Mankind has always been fascinated by mechanical simulations of human
activity. A characteristic of Western thought is to understand our
minds, bodies, and our world in mechanistic terms. Music especially
has been viewed as a mathematical and mechanical process. As a
result, musicians, scientists, and engineers have devised all sorts
of mechanisms and systems for composing and performing music. I will
review some or these activities their evolution over the last 2000
years, ending with some recent findings on how a human audience
relates to humanoid robot performers and how music can be composed
by computers.
- Music was considered by Pythagoras to be a branch of mathematics
closely related to Arithmetic
- Described by Plato in The Republic as the four arts: Arithmetic,
Music, Geometry, Astronomy
- Later formalized as the Quadrivium
- Music theory has always had a musical aspect
- Today, music composing, printing, recording, synthesizers … all
based on digital information processing