Deus in machina: Integrating artificial intelligence into new music drama

Description

Driven by the observation that human performance always has combined and been contrasted with technological elements in opera, an artistic research project was conducted 2022–23 to probe into the possibilities of creating an operatic work that integrated artificial intelligence (AI). The idea was not to replace the human performers with AI, but to set up an expanded agentive system with a trained AI-agent as an interacting part in connection to both artists and visitors. The immersive and interactive opera was based on the concept of a singing seeress equivalent to the Delphic oracle in contact with higher realms and was set up as a one-to-one micro-opera. The dynamic input from the AI agent prompted the sung responses to individual visitors’ questions and affected both aesthetic choices and cognitive processes. Documentation and user experiences were collected for analysis and further elaboration. The project gave rise to future research questions in relation to memorized and improvised opera, as well as the roles of humans and machines in operatic art. In this presentation, the ensemble’s work process and the concept design are in focus.

Period	2024 Feb 27
Event title	LTTA2 Learning Teaching Training Activity: MUSic higher EducatioN meetS the cyber dimension
Event type	Other
Location	Malmö, SwedenShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International