Our Joystick Music system allows a piece of music to be steered, modified, and shaped by manipulating two videogame joysticks. Such instruments are easy to learn but difficult to master, with enough depth to make them worth practicing and exploring. These speaking samples are immediately incorporated into performances. Singing voices of audience are recorded, and experience is expanded in Performance. Percussion plus voice samples, making rhythms and words.
Collective behavior is measured.
Timbre, articulation, and embellishment changed with slightest movement. In these experiences, as well as in various parts of the Brain Opera website, the goal is not just to have audience members contribute musical sounds or spoken text, thoughts, memories, or favorite songs, but to prompt a reflection on the significance and deeper meaning of each. In this integration of diverse sonic sources, the attempt is to present an exploration of how our minds turn fragmented experience into coherent views of the world. The audience will be right in the middle of this search, making the artistic experience more palpable and visceral to each active person, while underlining the collaborative, collective nature of the project as a whole. These Final Performances are one of the unique aspects of the Brain Opera.