar to what a human might improvise if given the same task. Jazz music, though known for its improvisation and “randomness,” so to speak, actually follows a series of rules that can be bent/structured in certain ways to find new creative sounds. Shimon works in a similar way where, although the improvisation can seem random, it actually works based on similar “rules” or detailed algorithms/ artificial intelligence that allows him to play a beat based on those already human-developed rules for improvisation. I find this project especially interesting due to its ability to connect humanity and robots through music, while still preserving the improvisational qualities of genres like jazz.

Shimon Robot