フラグマー 1

This is “フラグマー 1” (”Furaguma I”), an algorithmic piece based on a compositional approach that I called Wohlgestaltete Komposition. It is a hybrid process, in which machine and man cooperate. In a nutshell:

I identify musical quanta that represent initial configurations for a game simulator.
When fed into the simulator, those “μQuanta” produce 3-voice music fragments. I select the μQuanta that produce fragments that I consider of interest, and I compose them together.
I consider the music emerging from the combined fragments, and I operate modifications in the order and quantity of μQuanta in order to accentuate musical aspects that enhance the overall musical quality (according to my own perception) and to dampen aspects that I consider detrimental to that subjective concept of quality.
I continue the process by disrupting the selected μQuanta by flipping / adding / subtracting certain elements. Those disruptions in some cases aim at producing more “balanced” initial configurations, such that the corresponding games and music fragments last longer. In some other cases they may be purely random.
I include the disrupted μQuanta in the ongoing compositional process, and continue to build up the “piece” until its overall shape and contents assume what I arbitrarily recognize as a unique “identity”.

I refer to the overall selection of μQuanta in a piece such as “Furaguma I” as to “the Grundgestalt of Furaguma I”.

In fact, the term “Wohlgestaltete” means “well-shaped”, but it's actually a reference to the above process of selection of μQuanta that shape up the piece by defining its “basic form” — its Grundgestalt.

When time allows, I will write a paper describing the Wohlgestaltete Komposition. I would appreciate it very much if you would have suggestions regarding possible target journals. Thank you!

栄屯

Credits

Logo: Two of the 37 fragments from Manuscript Mi 75, a Missale crafted in a Trondheim scriptorium around 1150—1200. In Lilli Gjerløw: Ordo Nidrosiensis Ecclesiae (Oslo 1968), p. 92, n. 2 (as 878a). Processed with G'MIC.
Video: Reversed fragments from “Hawaii’s Spectacular Volcano Eruptions”, 1960. Photography by Art Carter with help of Fred Rackle, John Bonsey, Claude Jendrusch.

A curiosity

Comment about Mi 75 “One of the challenges in sorting out the fragments from Mi 75 is that the scriptorium seems to have a rather casual attitude to ruling – two pages of the same leaf can have different writing space, and the columns may be of different widths. Lat. fragm. 896, 1-4 are related to Mi 75 through initials, pigment and parchment, but differ in scribe, music scribe and format. Still, the scribe seems to be imitating the main scribe of Mi 75, and may therefore have collaborated on the same book.”

...and finally:

#μQuanta #WohlgestalteteKomposition. #Grundgestalt #GenerativeMusic #AlgorithmicComposition