As interactive media continues to advance new ways of interacting with music combined with visuals abound. Synesthesia is the term given to the way hearing and seeing can overlap, some people even see colors when they hear music. There are many apps on the market that combine novel ways for people to make music through innovative interactive design.
Twenty first century music toys
In a paper called Levels of Sound: On the Principles of Interactivity in Music Video Games, two scholars from Vienna named Martin Pichlmair and Fare Kayali categorize different types of music games. They describe what they call “active score games” that let you interact with virtual objects that affect elements within the music soundtrack.
A score is the name given to sheet music that detail the parts to be played by all the instruments in the musical composition. The score becomes “active” when each interaction the player makes changes an element within the music. It could make some instrument parts louder, add or remove parts of the music or any number of other options. Playing these games, you can become a detective sensing how manipulations affect the music. Like a puzzle unfolding without any predetermined solution.
There are a lot of names for this phenomenon in games. Generative music and interactive music are some of the more common names. The concept for making music like this goes all the way back to Mozart who devised a game where rolling dice determined what order to play small sections of a piece.
Thicket
Platform: iOS
Price: In-app purchase per “interactive experience”
Entering Thicket you are presented with a black screen. Geometric wireframe line patterns morph across the screen. In the “Sine Morph” level running your finger across the screen morphs the shape and new rhythms are added to the house music soundtrack with sounds filters that shift with the shape. Pinching on the screen with 5 more fingers continues to change the sound.
Each level is a different composition that reacts to your touch in unique ways.”Scary Ugly” is an angry noise piece where the visuals become frenetic scribbles. As you touch the screen noise explodes only to stop and freeze the image as you remove your fingers. “Cathedral” features shapes all arranged in some sort of sacred geometry proportions. As you move you finger from the bottom to the top of the screen lower to higher sounds are added. Each level costs $0.99 USD and offers you something more to play with, a new range of compositions to interact with.
These levels teach you to be a detective with your ears experimenting with how each action affects the music. Each composition features interactions that change the rhythm, timbre, pitch, or other aspects of the music. The game could be a fun way to teach active listening skills and naming the elements of music.
Musyc
Price: Free (offers in-app purchases)
Remember playing the game Mouse Trap? I remember finding the board game boring and just wanting to set off the series of chain reactions that set off the mouse trap. Movies like the Goonies and others continued this fascination. It was only recently that I learned that this was called a Rube Goldberg machine. Some music machines of this vein, both real and fake, have gone viral on social media over the years such as the. Wintergatan Marble Machine & the Pipe Dream animation that many people thought was real. Now with Musyc you can make your own!
Rube Goldberg machine for music
Musyc is a physics-based game where you can set in motion a series of chain reactions to make your own music. The options are staggering. Each shape creates a different instrument sound like woodblocks or chimes. The position the object is placed from left to right changes its pitch. Tts proximity to whatever it collides controls its rate of making sound. For example if you create the ball high above a platform the physics will make it bounce at a slow tempo, triggering a sound with large spaces in between. If you create the shape close to a platform it will bounce quickly triggering the sound very often.
You can also attach objects to strings to swing and collide like a virtual wind chime. You can hold on an object and change its size affecting the physics and the speed at which it will swing and collide with other objects. Some objects can be fixed in place while others move. You can create sequencers that emit objects at intervals with controls for their speed. You can also create black holes that will swallow up objects at points so they don’t collide with other things.
Finger Lab, the company behind the game, provides clear tutorials to guide your use of the game. It is easy to get overwhelmed by the sheer number of pre-made levels and options provided. To alleviate this the designers give a clear “help” button that directs you to a tutorial that makes everything very clear, holding your hand through understanding each parameter.
The options for this game are staggering and replay ability and experimentation possibilities are endless. They let you export what you create so you could use your creation beyond just a game in an app. It is a new type of active score that offers you the ability to create your own score from scratch and then change it through designing your own interactions.
Physics and music
It creates a great link between physics, math and music. Distance, collision, size, and velocity relate to rhythm and dynamics. Shape and size of objects affect timbre and tempo while the black holes or the object falling off the screen control sound and silence. The sequencers that emit shapes affect texture, rhythm and tempo within the score. The options are so endless and the possibilities for discussion of musical elements through experimentation are many. This is a true achievement on part of the designers. The only issue I have with this game is that the sound is too soft on my Bluetooth headphones. I can’t play with it anywhere noisy. It’s the only issue with the game as they seem to have thought of everything.
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