Current Trends and Future Research Directions for Interactive Music

Technology has shaped the way on which we compose and produce music: Notably, the invention of microphones, magnetic tapes, amplifiers and computers pushed the development of new music styles in the 20th century. In fact, several artistic domains have been benefiting from such technology developments; for instance, Experimental music, nonlinear music, Electroacoustic music, and interactive music. Experimental music is composed in such a way that its outcome is often unforeseeable; for instance, it may contain random generated tones, computer-generated content, variable-duration notes and "free" content. It may also include atonal melodies and microtones. Another domain is nonlinear music, in which the scenario is divided in parts whose order can be chosen at execution time. We will use the term "nonlinear" music in that sense. Nonlinear music exists from many centuries ago; for instance, Mozart's minuets in which the order of work's musical material was determined by coin-tosses. Electroacoustic music was originated by the incorporation of electronic sound production into compositional practice.