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Real-time Composition as Performance Ecosystem

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 June 2011

Arne Eigenfeldt*
Affiliation:
School for the Contemporary Arts, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada

Abstract

This article proposes that real-time composition can be considered a new performance ecosystem. Rather than an extension of electroacoustic instruments that are used within improvisatory environments, real-time composition systems are produced by composers interested in gestural interactions between musical agents, with or without real-time control. They are a subclass of interactive systems, specifically a genre of interactive composition systems that share compositional control between composer and system. Designing the complexity of interactions between agents is a compositional act, and its outcomes are realised during performance – more so than most interactive systems, the new performance ecosystem is compositional in nature.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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