Machine music workshops

Two high schools in Vejle chose the full workshops package for a day with multiple workshops available for them to join. I was aboard as teacher – the first workshop together with Kristian Hverring and Mads Paluszewski-Hau and the second workshop on my own.

Theme of the workshop

The theme of both days was ‘without mistakes’ (fejlfri), and that was a great stepping stone to making mistakes and errors and to let that be a part of the music instead of trying to make clean, digital music as we hear it so often in the radio (or wherever it is that people of today listen to music).

Machine music

We wanted to show the students how to make field recordings to use them as the starting point of music pieces composed on the laptop. Before recording, we discussed approaching the concept of sound from different angles, and how to find a starting point for making a small composition.

Results

The results were great – most of them quite strange and unique, and it was definitely an ear opener for all participants: an acknowledgement of the fact that music can be excactly what you want it to be, and that unexpected results are welcome when expressing yourself.

Listen to the results from the first workshop: