In the installation “Cloud Piano” by artist David Bowen, a robotic device plays the keys on a piano based on the movement of clouds overhead. An outdoor camera installed near the installation tracks the movement and shapes of clouds in real-time. Custom software translates the information into musical notes, which are then played on the piano by finger-like robotic armatures. The installation was commissioned by L’assaut de la Menuiserie in Saint-Etienne, France.
via Laughing Squid
Image: David Bowen
The music based on clouds was just hideous. Give me classical music from the 1700s to cleanse my mind after listening to this randomness.
MarketingEDA: So I guess you’re not a fan of chance music, huh?
I was thinking about how you could change or tweak this a bit to make a music performance I’d like better. A pretty basic thing would be telling the robot to stick to a key signature (so, essentially “play whatever piano keys the clouds tell you to, except these off-limits ones.”) Maybe you could even get fancier and have it change key signatures based on the speed or type of clouds.
There are other, more complicated options one could do, too. But you’d be getting further and further away from the pure “based on cloud movement” idea.
Or for even more sure-fire “sounds like music” algorithm tweaking – it could be restricted to a pentatonic scale. Then, it could do no wrong. Or, perhaps one might see that as “it could do no right”…