An interesting reply to an article in the University of Southern California's "Networker Magazine" April 1997, Vol7 #4

Mozart unmatched

I was reading your article about
musical software ("Liszt Servers,"
p.35, January/February 1997,
Networker. I'm a bit concerned
about such a blasé attitude about
the ability of computers. Do you
actually know of a program that
can do what Mozart did? I'm
working on a program for
real-time pitch analysis - and it
only works for one note at a time.
I doubt "it's a piece of cake." If
you can document a program that
can extract a score from a
recording, I'll be most surprised.
Incidentally, the story about
Mozart [accurately transcribing a
work he had heard only once] is
much better documented than
"legend." The "Miserere" of Allegri
was guarded as a special secret by
the Vatican. Mozart heard it during
a service and wrote out the score
afterwards. It has nothing very
unusual in terms of composition to
make it so special - part of the
magic of the piece came from the
particulars of the performance,
instructed by the composer and
passed down as a living tradition.
Even a score cannot capture that.
Certainly a MIDI file, lifeless as it
is, cannot. You brought out that
idea forcefully at the end of the
article.

Michael Zarky
Programmer and harpsichord maker

Editor's Note: We didn't expect
anyone to take quite so literally
the analogy between Mozart's
uncanny aural memory and music
software's pyrotechnics. True, no
known software can pluck notes
out of the air and set them down
as a score. However, programs
like Digital Performer can extract
keystrokes on a synthesizer -
improvised or played from
memory - and automatically
translate them into a clean score.
This ability, while not the same as
that demonstrated by Mozart in
Rome, is nonetheless one that
astounds and liberates musicians.
The fact that programmers like
Zarky are working to develop
software to perform real-time
pitch analysis suggests that like
the once-matchless moves of chess
master Gary Kasparov, Mozart's
transcribing trick may one day be
topped by a machine.