Autobach is a neural network based system for the automatic production of stylistic music.

When the system was originally developed, its goal was to automatically produce harmony (predominantly bass lines) parts to given melody lines in the style of given composers. A neural network approach was decided upon as there are already a number of explicit algorithmic solutions to the problem out there. These algorithmic solutions tend to be fairly predictable and uninteresting, perhaps a neural network might pick out intricacies that algorithmic solutions tend to miss, plus there was always the chance that it might produce somthing very strange...

The system has now been extended a little so that it can be trained on, and produce, melody lines as well as producing harmonies to any number of existing parts.

Autobach will artificially produce quartets in the style(s) ofcomposers of your choice. The quartet will then be e-mailed to you, in the comfort of your own familiar surroundings, as a uuencoded .mid file readable by any up-to-date bit of midi software. You can even select different composers for each part of the artificially generated quartet - see below.

Either

Select a composer in whose style to produce an artificial quartet. Enter your e-mail address. Submit. Then sit back and wait. Your piece will be with you in under 24 hours.

E-mail address:

Select a composer

Haydn.
Bach.
An unholy, low-level fusion of the above two maestri.

Short Medium Long Very Long

Or

Enter your e-mail address below. Then choose the makeup of your artificially generated piece of music by choosing a composer for each part (up to four) of your piece - you may have one, two, three or four parts. Note that the way the system works is to first write a soprano part, from that it constructs a bass part, from these two an alto part and from these three a tenor part. Thus, if you only have one part to your piece, it must be a soprano part; if you have two they must be soprano and bass; if three soprano, bass and alto and only if you have four parts can you have a tenor part.

The new Haybach hybrid networks are trained on equal amounts of Bach and Haydn - the unholy alliance to which I refer above.

E-Mail address:

Select a composer for each part:

Soprano Bass Alto Tenor
:Bach :Bach :Bach :Bach
:Haydn :Haydn :Haydn :Haydn
:HayBach Hybrid :HayBach Hybrid :HayBach Hybrid :HayBach Hybrid
:None :None :None :None
Short Medium Long Very Long

 Autobach composes only once per day. At 01:29 sharp, inspiration strikes. A n entirely unique piece is generated for each user who requested one over the previous day in the style of their choosing.

Once the script has finished running, a uuencoded .mid file will be dispatched to the specified e-mail address. The .mid file contains four (at most) tracks (on midi channels 1, 2, 3, and 4) containing the soprano, alto, bass and tenor parts of your quartet.

Sometimes the quartet produced can be very boring (hard to believe I know), ie, just one note repeated over and over again. If this happens, please don't despair, keep trying...

Warning

The midi files generated by this script may not work if you are trying to play them through an internal FM synth, ideally, you need to play them using an external midi device.

Other examples to follow soon........

Most notably:

AUTOMADONNA

 and

AUTOMICHAEL JACKSON

 and

AUTOBOB MARLEY

 and

AUTOABBA

 plus a grotesque array of hybrids that should never be...

PLEASE SEND ME ANY MIDI FILES YOU HAVE OF ANY OF THE WORKS OF ANY OF THE ABOVE, MY NETWORKS ARE HUNGRY, THEY DEMAND MORE DATA.

All cometh soon, take cover and keep watching...

Here are some other interesting musical projects going on ...

The Fractal Music Project

Genetically Programmed Music

Genbebop

Computer Music Journal Home Page