bacterial-orchestra
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The Bacterial Orchestra uses the iPhone to create "viral music"
This is really wild: what you see above is an example of "viral music" -- it's part of an upcoming music festival that's taking place in Sweden, and it features a circle of iPhones that are both listening to and playing a very abstract kind of "music." Each one is picking up audio from its environment, then running it through a series of software filters to make it sound more musical, and finally playing it back in a rhythm. As each iPhone is picking up the tune from the other iPhones it's playing it back through the same filters, and so on and so forth. All while the software is "judging" each "cell" of sound, to see if it's interesting or loud enough or so forth, and cells will live or die based on that criteria -- in essence, a musical organism.Like I said, wild. That program is called the "Bacterial Orchestra -- Public Epidemic No. 1," and it sounds like the app will be available on the iPhone soon as well. Of course, you'll have to have a bunch of iPhones with the app in one place for it to work the way it's designed, but at least there's good video of it.
Bacterial Orchestra creates living cellular sound
While a vast majority of us probably prefer to keep grimy bacteria at bay, Olle Cornéer, Christian Hörgren, and Martin Lübcke actually seem rather fond of it. In yet another instance where "music" is made out of cacophonic tones, the Bacterial Orchestra at New Media Meeting in Norrköping, Sweden has reportedly belted out incredible sounds, creating some sort of "musical organism." The experiment was conducted in a underground corridor where an assortment of "cells" were equipped with microphones and speakers, and apparently, the programmed players picked up sounds from their surroundings and "played it back in sync." Purportedly, the organisms adapt to their environment and "learn" through experiences, and they were even said to create "cheers" (echos?) when groups of visitors came clamoring through. We'll admit, we're a bit baffled about this so-called "self-organizing evolutionary musical organism" as well, but until we hear a few sound clips or see this thing in person, our skeptic hats are remaining firmly seated.[Via SciFiTech]
