Dream Sampler is a research project we developed in collaboration with acclaimed bassist Riaan Vosloo and Birmingham City University. Riaan’s proposition was to explore new ways of composing music through deconstructing techniques of composition and recital. His concept was to reference the idea of a music sampler, but instead to make a ‘visual’ sampler which a band leader or conductor could use to give instructions to a band. The premise was to build a software package that could be widely distributed to other composers and musicians so that any visual samples could be loaded into the sampler and played back on demand.

This project was technically challenging and we needed to implement a project management strategy and information architecture in order to make it a reality. Once we had coded the software that could be triggered by a midi controller, we helped develop animations and content that would be used for the first use of the software. Several animations were made in collaboration with Riaan to be put into the sampler.

We also helped produce a recording session for the trial run of the software. This project shows how CR&D explores how Creativity and Technology can be fused in an innovative way. The Composer and University were both very happy with the final outcome and we look forward to working on the next iteration of the project.