A Musical Instrument based on Interactive Sonification Techniques

Abstract

Musical expressions are often associated with physical gestures and movements, which represents the traditional approach of playing musical instruments. Varying the strength of a keystroke on the piano results in a corresponding change in loudness. Computer-based music instruments often miss this important aspect, which often results in a certain distance between the player, his instrument and the performance. In our approach for a computer-based music instrument, we use a system that provides methods for an interactive auditory exploration of 3D volumetric data sets, and discuss how such an instrument can take advantage of this music-based data exploration. This includes the development of two interaction metaphors for musical events and structures, which allows the mapping of human gestures onto live performances of music.