Workshop on Current Research Directions in Computer Music

by Leonello Tarabella, Graziano Bertini and Gabriele Boschi

A workshop, held in November 2001 at the Audiovisual Institute, Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, provided an overview of the first year of activities of the European Network: MOSART (Music Orchestration Systems in Algorithmic Research and Technology). The event was structured around four main topics: Music Generation, Music Performance, Music Interfaces and Music Sound Modelling.

MOSART is a 3-year project of the European Commission within the Research Training Networks programme. The aim is to 'promote training-through-research, especially of young researchers, both pre- and post-doctoral level, within the frame of high quality trans-national collaborative research projects, including those in emerging fields of research'. MOSART promotes research in the field of Sound and Music Computing, focussing on machine analysis and understanding of musical aspects of sound, such as timbre space and control and virtualisation of instruments. Issues regarding the areas of Interactive Musical Performance and of Human Computer Interactive Conducting Tools are studied, with special attention being given to the use of computers in music analysis, digital music representation and computer assisted musical composition and performance.

The institutions involved in the coordination of the MOSART project are DIKU-University of Copenhagen, DAIMI-DIEM-University of Aarhus, DTU-Danish Technical University, Denmark; NTNU-Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway; KTH-Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden; University of Sheffield, United Kingdom; NICI-University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands; Austrian Research Institute for Artificial Intelligence, Vienna, Austria; DEI-University of Padua, DIST-University of Genoa, CNUCE/IEI-CNR, Pisa, Italy; LMA-Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique, Marseille, France; IUA-Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, Spain.

The Workshop was structured around four main topics: Music Generation (emphasizing algorithmic composition and composition systems), Music Performance (focussing on quantitative models of performance, cognitive models of perception and production, and expressive performance and emotion); Music Interfaces (with attention to gesture based interaction, mapping strategies and multimodality); Music Sound Modelling (concentrating on instrument modelling, instrument recognition and content processing).

There were three types of events: presentations of overview and short papers (published in the proceedings), posters/demos allowing in-depth discussions between presenters and participants, and panels which provided the opportunity for more informal discussions on the state of the art and future directions of the topics.

Please contact:
Leonello Tarabella, CNUCE-CNR
Tel: +39 050 315 3012 (office) 2043 (lab)
E-mail: l.tarabella@cnuce.cnr.it

Graziano Bertini, IEI-CNR
Tel: +39 050 315 3125 (office) 3144 (lab)
E-mail: bertini@iei.pi.cnr.it