New Rules for the Melody Generator II Repeating Rhythm and Varying Harmony

Abstract

New rules were sought for the Melody Generator II, a knowledge based system that composes music. The system lacked good rules for continuation of a melody, so several features were selected to investigate how the melodies could continue. The features - harmony, contour and rhythm - were manipulated such that they could be repeated or varied. We found that it was best to repeat the rhythm over the course of the melody and to vary the harmony when the contour was repeated. Keywords: Computer generated music, Knowledge Based System, Continuation of a Melody, Melody Generator II, Repetition, Variation