TypoPhonia

About the Work

This game piece, programmed in Max MSP from scratch, unfolds through a wireless network, synchronizing multiple performers via a custom server-client patch. In addition, the conductor manipulates sequence length and dynamics mid-performance. Players are arranged in a semi-circle, each with a laptop and speaker, typing displayed text that is sonified in real time. Every keystroke is verified against the conductor's blueprint and transformed into sound through a rhythmic grid sequencer with a variable pulse that synchronizes the collective typing. At its core, this is a survival game piece where the balance of accuracy and speed is paramount: this friction comes into play because the slowest typer in each batch loses a life, and three mistyped keys in a round cost another. Players are eliminated upon losing all remaining lives, and the piece ends when the final player falls. Bonus rounds may grant extra lives to the fastest typer, but that daring strategy may come at a cost. The sonic arc deals with changes in density of sound events and their timbral morphology: as players drop out, collective sound diminishes. Toward the end, sparse clicks contribute to organic syncopation, but auxiliary parameters – reverb, delay, timbre, tuning, and harmonic quantization – are adjusted with each lost life, growing in resonance and intensity. Shaped by the players' typing skills, the piece is malleable by design, allowing for variable ensemble sizes and life counts, which make duration proportional and indeterminate.

Performance History

Images