NIME 2009: Conference Report
New Instruments for Musical Expression is a conference that addresses scientific research on the development of new technologies in the field of musical instruments and artistic performances. Originally started as a workshop of the CHI (Computer-Human-Interaction) conference its research and growing community deals with cognitive and perceptual issues, sensing movements and gestures, mapping strategies and their influence on digital music.
This year’s conference was hosted by the Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), School of Music in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was my first NIME conference and I was very excited to meet some of the guys whose papers and articles I have been reading for quite some time now. The daily agenda was divided into two sessions including a demo and an installation session. Various concerts in the lovely concert hall of the CMU concluded the day.
Due to the fact that human- or more specifically musician-computer-interaction and the embodiment of musical interfaces is in my particular interest I especially enjoyed the sessions about haptics, Sensing and Conducting, Mobile Music and Design and Graphics. A few talks and submissions dealt with the issue of an ecological and social perspective on technically driven development of musical systems. The keynote speech was well worth seeing: Paul DeMarinis presented an overview of his work as an electronic media artist. His bizarre email messenger where 26 hung skeletons with the letters from A to Z start to dance according to the written words or the „Rain Dance“ where viewers walk into water streams that create music by intercepting the visitor’s umbrella were only two of his excellent installations. However, for a keynote speech it lacked a forecast or at least a critical review of the current scientific status of digital (musical) research.
From my point of view the NIME community’s research seems to be interested in different tendencies: On the one hand musical mapping and processing of sensor data is pushed by complex systems. On the other hand unweary (re)designing instruments and controllers with all types of sensors sometimes gets the upper hand. “I can build (and play) it so I am doing it!“ Even though I enjoyed the results and the activity and I am part of this kind of research I sometimes wish for a more substantiated reflection on built prototypes. Regarding my work I came to the conclusion that in the future the relationship between interaction principles and the ease of learning should play a stronger role, as well as the integration into social ecology and social networks.
Anyway, I am looking forward to next year’s NIME in Sydney.