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. . . Computer Cantata
(Hiller and Baker). A
much more ambitious composition is the Computer Cantata, completed
in June 1963. This composition consists of a series of studies designed
to exploit a few features of MUSICOMP and to check it out as far as basic
operation was concerned. As described in detail elsewhere, the principal
sections of this cantata consist of five “Strophes” that
employ in sequence
five successive stochastic approximations to spoken English. These five
samples of “text,” which range from zeroth- to fourth-order
approximations,
were realized in the ILLIAC I computer and were prepared by Hultzén,
Allen, and Miron [Tables of Transitional Frequencies of English
Phonemes].
Analogous stochastic approximations to these texts were composed, employing
a sample of music taken from Charles Ives’
Three Places in New England
as the reference material.
In addition, the Computer Cantata contains “Prologs” and “Epilogs” to the various “Strophes” that deal with (a) problems of rhythmic organization for nonpitched percussion, (b) the generation of total serial music employing the model of Boulez’s Structures for Two Pianos—Book I, and (c) the generation of music with both linear and vertical structure in tempered scales ranging from nine to fifteen notes per octave. . . .
Lejaren Hiller
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