Computer music is relatively old, going back
to the very early 1950s. In the following decades, people have been creative with programmable technology, leading to
"She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain" being played on an IBM
chain printer back in 1966, and in more recent years,
HP ScanJet 5100c included an Easter Egg. The
HP ScanJet 4c's SCL (Scanner Control Language) unofficial PLAY TUNE command lead to
these fine little ditties. Now over a decade ago, the duo known as
[The User] enlisted
three specialists to operate a computer program via a server that synchronized the dot-matrix printers and read complex ASCII text files in order to create musical compositions. The result was a techno-sounding piece that was performed by the administrators of the system, rather than one that was simply being played. Like
a symphony of car horns, the coordination of these printers became
Symphony #1 and
#2 for Dot Matrix Printers (
samples of Symphony #2,
Symphony #2 Slashdot thread). [More computer music exploration inside]
[more inside]
posted by filthy light thief
on May 26, 2009 -
27 comments
