David Cope is pleasantly surprised by the notoriety and acclaim Emily Howell has received
(Shmuel Thaler/Sentinel)

A graphic representation of the interaction between David Cope and Emily Howell is displayed on his computer screen
(Shmuel Thaler/Sentinel)

003_WindchimesDavid.jpg

David Cope is surrounded by wind chimes as he interacts with Emily Howell from his laptop computer
(Shmuel Thaler/Sentinel)

004_WindchimesDavidPerspective.jpg

Another picture sent to me by Mary Jane. Nice artistic shot!

From newspaper article: http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/ci_14330754?IADID=Search-www.santacruzsentinel.com-www.santacruzsentinel.com Composer Emily Howell may lack flesh and blood, but her creator David Cope has given her that most human of traits: creativity By CHRIS WATSON Posted: 02/04/2010 01:30:31 AM PST It wasn't a surge of electricity through the phone line that shocked me on a recent, stormy day. Instead, it was the sound of a man's voice at the other end. I was pretty sure, after all, that I'd dialed the right number for Santa Cruz's newest recording artist, Emily Howell. But the male voice in my ear in no way matched my visual of the composer behind "From Darkness, Light," a gamelan of passionate sounds just published by Centaur Records. In my head, Emily Howell was a ravishing, red-headed beauty. Athletic, maybe, but completely feminine. David Cope -- Ms. Howell's close collaborator and the man at the other end of the phone -- was delighted to explain why he'd answered the phone instead of his partner. "She's indisposed," he laughed, adding, "I thought of giving her a computer voice, but those things annoy the hell out of me. And I could give her a face, but cosmetic surgery's not necessary. What Emily does is so much more interesting than what she looks like." Emily Howell is a computer program. First cousin to Emmy or EMI, an acronym for Cope's Experiments in Musical Intelligence, Emily is a derivative algorithm based on thousands of compositions Emmy composed over two decades, beginning in 1980. Cope's grand experiment began three decades ago, when he came down with a bout of composer's block. Instead of trashing what he was working on, he began composing at another kind of keyboard, eventually producing a computer program that understood his musical style, the basic rules of music and could generate ideas for a next note or measure of music. Trained in classical piano and violoncello, Cope spent his career teaching the art and science of musical composition. Even today, as a professor emeriti at UC Santa Cruz, he still teaches graduate seminars. But while the courses are under the auspices of the music department, students flock from computer science and the digital arts as well. For Cope, there is little difference between sculpting a database and sculpting a symphony. "Composing and programming," he said, "are synonymous." Despite being married to musician Mary Jane Cope for 42 years, Cope got heartily sick of Emmy about seven years ago. Emmy, he learned, could generate any number of compositions in the style of Bach, Mozart, Mahler, Rachmaninoff, Chopin, Bartok, Brahms, etc. But unlike mortal composers, her output would never reach a zenith. It made him wonder: if you can compose 5,000 barcarolles in 25 minutes, where's the virtue of doing even one? So, he killed his darling. After publishing Emmy's code, writing a book called "Computer Models of Music Creativity," and saving about 12,000 of her pieces, Cope destroyed Emmy's database. "I had to destroy it," he said. "I didn't want to be seduced into writing an opera in the style of Mahler just because someone suggested it." But, just like quitting cigarettes, ending his collaboration with Emmy wasn't easy. "I stopped many times," he said quietly. "In fact, I did end up doing the opera by Mahler." Father of four sons -- Tim, Steve, Brian, and Greg -- Cope is also the father of four virtual daughters -- Sara, Alice, Emmy and Emily Howell. Cope gave Emily, the youngest, Emmy's database of compositions-in-the-style-of-famous-composers to work with. Then, through musical trial and feedback, Emily and Cope began to produce new material in their own style. The process for a new piece always begins with a simple conversation in ASCII English between the two. "I might start by sending her a sentence like It's raining today,'" he said. "Then, after a couple of hours of interaction, I'll ask her musical questions and, trained by what we've been talking about, she'll give me something back." Because Emily is much less strict that her older sister, Cope never knows what she'll return. He might, for example, request some tuba and Emily, a free-thinker, might add trombones instead. "Emily's like a cat -- she only understands me to a certain degree. I'm often taken aback by her. She gives me the impression, sometimes, of being a sentient being." You can hear Emily Howell's compositional virtuosity in "Darkness, Light." Including performances by Mary Jane Cope and a chamber piece conducted by Nicole Paiement, the CD recorded at the UCSC Music Recital Hall runs the gamut of tonal to atonal music. In its most elemental form, it works as a genome for classical music between 1890 and 1940. Cope hopes that in a couple of years, computer speeds will increase to the point that he can reload all his conversations with Emily upon booting up his computer. On the other hand, those long, 12-hour conversations have massaged their relationship in interesting ways. "Emily's so complicated that, after working with her a few hours, I forget she's part of me, that I'm talking to myself." Unlike science fiction dystopias where robots are envisioned as evil machines, Cope's creations mirror only what's in his own soul, he said. "Some may think these creations are anti-human, but the exact opposite is, in fact, true. Mimicry helps us understand our humanness. Emily Howell is a confirmation of the human spirit. As an aural avatar, she's good news, a verification that we are progressing along nicely to an understanding our place in the universe."