How I Taught My Computer to Write Its Own Music - Issue 50: Emergence
▻http://nautil.us/issue/50/emergence/how-i-taught-my-computer-to-write-its-own-music-rp
On a warm day in April 2013, I was sitting in a friend’s kitchen in Paris, trying to engineer serendipity. I was trying to get my computer to write music on its own. I wanted to be able to turn it on and have it spit out not just any goofy little algorithmic tune but beautiful, compelling, mysterious music; something I’d be proud to have written myself. The kitchen window was open, and as I listened to the sounds of children playing in the courtyard below, I thought about how the melodies of their voices made serendipitous counterpoint with the songs of nearby birds and the intermittent drone of traffic on the rue d’Alésia. In response to these daydreams, I was making a few tweaks to my software—a chaotic, seat-of-the-pants affair that betrayed my intuitive, self-taught approach to (...)
