INTERACTIVE DANCE
Exploring the interaction between dancer and musician through technology
We explore how the interaction between a dancer and a drummer changes when making use of sensor technology on both the limbs of the dancer and on the drum set. Through the usage of the dancer's wearable sensors, the dancer manipulates the sound produced by the drummer in real-time. Different sound effects to manipulate through movement have been tested. Manipulation of the pitch and delay of the drum sounds have been found to be most rewarding for the dancer to use.
Four NGIMU (x-io Technologies) sensors are placed on the dancer to track movement; one on each arm and one on each leg. The sensors are connected wirelessly and mapped to different movement parameters and sound effects. The drum set have four Sensory Percussion (Sunhouse) sensors placed on four of the drums, for analog-to-digital conversion used as a music production tool.
Max/MSP is used as the programming environment that both the Sensory Percussion sensors on the drum set and the NGIMU sensors weared by the dancer are connected to. Through this connection between dancer movement tracking and music production by the drummer through Sensory Percussion, the Max/MSP maps the movements to sound effects. Thereby, the dancer controls the sound outcome through the movements.
A special thank to Isabell Hertzberg!
Project Team
JAKOB KLANG
Master student in music production at the Royal college of music in Stockholm. Besides my studies at the Royal college of music I teach drums at Stockholm school of the arts and work as a freelance musician. In my work as a musician I have worked a lot with contemporary dancers, inter alia, at Stockholm university of the Arts and at Balettakademien. I am very interested in exploring the co-play between music and dance and I also find it very exciting to try out new technology and investigate in what new ways the technology can be applied in an artistic expression.
THELMA SVENNS
Engineering student in Interactive Media Technology at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. Studying my last year of my master with a specialisation within Sound and Music Computing. My biggest interests lies within sound/music, tech, design and UX, where I can be creative and solution oriented. I have a background in the classical music area but am now curious to combine my musical background with tech and to explore the fields of sound design and sound installations.
LISA ANDERSSON LÓPEZ
Engineering student in Interactive Media Technology at KTH Royal Institute of Technology (Stockholm). Studying my last year of my master. During my studies I've specialised in Sound and Music Computing. I'm truly passionate about the intersection between art, sound and technology, and my greatest interest is creating interactive sound installations and to build creative sound algorithms. Besides music and tech, I'm also very interested in coding systems or web pages, and in design.
All rights reserved Thelma Svenns & Lisa Andersson López (2020)