Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Origins of live coding Nick Collins Durham University 1 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Live coding <INSERT DEFINITION HERE> 2 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Live coding ¤ Art of re-programming; changing your mind about a process once established ¤ For artistic purposes, often live performance; possible aspects of theatre, meta-composition ¤ Venues including studios, concert halls, planetariums… ¤ Used to be a bit controversial, now institutionalised? 3 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Other terms… ¤ Live programming ¤ Interactive programming ¤ On-the-fly programming ¤ Performative programming ¤ ascii music… 4 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Or… ¤ Live coding is the realtime collection and coding of interview data, e.g. in qualitative medical research? 5 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Ancient live coding history ¤ Greek debates? ¤ Ancient algorithmic composition: Guido d’Arezzo c. 1026 ¤ Fior vs Tartaglia, 1535 6 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Precedents: improvisation ¤ Music’s natural state? ¤ Generativity of language itself 7 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 A literary precedent ¤ Hermann Hesse The Glass Bead Game (1943) ¤ ‘the players, mutually elaborating these processes, threw these abstract formulas at one another, displaying the sequences and possibilities of their science.’ (pp. 23-4, Vintage: London 2000 translated by Richard and Clara Winston.) 8 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Text pieces ¤ Primarily 1960s ¤ ‘verbal notations’ (Lely and Saunders 2012) ‘word events’ George Brecht ¤ An example of maximal freedom: LaMonte Young Composition 1960 #3 ‘Announce to the audience when the piece will begin and end if there is a limit on duration. It may be of any duration. Then announce that everyone may do whatever he wishes for the duration of the composition.’ 9 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Text pieces 2: live coding? ¤ Are there any early self-rewriting text scores? ¤ Schooltime Special Cornelius Cardew 1968 contains possibility to extend itself via new questions ¤ Click Nilson’s precedents (1975, 2012) ¤ Honourable mention though a late arrival: https://twitter.com/textscoreaday 11 Dec 2012 “#60: Take an existing text score and profoundly alter its meaning by changing only one word.” 10 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Games ¤ Nomic, 1982, Peter Suber ¤ Fluxx, Calvinball etc… 11 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Computer science precedents ¤ LISP, c. 1962 implementation as first interpreted programming language ¤ Use in education via LOGO from 1968 to control virtual turtles ¤ Smalltalk 1980, FORTH 12 5. D.P. Anderson and R.J. Kuivila. “Con- Computer Music J . Vol. 8, No. 3. Fall References tinuous Abstractions for Discrete Event 1984, 32-50. Languages,” Computer MirsicJ., Vol. 13. No. 3. Fall 1989. pp. 11-23. 10. D.P. Anderson. “Synthesizer Manage- 1 . Musical Itistriinimt Digitnl Interface Spc+ ment Based on Note Priorities.” Proc. Int‘l Origins of live coding rficntiorz 1.0. Int’l MIDI Assoc.. North 6. D.P. Anderson and R.J. Kuivila, “A Sys-April 1,Computer 2014 Music Conf .. Computer Music Hollywood. Calif.. 1983. tem for Computer Music Performance,” Assoc., San Francisco. 1987, pp. 230-237. A C‘M Truns. Computer Systems. Vol. 8. 2. R.F. Erickson. “The Darms Project: A No. 1, Feb. 1990. pp. 56-82. 1 1, D.P. Anderson and J. Bilmes, “Concur- Status Report.” Computers and the Hrr- rent Real-Time Music in C++,” Proc. matiitiesVol.Y.No.6.June 1975.pp.291- 7. D. Collinge, “Moxie: A Language for Usenix C++ Workshop, Berkeley. Calif.. 1991, pp. 147-161. 298. Computer Music Performance,” Proc. Inr’l Compiirer Music Conf . Computer 3. L.C. Smith. “Score. A Musician’s Approach Music Assoc.. San Francisco, 1984. pp. to Computer Music,“ J. Audio Eng. Soc., 21 7-220. Vol. 20. No. 1. Jan./Feb. 1972. pp. 7-14. 8. B. Schottstaedt, “PLA: A Composer’s 4. D.P. Anderson and R.J. Kuivila. “For- Idea ofa Language,” Computer MrcsicJ.. Live coding history: 1980sVol. 7. No. 1. Winter 1983, pp. 11-20. mula Version 3.4 Reference Manual,” Tech. Report 911630. Computer Science Division. Univ. of California at Berke- 9 X Rodet and P Cointe. “Formes Com- ley. May 1991. position and Scheduling of Processes.” David P. Anderson is an assistant professor in the Computer Science Division at the IJniversity of California at Berkeley. In ad- 32 time-advance dition to his work in computer music, he has done research in distributed operating sys- 33 base-pitch tems, software support for digital audio and 34 127 1 do video. distributed programming, computer ¤ 1980s Forth and HMSL. Computer musicians’ frantic graphics. and protocol specification. 35 i cycle-size 21 * 0 do Anderson received his BA in mathematics 36 inc + j mod base-pitch + 127 and dup $ from Wesleyan University, and his MA in preparations up to performance time (the audience mathematics and MS and PhD in computer 37 loop science. all from the University of Wiscon- wander around The Hub) 38 loop sin-Madison. 