SoundStrand: a Tangible Interface for Composing Music with Limited Degrees of Freedom

This thesis presents SoundStrand, a novel tangible interface for composing music. A new paradigm is also presented one that allows for music composition with limited degrees of freedom, and therefore is well suited for music creation through the use of tangible interfaces. SoundStrand is comprised of a set of building blocks that represent pre-composed musical segments. By sequentially connecting building blocks to one another, the user arranges these segments into a musical theme; and by individually twisting, stretching and bending the blocks, variations of the melodic, harmonic and rhythmic content are introduced. Software tools are made available to program the musical segments and govern SoundStrand's behavior. Additional work, namely the Coda system, is presented in order to put SoundStrand and the described paradigm in a wider context as tools for music sharing and learning. Thesis Supervisor: Tod Machover Title: Muriel R. Cooper Professor of Music and Media

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