Time after Time : Short-circuiting the Emotional Distance between Algorithm and Human Improvisors

In the experience of musical improvisation with an artificial improvisor, there is a différance. As every musical intention is given by the human player to the live algorithm driving the artificial player (and viceversa), meaning can never be fully conveyed but for the opposition of other, differing musical intentions. Variety is the essential data from which one can build successful algorithmic designs, as without it, the data set is flat and useless. However, neither algorithm nor human can for now, successfully convey the emotional consequence of this différance to each other, and thus the human player is left to invest into and create a prosthetic emotional relationship on their own. This paper will summarise the previous design and creation of such an algorithm, outline the emotional problem space engendered by the author’s interaction with it over a period of two years’ musical performances, and explicate a brute-force solution designed to foreshorten the emotional distance between algorithm and human.