Karlheinz Essl (University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna): The Chances of Chance
In the first of this semester's programme of colloquia the Music Department welcomes renowed Austrian composer Karlheinz Essl. Prof Essl says, "Starting as a classically trained composer in the 1980s, a radical change occurred when I got involved with computer technology. This altered my approach to musical composition and brought me in contact to scientific theories such as chaos research, networks and algorithms. It also influenced my working method as a composer: Before, I was mainly writing instrumental scores in splendid isolation, trapped in a self-imposed ivory tower. But then I realised the necessity for exchanging my ideas and artistic research with others in order to learn and to broaden my horizon.
The rise of the Internet in the early 1990s enabled me to get in contact with a world-wide community of composers who use computers for artistic purposes. While working on my realtime composition Lexikon-Sonate for computer-controlled piano I started to develop an open source software library for algorithmic composition in Max called RTC-lib.
This all has changed my life as a composer from a lonely hermit to a person who is embedded in a constantly changing global network. This also brought me into contact with improvisation which has in turn required the development of my own electronic instruments for live performances. Furthermore, I have learned about the advantage of chance which acts as a splendid source for innovations and new artistic expressions".
Everyone is welcome to this event.
See here for this semester's full Music colloquia programme.