The Composer and the Computer

Abstract

Perhaps it comes as no surprise that computers are having a profound effect in the world of music, just as in so many other fields of human endeavor. Computers are being applied to many practical aspects of musicmaking; consider, for example, the recent introduction of digital recording techniques to replace conventional tape recording in making the masters for commercial records and cassettes. Scholastic activities are also being affected: musicological research, music library management, and pedagogy. Since such activities have analogs in other fields of work, they are readily perceived as natural applications for digital processing.