Music by Computers

Music by Computers by Heinz von Foerster. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780471910305.

Since the electronic computer was invented, its usefulness to society has been limited more by the imagination of man than by the capability of the hardware. The possibility of a computer creating music, art, or literature is perhaps obscure only because our pride forces us to believe these areas are man’s exclusive provinces. The 1966 Fall Joint Computer Conference scheduled a highly creative, imaginative and enjoyable session on Computers in Music. The papers read there form the basis of this book, and focus on three aspects of the use of computers in generating music. First, computer hardware and software for implementing the generation of sounds are discussed under the heading Systems and Programs. Second, the versatility of digital computers in exploring rules of succession and synchronism is demonstrated in the section, Composition. Finally, the problem of judgment entering perception – i.e., what is “beautiful” and what is “ugly,” or to put it into information theoretical terms, what distinguishes signal from noise – is taken up in the section Aesthetics. At the end of the book, the reader may turn into a listener. A pocket of the back cover contains four high-fidelity records of all the examples mentioned in the text, which allows the testing of the presented theories by skeptics and enthusiasts alike. (from the Foreword and back cover)