The Oxford Handbook of Algorithmic Music

With the ongoing development of algorithmic composition programs and communities of practice expanding algorithmic music faces a turning point. Joining dozens of emerging and established scholars alongside leading practitioners in the field chapters in this <em>Handbook </em>both describe the state of algorithmic composition and also set the agenda for critical research on and analysis of algorithmic music. Organized into four sections chapters explore the music's history utility community politics and potential for mass consumption. Contributors address such issues as the role of algorithms as co-performers live coding practices and discussions of the algorithmic culture as it currently exists and what it can potentially contribute society education and ecommerce. Chapters engage particularly with post-human perspectives - what new musics are now being found through algorithmic means which humans could not otherwise have made - and in reciprocation how algorithmic music is being assimilated back into human culture and what meanings it subsequently takes. Blending technical artistic cultural and scientific viewpoints this <em>Handbook</em> positions algorithmic music making as an essentially human activity.<br>