Flex

Flex is a generative, multi-channel music performance piece controlled by brainwaves.

Flex investigates the playful side of electronic music performance, toying with ideas of gesture, expression and immersion through harnessing cognitive thought processes and brain wave data classification.

Flex prescribes the mind as muscle, using thought to replace the physical embodiment of performance. As a result mappings are key to providing the feel, direction and nature of accuracy within the piece, from the micro up to macro parameters, replacing traditional, physical controllers to manipulate, arrange, synthesize and diffuse combinations of recorded and computer generated sound.

Technical Implementation

Using my bespoke BCMI (using an Emotiv headset and my own software) mapped to Integra Live - a musical performance tool developed at Birmingham Conservatoire - brain signals from the performer provide real-time control of the music.

Flex was born after my first BCMI performance piece, The Warren. It utilized a more portable setup, using two laptops, which made it easier to travel with. It extended The Warren’s use of mappings to expand musical control in new ways.

Performances

• Sight, Space, Sound and Play in Leicester UK
• At the 10th CMMR in Marseille, France
• Mercy/Syndrome at FACT, Liverpool, UK.