Antescofo is a program developed by Arshia Cont in 2007 at ''

IRCAM IRCAM (French: ''Ircam, '', English: Institute for Research and Coordination in Acoustics/Music) is a French institute dedicated to the research of music and sound, especially in the fields of avant garde and electro-acoustical art music. It is ...

'' in collaboration with composer Marco Stroppa to aid with the synchronization of electronics in live performances. It is a modular polyphonic

Score Following Score following is the process of automatically listening to a live music performance and tracking the position in the score. It is an active area of research and stands at the intersection of artificial intelligence, pattern recognition, signal pr ...

system as well as a Synchronous Programming language for musical composition.Omni Sound Blog (2012)
The Informatics Revolution: Antescofo - Computer Music with Live Music Performance
/ref> Since 2012, Antescofo is being developed by a joint team between

and

INRIA The National Institute for Research in Digital Science and Technology (Inria) () is a French national research institution focusing on computer science and applied mathematics. It was created under the name ''Institut de recherche en informatiq ...

. A common problem in electroacoustic is the displacement in time between the performer and the fixed electronic sound. Even if the trigger is synchronized at the beginning, there may still be a temporal discrepancy between both after a certain duration due to the natural inflection of time on the part of the human performer. Antescofo is able to recognize adjustment in tempo in real time through audio stream from live performers and detect its position in an input score, thus allowing synchronization. It is designed for use with

Max/MSP Max, also known as Max/MSP/Jitter, is a visual programming language for music and multimedia developed and maintained by San Francisco-based software company Cycling '74. Over its more than thirty-year history, it has been used by composers, pe ...

and

PureData Pure Data (Pd) is a visual programming language developed by Miller Puckette in the 1990s for creating interactive computer music and multimedia works. While Puckette is the main author of the program, Pd is an open-source project with a large d ...

programming. Some features also exist in NoteAbility Pro, a notation program developed by

Keith Hamel Keith Hamel (born 1956 in Morden, Manitoba, Canada) is a composer, software designer, and professor of music. His music consists of orchestral, chamber, solo, and vocal music, often focussing on live electronics and interactivity between ac ...

, to export information specifically for Antescofo. Antescofo is equipped with a dedicated real-time synchronous language as an aid to compose mixed pieces as association of live performers and computers. The language's aim to is to reconcile different notions of ''time'' in authoring and performing for musicians and composers.Hélène Combis-Schlumberger, Radio France Website (2013)
Quand l'informatique maitrise le temps de l'interprétation musicale
/ref> Besides its use in

live electronic music Live electronic music (also known as live electronics) is a form of music that can include traditional electronic sound-generating devices, modified electric musical instruments, hacked sound generating technologies, and computers. Initially the pr ...

, ''Antescofo'' is frequently used in automatic accompaniment applications including on voice.

Awards and recognition

''Antescofo'' has been featured in performances worldwide such as with New York Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, BBC Scottish Orchestra, West-Eastern Divan Orchestra and more. It has been used by composers such as Marco Stroppa,

Philippe Manoury Philippe Manoury (born 19 June 1952) is a French composer. Biography Manoury was born in Tulle and began composition studies at the Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris with Gérard Condé and Max Deutsch. He continued his studies from 1974 to 1 ...

, Jonathan Harvey,

Pierre Boulez Pierre Louis Joseph Boulez (; 26 March 1925 – 5 January 2016) was a French composer, conductor and writer, and the founder of several musical institutions. He was one of the dominant figures of post-war Western classical music. Born in Mon ...

, and

Larry Nelson Larry Gene Nelson (born September 10, 1947) is an American professional golfer who has won numerous tournaments at both the PGA Tour and Champions Tour level. Nelson was born in Fort Payne, Alabama and grew up in Acworth, Georgia, northwest of A ...

. ''Antescofo'' was awarded the popular French magazine La Recherche jury prize in 2012. In 2013, ''Antescofo'' received the French Industry award by the French Minister of Industry at the time

Arnaud Montebourg Arnaud Montebourg (; born 30 October 1962) is a French politician, lawyer and entrepreneur who served as the Minister of Industrial Renewal from 2012 to 2014,List of music software This is a list of software for creating, performing, learning, analyzing, researching, broadcasting and editing music. This article only includes software, not services. For streaming services such as iHeartRadio, Pandora, Prime Music, and Spotify, ...

References

{{reflist

External links

R&D WebsiteOfficial Website
Music software