The Composers (In development)

Made in collaboration with Threshold’s Sarah Lockwood, and the Listies’ Matt Kelly, this experimental work explores how babies’ movements might be turned into music. Working with babies and their carers, this project utilises motion tracking software interfaced with Ableton Live, to translate the babies' movements into music. Physical gestures – kicking, raising hands, movements at the elbow or knee – trigger sounds in real time.

Babies and their carers were invited to participate in individual jam sessions. Each 20-minute session involved only one baby and their carer(s) and focused on what worked: what sounded good, what the carers liked, how much the composers were in charge, and how the participant's age might affect the work. How might different coding make the sounds feel more like music? What kind of environment, sonic or otherwise, encouraged the baby to move? How can we craft all this into something that moves beyond novelty and into a musical composition ready for an audience?