Sónar+D: Future Perspectives of Music Technology

Sónar+D contributes to this edition of Ars Electronica Festival by bringing an artists’ conversation on the future of music technology in the era of AI, and a video performance capsule uniting music and artificial intelligence.

Future Perspectives of Music Technology

Sónar+D is an international congress of researchers, innovators and business leaders to explore how creativity is changing our present and promote imagining new futures. Since 2013, this antidisciplinary meeting gathers leading artists, creative technologists, musicians, filmmakers, designers, thinkers, scientists, entrepreneurs, makers and hackers in Barcelona to participate in a carefully commissioned program to inspire and network.

Timetable

Program

This is Sónar+D

Sónar+D – Sónar Festival’s creative technologies conference – is an international congress exploring how creative minds are changing our present and imagining new futures, in collaboration with researchers, innovators and business leaders from all sectors and industries.

Acte de Fe

Marc Vilajuana, Adrià Grandia, Carlos Martorell

Act of faith (Acte de Fe) is an exploration of our relationship with technology, its similarities with the one we have with religion, the tools involved in both processes, and its impact on us and in our sacred/private space. Mise-en-scène will consist in a liturgy performed by Marc Vilajuana (voice, effects, hand drum), Adrià Grandia (acoustic and MIDI hurdy-gurdy, modular synth, laptop, aerophones), Carlos Martorell (coding, synths, motion sensors, artiphon) and a real-time reactive AI trained with religious scores.

Interdependence with Richie Hawtin: AI for humans

Holly Herndon, Matt Dryhust

In this discussion we explode the false binary of humans and machines in the music making process, explore ways that AI systems could actually help get more humans paid rather than displace them, and discuss the necessity of artists having a seat at the table in the process of AI tool development.

Project Credits / Acknowledgements

Curation and production: Sónar+D
Filming: Factory Berlin

The AIxMusic Festival, a S+T+ARTS flagship event, is organised by Ars Electronica and the European Commission.

Ars Electronica Garden Barcelona