Quintet.net - A Quintet on the Internet
Georg Hajdu · University of Michigan Library Repository · 2003
Quintet.net is an interactive Internet performance environment enabling up to five performers to play music in real-time over the Internet under the control of a “conductor.” The environment consists of four components: a server, a client, a conductor and a listener. The players interact over the Internet by sending musical (control) streams to the server. In addition, the conductor can log in and control the musical outcome by changing settings remotely, either manually (improvisation) or by executing a score (composition). Quintet.net has additional video and graphical properties, which allow for better interaction and control on a symbolical level: The performers see the music they produce on screen in “space” notation. The conductor, acting as video DJ, can mix films or live video streams to create a truly medial Gesamtkunstwerk. Several compositions have been specifically written for Quintet.net or used it as an integral component, such as the Munich Biennale opera Orpheus Kristall. On May 3rd, 2002, in the opera Orpheus Kristall, for the first time Orpheus journeyed into the Internet instead of into the Underworld. This occurrence symbolized the increasingly profound relationship which opera is entering into with the new media. The new media make it possible to simultaneously present both real stages and virtual ones and to extend the space of operatic events to a global dimension through the inclusion of the Internet. Orpheus Kristall was conceived by a team consisting of composer Manfred Stahnke, librettist Simone de Mello, director Bettina Wackernagel, literary manager Peter Staatsmann, set designer Stephanie Wilhelm and web designer Bettina Westerheide under the aegis of Tilmann Broszat (Munich Biennale for Contemporary Opera) and Jens Cording (Siemens Arts Program). My task primarily consisted of the development and preparation of Quintet.net, an interactive, networked, real-time performance environment that enables interaction between musicians in and via the Internet. As the name Quintet.net implies, up to five participants can be involved in an Internet performance; however, “participant” does not indicate one individual performer in this case, but rather a location in which several performers can be present. The program consists of four components and runs on the Apple Macintosh platform. It was programmed with the graphical software MAX, with the addition of the audio and video extensions MSP and Jitter. The core of Quintet.net is the server, to which all of the During a performance with Quintet.net, the audience follows the Internet events projected on a screen. Quintet.net consists of 4 program components that are connected in a local network or over the Internet. Quintet.net – A Quintet on the Internet