Do Scots Dream of Robotic Bagpipes?
Audio-Installation
The piece “Do Scots Dream of Robotic Bagpipes” explores the complex relationship between technology and tradition through the use of early and now even outdated machine learning methods such as Markov chains. Old tradition meets ancient AI.
Markov chains are mathematical models that represent the probabilities of note sequences that resemble the unpredictable rhythms of nature itself - each note a step on the mist-shrouded paths through the heather-covered moors. Stochastic models, imbued with the capriciousness of random variables, arrange these notes into symphonies that evoke the vastness of Scotland's rugged landscapes. Here beauty is drawn in the shadow of every valley and every peak. The project captures not only the melody of the bagpipes, but also the soul of a country whose history is inextricably interwoven into the fabric of its landscapes.
Georg Hobmeier developed the project together with the musicologist, musician and expert for artificial intelligence in music, Juan Romero, who works at the ZKM Karlsruhe, among others, in the early 2010s as an automated bagpipe machine with machine learning programming. As part of the exhibition “100 Years of Traklhaus” Hobmeier and Romero are showing an audio version of the work.
