Fluid Music A New Model for Radically Collaborative Music Production Charles Joseph Holbrow Master of Science in Media Arts and Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2015 Bachelor of Music at University of Massachusetts Lowell, 2008 Submitted to the Program in Media Arts and Sciences, School of Architecture and Planning, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology September 2021 © Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2021. All rights reserved Author Charles Joseph Holbrow Program in Media Arts and Sciences 20 September 2021 Certified by Tod Machover Muriel R. Cooper Professor of Music and Media Thesis Supervisor, Program in Media Arts and Sciences Accepted by Tod Machover Academic Head, Program in Media Arts and Sciences Fluid Music A New Model for Radically Collaborative Music Production Charles Joseph Holbrow Submitted to the Program in Media Arts and Sciences, School of Architecture and Planning, on August 20, 2021, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Abstract Twentieth century music recording technologies were invented to capture and reproduce live music performances, but musicians and engineers used these new tools to create the art of music production, something distinctly different from – and well beyond – simple archiving. Are current technologies poised to bring about new kinds of musical experiences yet again? Could these new kinds of music be every bit as transformative and impactful as recorded music was in the 20th century? Fluid Music proposes one possible trajectory by which this could happen: harnessing the internet’s power for massive asynchronous collaboration in the context of music production. This dissertation articulates how Fluid Music proposes new tools for computational music production, prioritizes human agency via audio production paradigms found in digital audio workstations, and rejects existing collaborative processes like remixing and crowdsourcing. It describes the Fluid Music framework, a software toolkit which provides the foundation to build, experiment, and study Fluid Music workflows. It discusses the long-term goals of Fluid Music, including the construction of a massive, open repository of music production Techniques that sound designers, producers, and composers can use to share malleable sound worlds without reimplementing complex music production processes, demonstrating how design choices in the Fluid Music framework support the project’s larger objectives. One consequence of these design choices is that Fluid Music encapsulates the art of music production in the same way that recorded music encapsulates the art of music performance. The dissertation lays out next steps that are required for Fluid Music to grow into an entirely new art form which is clearly distinct from the recorded music that is pervasive today. Thesis Advisor: Tod Machover Muriel R. Cooper Professor of Music and Media Program in Media Arts and Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology ii Fluid Music A New Model for Radically Collaborative Music Production Charles Joseph Holbrow This dissertation has been reviewed and approved by Thesis Reader: Tristan Jehan Founder, CEO Elis OS, Inc. iii Fluid Music A New Model for Radically Collaborative Music Production Charles Joseph Holbrow This dissertation has been reviewed and approved by Thesis Reader: Nancy Baym Senior Principal Research Manager Microsoft Research iv Acknowledgments I would like to thank Tod Machover for over a decade of support, guidance, and encouragement, and for sharing his musical thinking, which influenced every part of Fluid Music. I will do my best to pass it on. I would like to thank committee members Tristan Jehan and Nancy Baym, for crucial guidance, support, and perspectives, and for their part in ensuring that Fluid Music is something I can be proud of. I would like to thank my family, who made my time at the Media Lab possible in countless ways, and especially Helen, who also made it possible for me to graduate Helen Corless, Mark and Gwen Holbrow, Charlie H. and Mary Holbrow, and Hilary, Giles, and Felicity Holbrow. I would like to thank my Opera of the Future family for welcoming me in 2008, carrying me over the finish line in 2021, and filling the journey with inspiration, creativity, and friendship: Ben Bloomberg, Rébecca Kleinberger, Nikhil Singh, Aarón Montoya-Moraga, Karsten Schuhl, Manaswi Mishra, Nicole L'Huillier, Alexandra Rieger, Akito Van Troyer, Priscilla Capistrano, Sizi Chen, Kelly Egorova, Simone Ovsey, Peter Torpey, Elly Jessop, Zhi Wei Gan, Catherine Zeng, Ethan Nevidomsky, Hane Lee, David Su, Bryn Bliska, Sarah Platte, Thomas Sanchez Lengeling, David Nuñez, and Janice Wang. I would like to thank colleagues, friends, and community members, who offered guidance when I asked, and shared both the most difficult and the most joyful parts of the Media Lab: Joe Paradiso, Deb Roy, Ethan Zuckerman, Brian Mayton, Spencer Russell, Harpreet Sareen, Sunanda Sharma, Sang-won Leigh, Udayan Umapathi, Pedro Reynolds-Cuellar, Cindy Hsin-Liu Kao, Joy Buolamwini, Tim Savas, Alexis Hope, Savannah Niles, Shannon Johnson, Paula Aguilera, Jonathan William, Jimmy Day, Bianca Datta, Caroline Jaffe, Jon Ferguson, Sarra Shubart, Linda Peterson, Keira Horowitz, Monica Orta, Lily Zhang, Rebecca Cuscaden Marvin, and Becca Bly. I would like to thank many others who trusted, aided, and supported me in big, small, or unexpected ways, including: Larry and Terry Sass, David Singer, The MacGregor House Team and the E-Entry Chairs and students, Meghan Moriarty and the KTCP, Mashi Hasu, Alex Case and the UMass Lowell SRT program, The Audio Engineering Society, Shawn Drost, Hack Reactor, The Recurse Center, Sudbury Valley School, Jo and Richard from Interfacio, David Rowland from the JUCE forums, Justin Frankel of Reaper fame, the Lynch Family Skatepark and the Lynch Roller Rats, and, finally, Ben, Gene, and Jeff for the best screams I ever recorded. v Table of Contents 1 Introduction ................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Configuration, Computation, and Collaboration ..................................................................2 1.2 Overview ...........................................................................................................................4 2 Background .................................................................................................................... 6 2.1 Radio .................................................................................................................................8 2.1.1 Similarities Between Radio and the Internet ......................................................................................... 9 2.2 New Music After World War II .......................................................................................... 10 2.3 Rhetoric and Prognostication ........................................................................................... 11 2.3.1 The Telegraph and the Internet ........................................................................................................... 11 2.3.2 Mechanical Music ................................................................................................................................ 12 2.3.3 The Liberation of Sound ....................................................................................................................... 14 2.3.4 The Beatles, Strawberry Fields, and Sgt. Pepper’s ............................................................................... 21 2.4 The Transition to Digital ................................................................................................... 24 2.4.1 Modern Technology for Massive Collaboration: Code and Music....................................................... 25 2.4.2 Digital Audio ......................................................................................................................................... 27 3 Fluid Music ................................................................................................................... 31 3.1 The Concept ..................................................................................................................... 31 3.2 The Framework ................................................................................................................ 32 3.3 What is a Digital Audio Workstation? ............................................................................... 34 3.3.1 The Core ............................................................................................................................................... 34 3.3.2 The Extended Features ........................................................................................................................ 35 3.3.3 DAW Sessions ....................................................................................................................................... 35 3.4 Music Production Analysis................................................................................................ 37 3.4.1 Analysis: No Tears Left to Cry............................................................................................................... 37 3.4.2 Report: Between the Desert and the Deep Blue Sea: A Symphony for Perth ..................................... 39 4 The Fluid Music Framework .........................................................................................