Clap-along: A negotiation strategy for creative musical interaction with computational systems

This paper describes Clap-along, an interactive system for theorising about creativity in improvised musical performance. It ex- plores the potential for negotiation between human and computer par- ticipants in a cyclical rhythmic duet. Negotiation is seen as one of a set of potential interactive strategies, but one that ensures the most equitable correspondence between human and machine. Through mutual negotia- tion (involving listening/feature extraction and adaptation) the two par- ticipants attempt to satisfy their own and each other’s target outcome, without knowing the other’s goal. Each iteration is evaluated by both participants and compared to their target. In this model of negotiation, we query the notion of ‘flow’ as an objective of creative human-computer collaboration. This investigation suggests the potential for sophisticated applications for real-time creative computational systems