Willie or Won't He? He Did!

'Harvestworks Digital Media Center presents Joshua Fried and Music for Robots' With LEMUR, the League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots. Harvestworks, 596 Broadway, NYC. April 12, 2004

Imagine a musical performance by robots, not in human shape, but mechanical devices that pluck strings, bang on pails, shake tambourine "jingles" and strike metal sheets. Then you have an idea of Joshua Fried's mechanical companions for his most recent work Music for Robots.

Presented at Harvestworks as a free demonstration, Fried's new composition has been supported by a generous commissioning grant from the Jerome Foundation. And for good reason, since these "bots" and his musical implementation of them are truly original.

Fried didn't create the robots. They are the brainchild of musician/technologist Eric Singer and his wild-eyed collaborative LEMUR, or the League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots. Needless to say, the LEMUR devices are not members of musicians local 802, and they complain little about extensive rehearsals or overtime.

Based on MIDI technology and operating from a computer score that a composer creates, the robots come in various shapes and sizes and scrape, hammer, rattle and roll, visually dancing in the process. The challenge for a composer is to create convincing music for these metal nobodies.

Joshua Fried has a particular talent for this. Coming from a pop and rock background, Fried is "wired in" to the music of our popular times. However, he now wishes to create "art music" or something that goes beyond pop forms. In his wonderful efforts with these machines he does this, creating tuneful, semi pop melodies and jams that reach a wide audience taste while, simultaneously, having the sophistication of contemporary minimalism and the variation technique of lengthier art forms.

The first movement of Fried's Music for Robots features "Willie" (well I'm just calling him that; it's a guitar bot that consists of various electronic guitar components struck by an automated plectrum and played with a movable bridge in a tuneful rhythmic exercise that manages to be sophisticated and at the same time grabs popular attention).

The second movement, played after Fried made a few minor adjustments of his mechanical friends, featured the "percussion" bots: mechanisms that automatically played an upside-down plastic pail, a tambourine jingle and banged on a metal plate. Here Fried keeps the pitched robot fairly static as everything and the kitchen sink takes over. The balance and change of focus works.

The final movement consists, mostly, of three-part chords from the melodic robot with notes that are struck at different times, gradually changing phase a la Steve Reich. This melodious variation works convincingly as a conclusion.
The robots, by the way, have been in public view on the web for some time. Videos of them in operation may be seen at www.lemurbots.org, including much of the first movement of the Joshua Fried piece. I recommend this website highly, since the video closeups of these robots in action are even superior to seeing them in a live performance setting.

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Willie or Won't He? He Did!