Projects per year
Abstract
Over the past four decades, the number, diversity and complexity of digital musical instruments (DMIs) has increased rapidly. There are very few constraints on DMI design as such systems can be easily reconfigured, offering near limitless flexibility for music-making. Given that new acoustic musical instruments have in many cases been created in response to the limitations of available technologies, what motivates the development of new DMIs? We conducted an interview study with ten designers of new DMIs, in order to explore 1) the motivations electronic musicians may have for wanting to build their own instruments; and 2) the extent to which these motivations relate to the context in which the artist works and performs (academic vs. club settings). We found that four categories of motivation were mentioned most often: M1: wanting to bring greater embodiment to the activity of performing and producing electronic music; M2: wanting to improve audience experiences of DMI performances; M3: wanting to develop new sounds, and M4: wanting to build responsive systems for improvisation. There were also some detectable trends in motivation according to the context in which the artists work and perform. Our results offer the first systematically gathered insights into the motivations for new DMI design. It appears that the challenges of controlling digital sound synthesis drive the development of new DMIs, rather than the shortcomings of any one particular design or existing technology.
Original language | English |
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Number of pages | 17 |
Journal | Musicae scientiae |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 16 Oct 2018 |
Bibliographical note
© The Author(s) 2018. This is an author-produced version of the published paper. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self-archiving policy. Further copying may not be permitted; contact the publisher for details.Projects
- 1 Finished
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3DMIN: Design, Development and Dissemination of New Musical Instruments
Egermann, H. & Weinzierl, S.
1/11/13 → 31/10/16
Project: Other project › Research collaboration