Radiolab
Musical DNA
Which came first: Language or Music? We're still not sure, but now we'll ponder what comes next. Producer Jonathan Mitchell brings us a piece about David Cope, the composer and professor at UC Santa Cruz, who cured his artist’s block by writing a computer program to do the dirtywork for him. His program, named EMI (Experiments in Musical Intelligence), deconstructs the works of great composers, finding patterns within the voice leading of their compositions, and then creates brand new compositions based on the patterns she finds. But it's not just copy and paste. She brings something new to the pieces. Drift along to the eerily enchanting music of EMI Mahler and ask yourself this: What would Mahler think of an EMI Mahler score? Brillant music? A forgery?
Hear EMI's compositions
More on David Cope
Forgive me, but I don't understand what the fuss is about. EMI's creator is brilliant, as are the composers from which she derives her data. Could EMI create an analytical engine that recombines musical features? And from where do those features (you call them "clichés") come? Could EMI make EMI music?
The FM stream is currently down. We hope to have this stream back online today.
Windows 
Windows 
Search current and archival WNYC broadcasts. More
Email us at radiolab@wnyc.org
- The Brian Lehrer Show: How to Go to College for Almost Free (July 15, 2008)
- The Brian Lehrer Show: The Color of Satire (July 15, 2008)
- The Leonard Lopate Show: Drink Tips for Summer Grilling (July 18, 2008)
- The Leonard Lopate Show: Please Explain: Hamburgers (July 11, 2008)
- The Brian Lehrer Show: Making green in green markets? (July 18, 2008)