The ability to play music has been something that people through out all time have taken great pride in. People have devoted their entire lives to music and its creation. It takes immense skill, practice, and even physical ability. This is one reason why seeing a live performance is so trilling. The intensity that musicians and the crowd brings to a concert atmosphere also play a big role (Musicians seem more likely to enjoy the sheer talent, while non-musicians seem to enjoy the other stuff more. I'm not saying both types can't enjoy both things. I digress.).
On the (seemingly completely) other hand, there are those who devote their lives to computers, technology, and everything that encompasses. One can spend their entire life learning more about programming on every level possible.
This article though, is dedicated to those who have attempted to take the ancient art of music and combine it with the new age of technology. No, this isn't about all those amazing mixers and fancy music creating software. This is about the merging of music with robotics. This is about taking an art, and performing it mechanically.
Following are a few of my favorite robots that have been made to perform. I consider these programmers and engineers artists themselves.
Our first robot does not play your standard musical instrument, but then again, it wasn't created by your standard group of musicians. Of course, what standard person would create something like this in the first place? From their site:
LEMUR: League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots is
a Brooklyn-based group of artists and technologists who create robotic
musical instruments. Founded in 2000 by musician and engineer Eric
Singer, LEMUR creates exotic, sculptural musical instruments which
integrate robotic technology. LEMUR's philosophy is to build robots
that are new types of musical instruments, as opposed to animatronic
robots that play existing instruments. LEMUR's growing ensemble includes over 50 robotic instruments.
Here is their creation, GuitarBot.
Along with GuitarBot goes Crazy J who plays an acoustic guitar. Well, it's actually similar to the one above in that it is controlled by permanent parts that are simply programmed when to pluck. It can play some pretty neat stuff though.
When people get creative, they can have robots create music in the most unusual ways (Or is this more usual?). I would like to showcase this robot from where else but Japan. This display from the Robot Museum in Nagoya Japan shows that the Japanese are a little kooky. But, although this robot was not originally designed to play music, they have used their imaginations and found a way (Although calling this music might be a little of a stretch).
Yesterday
all my troubles seemed so far away
Now it looks as though they`re here to stay
Oh I believe in yesterday
I'm not too sure what I think about this one. It is more of an all around musician with no real specialty except keeping the crown going. MechaBonham is a KHR-1 fight robot turned Led Zeppelin fan. Here he is playing the Piano, guitar, and "in concert." Keep in mind he probably would not win any music competitions. The rumor is that he is being trained on drums also. This one may take an update eventually. As of now he's got the look, but could use some more practice.
Keeping with the piano now, there are many robots out there that have been programmed to play the piano. All you need are fingers to press up and down, an arm to move left and right, and someone to program when to make those things move. I could not find the best video of a robot playing the piano. I have seen better ones in the past, but this will have to do for now.
This other robot is simply an arm with four fingers that has been developed in Harbin, China and can play the electric organ. Playing the piano is simply a side project for this though. It is being used for research and development for future useful projects.
Finally we have my personal favorite. Being a trumpet player myself, I am particularly fond of this robot that Toyota created. They have developed this robot to use in factories in place of humans. I think they put it's speciality quite well in their press release from March of 2004.
Toyota developed artificial lips that move with the same finesse as
human lips, which, together with robots’ hands, enables the robots to
play trumpets like humans do.
Check it out!
And for those of you who might think it's not really playing, here's a close up.
And don't ask my why they put a feather in his hat. I would say it is there to look like Robin Hood, except that his feather was red. Oh, and I thought he robbed the rich and gave to the poor, not built robots to take jobs from the poor and make things more available for the rich...
As I find new interesting musical robots I will add them to this article. If you have one you would like me to check out, shoot me an email using the feedback link in the menu at the top left of this page.
12/7/07 - Update:
Toyota has just released video of their newest robot which can play the violin. This is their next step in the development of a household robot that can help with tasks that requre fine and precise movements.
This website was created in memory of the ChatbotFriends website which inspired me to delve deeper into the topic of Chatbots (Chatterbots). I originally started it as a replacement when that site went down, but we have since branched out a lot. We were originally the Chatbot Hub and focused mainly on chatbots but, with the growth of the site, we decided to expand out to other similar aspects of AI and rename ourselves "AI Hub". I hope that all of the visitors can be inspired by what Artificial Intelligence can accomplish.
