François Pachet

Experiments with a Musical Machine: Musical Style Replication in 3 to 5 Year Old Children.

The relationship between new technology and learning is gaining increasing relevance in the field of music education (Webster, 2002; Folkestad et al. , 1998). However, only a few studies have considered the nature of the interaction between children and musical machines. This article describes an observation study of children aged 3–5 years confronting a particular interactive musical system, the Continuator, which is able to produce music in the same style as a human playing the keyboard (Pachet, 2003). The analysis of two case studies suggests that the Continuator is able to develop interesting child/machine interactions and creative musical processes in young children. It was possible to observe a ‘life cycle’ of interaction, as well as micro-processes similar to those observed in child/adult interactions (Stern, 1985; Imberty, 2002). The ability of the system to attract and hold the attention of children has been interpreted through Csikszentmihalyis (1990) ‘flow theory’.

When children reflect on their own playing style: experiments with continuator and children

The Continuator project concerns the study of interactive musicalsystems that are able to learn musical styles. The Continuatorsystem was developed with the primary goal of designing new musicalinstruments in the context of improvised music. The strongsubjective impressions created with the use of the system led us toconsider its use in a pedagogical context. This article describesexperiments conducted with the system and 3- to 5-year-oldchildren. We highlight several dimensions of the study pertainingto music education, including attention span, spontaneousdevelopment of playing modes, and capacity to listen analytically.We describe very encouraging preliminary results and stress theimportance of using reflective interactive systems for triggeringmusical interest in children and creating stimulating,nonsupervised music learning environments. We conclude by settingup our research in the context of the theory of flow as an optimalexperience.

Young children confronting the continuator, an interactive reflective musical system

Background in music education The present study deals with various the interaction between children and musical machines. One of the principal aims is to understand how the use of interactive musical systems can affect the learning and the musical creativity of children and more especially of younger children (3 to 5 years old). Background in artificial intelligence An innovative system was conceived at the Sony CSL in Paris which is able to produce music in the same style as the person playing the keyboard. The name chosen for this machine is the Continuator. Its basic design is that of Interactive Reflective systems where the core concept is to teach musical processes indirectly by putting the user in a situation where learning takes place through the actual interaction between the user and the system. Aims The aim of the study is to understand in what way the children relate to this particular interactive musical system, what kinds of musical and relational behaviours are developed, and how interactive reflective systems can be used in the educational field to stimulate creativity and the pleasure of playing. Method The study involved 27 children aged 3 to 5 years, in a kindergarten in Bologna (Italy). Three sessions were held once a day for 3 consecutive days. In every session, the children were asked to play on the keyboard in 4 different situations: with the keyboard alone, with the keyboard connected to the Continuator, with another child, and with another child and the Continuator. Results The present paper reports the observation of three particular aspects: the emergence of a life cycle of interaction, moving from initial surprise, to phases featuring excitement, analytical behaviour and invention; the fact that the two tasks involving the system gave rise to the longest attention span characterized by strong intrinsic motivation and joint attention; the varied nature of the listening behaviours. Conclusion The results show how an interactive reflective system such as the Continuator can develop interesting child/computer interaction and promote creative musical behaviours in young children. This outcome points to the considerable potential offered by the association between the disciplines of music education and artificial intelligence.

The future of content is in ourselves

The word “Content” is the ugliest word one can imagine to describe the most valuable creation of mankind. Content is everything that is, or flows, inside containers. A strange way indeed to talk about the products of our digital culture: music, films, photographs, books, games; in short everything which is produced for other reasons than necessity. The success of this word is probably related to the paramount and probably excessive importance of distributors in the present state of our society. A view which culminated with the erratic visions of Jean-Marie Messier, during the creation of the Vivendi conglomerate, who explicitly proposed to view objects of creation as free fluids.

Interview with Francois Pachet (May 7, 2008)

François Pachet, Civil Engineer (Ecole des Ponts et Chaussées), Ph.D. from University of Paris, and, until 1997, assistant professor in artificial intelligence and computer science at Paris University. In 1997, he set up the music research team at SONY Computer Science Laboratory (Paris), where he developed the concept that metadata can greatly enhance the musical experience in all its dimensions, from listening to performance. His team conducts research in interactive music-listening, computer-aided performance, and musical metadata, and developed several innovative technologies and award-winning systems (MusicSpace, constraint-based spatialization, PathBuilder, intelligent music scheduling using metadata, the Continuator for Interactive Music Improvisation, and EDS for audio feature geeneration). François Pachet is the author of over 80 scientific publications and 15 patents in the fields of musical metadata and interactive instruments. His website is www.csl.sony.fr/∼pachet/, François Pachet answers the following questions: