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Advanced Technologies for Collaborative Performance

A workshop run by Alan Blackwell and Ian Cross, CRASSH, University of Cambridge and Julio D'Escrivan and Richard Hoadley, Anglia Ruskin University (20-21 December 2006).

The aim of this workshop was to train practice-based researchers in the performing arts to make better use of ICT technologies that support live collaboration in performance situations. The workshop leaders were Julio D'Escrivan and Richard Hoadley of Anglia Ruskin University; Ian Cross of the Cambridge University Centre for Music and Science; and Alan Blackwell of the Crucible network for research in interdisciplinary design.

The workshop was based in the recently-upgraded music technology teaching facility at Anglia Ruskin University, which contains two group studios each equipped with nine G5 dual-processor Macintoshes. Collaborative facilities included networked sound processing with studio monitors, local MIDI keyboards and audio processors on each workstation, shared headphones for pair work, and central video projection facilities.

The workshop was structured to include a range of participants including technical specialists in the use of SuperCollider and Max/MSP, professional exponents of mixed genre performance and a selection of practitioners from other performance genres such as poetry, live video art and others. Participants were provided with a broad range of inexpensive sensors at the start of the day, and a short hands-on introduction to the process of interfacing these to performance software such as SuperCollider. The workshop was then divided into mixed discipline teams for hands-on development and instruction, ensuring that programmers did not ‘race ahead’ of performing collaborators. In the course of the day, the group shared experiences during unstructured breaks, with a structured sharing of experiences in the final session. Throughout the day, work in progress was captured and shared by facilitators moving from team to team. The overall ambition was to emulate a ‘collaboration masterclass’ as the most appropriate model for practice-based research workshops applying technology in the performing arts. The experience gained during the workshop is likely relevant to future experiments related to the agenda for e-Science in the Arts and Humanities.