Computers create musical

  • March 4, 2016
Computers create musical

Alex Davies worked on the world's first computer-generated musical.

A Gates Cambridge alumnus has worked on the world’s first computer-generated musical.

The musical, Beyond the Fence, opened in London’s West End on 22nd February and runs until 5th March.

Commissioned by SkyArts, it is based on a big data statistical study of what makes a Broadway hit.

Alex Davies [2010] and colleagues in the Machine Learning Group at Cambridge University analysed the data, which included the emotional structure of a work, the number of actors involved and whether or not romance was important. Alex and a colleague worked on generating lyrics. About 15% of the lyrics in the musical were computer generated.

They used this data to develop a model of what was most likely to result in a successful musical. Researchers at Goldsmiths, University of London and the Complutense University of Madrid, took this model and generated characters and a plot, again using computers. The score was also written by computers under the aegis of Dr Nick Collins of Durham University and others.

Beyond the Fence is set in 1982 at the Greenham Common peace camp and involves a soldier finding true love through learning how to understand a child. Alex is currently a Machine Learning Specialist at ‎Google.

Latest News

Recent Scholar returns to Cambridge as assistant professor

A Gates Cambridge Scholar has been appointed an Assistant Professor at the University of Cambridge’s Department of Politics and International Studies at the age of 29 – just one year […]

Piecing together a scientific knowledge puzzle

Zhi-Yu Chen’s research is like piecing together a jigsaw puzzle. Zhi-Yu is interested in the cross-cultural exchange of scientific knowledge between Chinese migrants and other communities in Southeast Asia between […]

New book explores future of the Arctic

A Gates Cambridge Scholar has co-written a book about the future of the Arctic which has been praised by the executive director of the Arctic Economic Council for bringing the Arctic […]

Behind the scenes in discussions on Inter-American rights treaties

What is the difference between how we think of human rights and economic and social rights? Several decades in the case of Mexico, according to research by Andrés Ruiz Ojeda [2023].  […]