39 drop 40 maxend 41 ;ap ¤ Ron Kuivila, Water Surface42 (1985) :ap asynch-scale 43 :ap (tuf-stuf 44 ::gp ::ap 45 280 beats-per-minute 46 ::ap 50 to $location nasty-bass 0 18011 c 30 d 2 146 e 2 4211f g tuf ;;ap5$ 47 ::ap 20 to $location piano 1011 18011 50 4 73 4 8411 tuf ;;ap 48 ::ap 80 to $location piano ;;2511ap 5011 66 2 146 3 6411 tuf ;;ap Ron Kuivila teaches in the Music Depart- ment at Wesleyan University. He composes 49 ::ap 80 to $location piano 5011 18011 66 2 146 3 6411 tuf ;;ap music and designs sound installations to high- 50 ::ap 100 to $location;ap vibes 5011 18011 70 4 73 6 12811 tuf ;;ap light the unusual electronic instruments he designs. He pioneered the musical uses of 51 ::ap 0 to $location xylophone 5011 10011 76 2 146 6 12811 tuf ;;ap ultrasound. sound sampling in live perfor- 52 ::ap 0 to $location xylophone 10011 18011 76 2 146 3 12811 tuf ;;ap mance. speech synthesis, and high-voltage phenomena. He has performed and exhibit- 53 127 to $location electric-piano 10011 18011 69 3 18 9 25611 tuf ed throughout the IJS and Europe. 54 ;;gp Kuivila received a BA in music from Wes- leyan llniversity and an MFA from Mills 55 ;ap College. 56 57 :ap tuf-stuf 58 ::ap” tuf-stuf” 13 59 (tuf-stuf Readerscan write to Anderson at the Com- 60 ;;ap puter Science Division, Electrical Engineer- 61 ;ap ing and Computer Science Dept., University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720: or Kuivila at the Music Department, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT 06457. July 1991 21 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Live coding history: c2000 ¤ 2000, slub start to play in London projecting their screens ¤ Julian Rohrhuber exploits SuperCollider 2 to allow hot- swapping code in performance 14 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 The Tspawn trick (SuperCollider 2) //run me first ({ a = TSpawn.ar({arg ts,ec,syn, func; func.value},2,inf, 0.0); b = a.source; a }.play;) //now b.trigger({Pan2.ar(SinOsc.ar(exprand(220,440),0,0.1), 1.0.rand2)}) 15 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 (Selected) Chronology 1 ¤ 2000: ICMC Berlin, networked code passing McCartney/ Rohrhuber ¤ 2002: First live coding albums (unreleased) ¤ 2003: ChucK ¤ 2004: TOPLAP 16 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 TOPLAP 17 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 TOPLAP ¤ Multiple interpretations ¤ Scene: Feb 15th, 2004, 2am, a smoky bar, Hamburg. An anagram competition ¤ Livecode mailing list now has 100s of enthusiasts 18 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 (Selected) Chronology 2 ¤ 2005 TOPLAP transmediale ¤ 2005: first live code battle ¤ 2005: fluxus ¤ 2006: aa cell practice ¤ 2007: LOSS live code festival 19 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Sorry Ge 20 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Fights ¤ The boxing analogy rears for the World Programming Federation Fingerweight Belt ¤ Ghent 2005: Coding Bull: McLean vs Collins (match rigging allegations) ¤ Barcelona 2005: Raging Code: Wang vs Collins (disaster!) 21 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Challenges continue ¤ Nic vs Nick (2-1, New York/London/Mexico City) and The Ultimate Weapon ¤ Max/MSP in Belgium ¤ Mexican live coding 22 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Practice ¤ The importance of ten years ¤ Practice pacts ¤ No guarantee of effective transference (e.g. ordinary coding to live coding) ¤ Danger of misplaced practice with new techniques 23 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Selected Chronology (3) ¤ 2009: BBC documentary on pub code ¤ 2012: Live Notation AHRC: live arts and live coding ¤ 2013: Live Coding festival in Karlsruhe ¤ 1::year => now 24 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Documentations ¤ 2007 A pre-history of live coding ¤ 2012 CMJ DVD ¤ 2014 Computer Music Journal special issue 25 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Continuing live coding developments ¤ Live coding without computers, including choreography ¤ Live coding orchestras and ensembles ¤ New live coding environments, especially browser and mobile based ¤ Live coding in computer science education and HCI 26 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Live coding collaborations ¤ Live coding solo is very stressful ¤ Experimentalism is easier with a community support group ¤ But you may need more data projectors 27 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 A historical example: Wrongheaded (2009-2013) 28 Origins of live coding Chalk April 1, 2014 explode Wrongheaded (with Matthew Yee-King) ¤ Algorithmic choreography ¤ Laptopists caught between programming work and external human action ¤ Our lowest moment: Leonardo 44(3) cover stars !"#$$%&'()$$'!$$)(*)$$*%'+,&$$-#)./$$0"+"$ ,"1213)$$4)!.3(+$$,&.#$$*'01)4$$31*'01)4$ '1+$$*&"#+$$("10$$5".+$$4"3-()$$)136$$31'"1$ H$I$J$K$L$MM$NO$PQ$RS$T$U$V$W$XX$YY$Z$Y$[$\$[[$\\$]!$ Zombie 7$8$9$:$;$<$=$>$?$@$$ mode Ouija .$-$,$4$)$!$0$&$'$A$/$($6$1$"$B$C$#$*$+$3$D$%$E$F$G$ code ^)(("$ +#3)$ _"#(4$ !.(*)$ 29 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 Warning! ¤ Look away if you’re squeamish before the next slide 30 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 An anatomy theatre 31 Live coding April 1, 2014 The Gospel According to Wrongheaded 32 Origins of live coding April 1, 2014 iPhone live coding 33 ’IF’ Code Snippet Responses 4.