Advanced Technology Forum: Human-Machine Interaction for Real-Time Musical Performance

Presented by David B. Smith

David B. Smith will demonstrate real-time musical performance systems and discuss the challenges involved in developing and using them.

Dr. Smith is a composer, sound designer, inventor, and programmer. He is recognized as a world leader in the development of live performance computer instrument systems. He is also founder and Chair of the Entertainment Technology Department at NYC College of Technology, City University of New York. His Ph.D. is from the College-Conservatory of Music of the University of Cincinnati.

In the late 1980's, Dr. Smith partnered with Dr. Frederick Bianchi to create the first virtual orchestra system. The system performed in several professional productions, including a critically acclaimed Wizard of Oz at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park and the world's first virtual orchestra presentation in professional opera: Hansel und Gretel at Kentucky Opera, in 1990. Further research led to a collaborative experiment in live gestural control of virtual orchestra systems with Lucent Technologies. The results were showcased at Telecom '99 in Geneva Switzerland, with a 320-speaker immersive environment used in conjunction with a performance by l'Orchestre du Suisse Romande.

More recently, the pair teamed with Jeffrey Lazarus to found Realtime Music Solutions (RMS). This company is devoted to the development of new musical instruments that increase the efficiency of pit orchestra performance without sacrificing musicality and expression. As Director of R&D at RMS, Mr. Smith holds both US and British patents in music performance systems. RMS' product, Sinfonia, has been used by the Opera Company of Brooklyn and elsewhere around the world. This has led to Dr. Smith's current research in tighter metric integration.

Please join Dr. Smith for his talk on Thursday, November 4, at 7:30 PM at the Loyola University Timonium Graduate Center, Room 33. The talk is entirely free, and the public is welcome! Refreshments to be served.

(Above: David B. Smith. Below: Sir Paul McCartney with Sinfonia.)

The Advanced Technology Forum is sponsored by the Loyola University Maryland Graduate Programs in Computer Science and Software Engineering.