Artificial Intelligence & Innovation
In addition to their mastery of a diverse range of musical instruments, Charlie Chan leads a highly technical life when it comes to music and technology.
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Meet Baxter the robot
In 2017, the Interactive Orchestra, a Global Orchestra project, took to the stage at the Sydney Opera House in a groundbreaking performance that saw music and technology working hand-in-hand.
Under the direction of Artistic Director Charlie Chan, the Global Orchestra worked alongside the Accenture Liquid Studio team to create an orchestra like no other: A part-human, part-robot collaboration.
In a world first, an artificial intelligence robot - named Baxter - was a key member of an orchestral jazz performance, playing the marimba as part of the ensemble.
Presented at the 2017 Adobe Symposium, the Interactive Orchestra was exemplary of the art that’s made possible by blending artificial intelligence and robotics with creativity.
Using a million pieces of music and custom-built artificial intelligence, engineers programmed Baxter to play the marimba. Then, utilising cutting-edge artificial intelligence technology, Baxter was able to respond to commands from conductor Charlie Chan during the live show - contributing to the performance like any other member of the orchestra.
To create an even greater interactive experience, the music, lighting and visual projections were all manipulated by the audience interacting with the performance on their mobile phones.
A fusion of robotics, machine intelligence and music, this Interactive Orchestra performance was a leading-edge world first.
Global Orchestra Foundation
In 2012, Charlie co-founded the Global Orchestra Foundation with Nathan Waks & Justin Baird.
The Global Orchestra is a not-for-profit organisation that aims to bring people together through the act of playing music, to mark our global commitment to finding a sustainable future for our planet.
During Earth Hour 2015 the Global Orchestra with the support of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra facilitated the Concert for the Planet. This was a mass participation, multi location, simultaneous performance of Holst’s The Planets. On the countdown to Earth Hour, direct from the stage of the Sydney Opera House, a live stream of chief conductor David Robertson was beamed across the globe.
Everyone, anywhere on the planet, was able to play along to the stellar sounds of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra with the help of Conductor-Cam, a technology developed by Charlie which for the first time anywhere ever, allows conducting and performance in perfect sync.
In 2015 the Global Orchestra achieved its goal to enable millions of participants across more than 350 locations in Australia and abroad to play together in sync as the live soundtrack to Earth Hour.
MUSIC TECHNOLOGY & DIGITAL INNOVATION
Working with Yamaha as a new product demonstrator as a teenage keyboard prodigy put Charlie Chan in front of the gamut of new music technology during the early 1980s. They became proficient on the Yamaha DX7 – the first commercially successful digital synthesizer. They also took to the Minimoog – a monophonic analog synthesizer released in the early 1970s. This led to further experimentation with keyboards, sequencing software and electronic sampling – something Charlie embraced at the very beginning of their career and has continued to incorporate into their ongoing work with original albums as well as for stage and screen scores.
Charlie was among the first group of Australian musician/composers to fully embrace technology in their work. As noted by journalist Bridget McManus in the Sydney Morning Herald: "Buzzing with creative energy and driven by an insatiable desire to learn, this composer, performer and cyber-chick is tuned in and logged on". This sentiment was echoed by Cal Clugston writing for Revolver magazine: "As well as being known for their forays into sampling and electronica, this cutting-edge pianist and composer has an association with technology and the internet."
In the early to mid-2000s, Charlie expanded their label, Martian Music, into a successful independent online music distribution service for themselves and other artists in Australia and around the world. Its Internet-based sales and distribution mechanism pioneered digital downloads and music e-commerce in Australia.
Charlie has since moved on into the field of application development, partnering with several technology firms to develop new music distribution models. Along with that, their projects now feature generative composition tools such as Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning.
