The Odd Couple

Human+AI Real-Time Improvisation

With this concert, the possibilities of musical improvisation are expanded beyond human limits as concert pianist David Dolan and an artificial improviser developed by composer and researcher Oded Ben-Tal will carry out a duo improvisation.

The improvisation is based on an expanded tonal–modal idiom, but does not conform to a specific musical style. The artificial improviser does not try to model tonal–modal thinking or directly imitate Dolan’s material; neither is it mainly an extension of Ben-Tal’s own musical idiom—it aims to open a space for human–computer musical dialogue by generating novel material that draws on Dolan’s music on the one hand and Ben-Tal’s compositional sensibilities on the other. The research-creation process is therefore one of joint discovery as both Dolan and Ben-Tal venture beyond their previous musical experiences.  

 Admission is free. As the number of seats is limited, we kindly ask you to register in advance via this  link.

About the performers:

David Dolan ia an international concert pianist, researcher, and teacher. He has devoted a part of his career to the revival of the art of classical improvisation and its applications in performance. In his world-wide solo and chamber music performances, he returns to the tradition of incorporating extemporizations within repertoire in embellished repeats, eingangs, and cadenzas, as well as improvised preludes, interludes, and fantasies. Yehudi Menuhin’s response to his CD, “When Interpretation and Improvisation Get Together,” was: “David Dolan is giving new life to classical music.” David Dolan is a professor of classical improvisation and its application on solo and chamber music performance at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, where he is the head of the Centre for Creative Performance and Classical Improvisation. He also teaches at the Yehudi Menuhin School, and has been conducting masterclasses and workshops in major music centers and festivals worldwide

Oded Ben-Tal is a composer and researcher working at the intersection of music, computing, and cognition. His compositions range from purely acoustic pieces, to interactive, live electronic pieces, and multimedia work. In recent years he has been particularly interested in the interaction between human and computational creativities. Together with Dr. Bob Sturm he developed research applying deep learning to folk musics and interrogating the creative capacity of the resulting generative system within the folk tradition as well as outside it. He is also using AI-inspired approaches in the domain of interactive, live electronic music. Machine listening techniques combined with algorithmically steered processes open space for musical dialogue, in real-time, between human performers and computer counterparts. 

In 2022 he launched the Datasounds, Datasets, and Datasense research network which aims to identify core questions that will drive forward the next phase in data-rich music research, focused in particular on creative music making. Stemming out of his own compositional interests in relating human and machine creativities and broadening the scope to consider the implications as well as applications of computational means used to make music, understand it, and engage with it.

Since January 2023 he has been collaborating with Dr. Örjan de Manzano on the research project Creative Musical Dialogues Between Human and Machine: A Novel Approach to Studying Improvisation and Joint Action, funded by the Volkswagen Stiftung.