Output details
35 - Music, Drama, Dance and Performing Arts
University of Durham
Live Coding of Consequence
Collins’ research in live coding encompasses software development and live performance elements, as well as text publications, elements which are all interrelated. Since the research dimensions of this work cannot be fully represented by any one item, multiple interconnected items are gathered here in a portfolio. (One note to avoid confusion: Live coding work by the author has appeared both under his own name, and under the anagrammatic pseudonym Click Nilson).
Research contributions here extend from exploration of programming a computer as a performative act through a variety of interfaces, to algorithmic choreography of human action. These projects provide a commentary on a human musician-programmer’s dialogue with the machine. The portfolio comprises a lead article:
(a) (2011) Live Coding of Consequence, Leonardo 44/3, 207-211
accompanied by the following supporting items:
(b) TOPLAPapp software
Collins created three iPhone live coding apps (TOPLAPapp, RISCy, and Cryptoclash). These are App Store only, with only the first being free for download; however, submitted here is a web audio API version of TOPLAPapp which is equivalent and freely accessible (requires Chrome or latest Safari browsers):
http://www.dur.ac.uk/nick.collins/livecode/toplapappjs/toplapapp.html
Original iPhone version from 2009:
http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=323675376&mt=8
(c) Audio demo and programme notes: Robot Schumann (20 April 2013) For live coder and Disklavier. Premiere at the live code festival, Karlsruhe (http://imwi.hfm.eu/livecode/2013/nick-collins/)
(d) Performance, documented via video: The Gospel According to Wrongheaded (27 July 2012). Performance conceived by Nick Collins for duo of Matthew Yee-King and Click Nilson. Live at the Arnolfini arts centre in Bristol in the closing concert of the Live Notation AHRC-funded network for live coding and live arts. The Wrongheaded collaboration is further described in the article, illustrating connections between live coding and choreography of human action.
(e) Click Nilson's Six Live Coding Works for Ensemble (December 2012) Musical action and intervention score (http://www.dur.ac.uk/nick.collins/livecodingworksforensemble.html)
