Art meets the algorithm, and Sónar meets its audience face to face again, next Thursday 28th October for the AI and Music S+T+ARTS Festival at CCCB.

With the date fast approaching, and with over 30 concerts, sets, talks and presentations to choose from, we’ve compiled a handy guide to the unmissable highlights of this groundbreaking new festival for Barcelona. 


1/ Holly+: Meet the face of AI, with the voice of Holly Herndon, Maria Arnal and Tarta Relena
(Teatre Stage - 19:45h)
The singer, producer, researcher and artist Holly Herndon is no stranger to working with AI, creating her own ‘AI Baby’ for her most recent LP Protos, which she presented at Sónar 2019. During lockdown she’s been continuing to experiment, resulting in the show she’ll debut at SónarCCCB: Holly+. This  ‘digital avatar’  allows other people, on this occasion the extraordinary Barcelona based artists Maria Arnal and avant-pop duo Tarta Relena, to sing with ‘her’ voice. 


2/ Engendered Otherness by Kiani del Valle and Hamill Industries: Dance meets generative AI
(Teatre Stage - 21:15h)
What happens when an award winning choreographer, the visual design studio favoured by Floating Points and a custom AI meet? The show ‘Engendered Otherness’ by Kiani del Valle and Hamill Industries, co-created with researchers from the UPC,  will answer that question, as well as raise others about where the self ends and the image begins.


3/ Mouse on Mars AAI AV Live: Electronic Anarchy meets analogue performance 
(Hall Stage - 22h)
German IDM pioneers Mouse on Mars know a thing or two about technology, having dedicated over 20 years to exploring the farthest reaches of electronic music. For their latest project they square the circle, developing a custom AI with studio Birds on Mars, that turns speech into a musical instrument. Together with a groundbreaking AV show that breaks out of the stage and live instrumentation, AAI Live is at once a comment on, and an exemplary use of AI technology when it comes to musical creation.


4/Scientists meet techno auteurs: Make way for the new Instruments with Rob Clouth, Agoria and Douglas Eck 
(Auditori CCCB by NTT DATA - 16h)
From Mozart’s use of the piano to Stockhausen’s synthesizers, musicians have always been at the forefront when it comes to adopting new technologies, and today is no different. This talk brings together the coder and generative audio musician Rob Clouth, the French techno auteur Agoria and Douglas Eck, head of Google’s Magenta project to discuss how AI is enabling new instruments to make all new sounds.