NetWorks 2: Phase Portraits

by Shawn Bell

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Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Unfamiliar Order, NetWorks X: Momento Moirai, NetWorks 9: Somnia vana, NetWorks 8: Other Times, NetWorks 7: Canticle of Creatures, NetWorks 6: Music From a Farther Room, NetWorks 5: In Silico, NetWorks 4: Planet of Lost B-Movie Soundtracks and Other Anomalies, and 3 more. , and , .

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1.	Solace 07:43	info	buy track
2.	Music for Falling Asleep II 05:32	info	buy track
3.	Music for Falling Asleep III 04:40	info	buy track
4.	Music for Falling Asleep IV 03:00	info	buy track
5.	Where the Bright Waters Flow 05:26	info	buy track
6.	Chromazoa I 05:55	info	buy track
7.	Chromazoa II 06:38	info	buy track
8.	Chromazoa III 09:03	info	buy track
9.	The Loom of Time 07:28	info	buy track
10.	Deviations from the Average II 10:07	info	buy track
11.	Deviations from the Average III 10:09	info	buy track
12.	Some World Far From Our Own 10:27	info	buy track

about

Constraints on the connections and interactions between the entities of systems are central to what defines them. This is true of the interactions between the entities that make up matter, cells, societies, ecosystems, planetary systems and so on. It is also true for games and art. Constraints are what define, and how we recognize, musical genres and are key in the process of creation.

The music on “Phase Portraits” are instances of the diverse, self-organizing musical forms that information sharing over simple networks can produce. NetWorks represents six years of programming and tuning a network of 64 nodes that share music performance data including pitch, duration, velocity, and entry delay. Articulations such as legato, staccato, etc., as well as pedalling and various synthesis parameters are also often determined by the network.

NetWorks has been “tuned” to generate patterns at "the edge of chaos,” that is, balanced between variety and harmony. Although not explicitly programmed, one can often hear motives that repeat, vary, develop into melodies, diverge and return, all through the simple interactions between nodes. If constraints define genre, NetWorks is a search for new genres and cross-genres. To modify a phrase of Christopher Langton’s (a pioneer in the field of Artificial Life), NetWorks is the study of “music-as-it-could-be.”

The NetWorks network of 64 nodes is infinitesimally minuscule compared to natural networks, and five years of “tuning” and exploring some of its possible architectures and their musical potential is hardly a beginning. The sounds chosen to manifest the musical patterns discovered by the network attempt to reflect the mystery and wonder that virtually unlimited diversity can come from such small beginnings and such simple models of interaction.

credits

released November 3, 2015

Shawn Bell: Programmer, Composer, Mixing & Mastering. Album artwork evolved using SBart4 by Unemi Tatsuo.

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about

Shawn Bell Quebec, Québec

Educator, composer and interactive media artist dedicated to creativity and collaboration. Interested in constructionist approaches to new media education and how interactive technologies and complexity theory enhance and expand the creative process in the traditional arts, computation arts and game design. ... more

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