What Was the Question?

• Year: 2023
• Released: January 20, 2023

Ask not if AI can create, but whether AI-generated insights and materials can become the foundation for fully realized musical works by humans. Spoiler: yes they can.

The Album

What Was the Question? (2023) is a response to my previous album Answer is Waves (2020) — a collection of short AI études made with my Isomer software. I was searching for musical answers in the data. Could I create an alien musical surface that felt natural because it was based on fundamental observations in familiar music and sound events?

Whether or not I uncovered any meaningful “answers,” my time is best spent making MUSIC, so I took the best of what Isomer and I created together and treated those études as full compositions. The result is a collection spanning 2017–2022 that represents a major part of my musical interests during that period: human–AI collaboration, spatial audio composition, and the continuation of work that began at Eastman.

Three tracks (13th Hour, Little Spells, Dark Paths) were created in direct collaboration with Isomer. Two tracks (Atlas, Zaïs: Overture) were composed for the Music in the Constellation project at National Sawdust. Two tracks (Persona, Vyšehrad) come from my graduate work at Eastman — the foundation of my compositional voice.

Track by Track

1. Zaïs: Overture (2022) — 4:33

Originally performed as part of the full-sphere ambisonics section of the Music in the Constellation event. This stereo reduction maintains the spatial movement and architectural thinking of the original performance.

2. 13th Hour (2020) — 3:47

What Isomer proposed was a series of overlapping harmonic fields that shifted almost imperceptibly. My role was to shape the orchestration and the temporal structure — deciding when to introduce new material, when to let ideas breathe, and when to cut.

The title simultaneously refers to the liminal space between day and night, waking and sleeping — a metaphor for the collaboration itself, where neither human nor machine is fully in control — and nods to the influence of Schoenberg’s pioneering Pierrot ensemble.

3. Persona (1990s) — 7:07

Persona explores the idea of musical identity — how a single compositional voice can fragment, multiply, and recombine. The piece uses granular synthesis and spectral processing to create dense, evolving textures that feel both organic and alien.

This work represents the foundation of my interest in computational music — not as a replacement for human creativity, but as an expansion of what’s possible.

4. Little Spells (2019) — 1:49

I treated Isomer’s output as raw material — selecting the most compelling fragments, arranging them in space, and adding subtle processing to create a sense of ritual and repetition.

The title comes from the feeling that these small musical gestures have a kind of magic to them — they cast spells through repetition and variation.

5. Vyšehrad (2002) — 10:36

Like Persona, this piece was created using SGI Indy and NeXT Cube computers with csound, RTcmix, Aleck Brinkman’s Move-Space-Place, PVC, Cecilia, and other open-source software.

The piece explores large-scale formal architecture in electronic music — how to create a sense of narrative and development without traditional harmonic or melodic structures. It uses spectral analysis and resynthesis to transform source materials into dense, evolving sonic landscapes.

This work belongs on this album because it resonates with the musical spirit and continuing pursuit of my career — the idea that electronic music can be both intellectually rigorous and emotionally compelling.

6. Atlas (2022) — 2:09

The title refers to the mythological figure condemned to hold up the sky — a metaphor for the burden of attention in a world of infinite sonic possibilities. By limiting the piece to a single sound source, I attempt to obscure the sound’s origin while controlling the listener’s attention on a journey through the physical performance space.

7. Dark Paths (2021) — 4:36

As contrast to this surface activity, Isomer proposed a series of slowly evolving drones and percussive gestures that feel ominous and unsettling. My contribution was to shape the piece’s emotional arc — building tension, creating moments of release, and ultimately leaving the listener in a state of unresolved anxiety.

The title is literal — this is music for walking dark paths, both literal and metaphorical.

Working with Isomer

Isomer is not a tool that models human creativity. It’s a software system I developed over a decade to generate music with an emergent grammar that feels natural and emotionally resonant.

The Isomer Project aims to manifest computational creativity in automated music creation. It analyzes human-created music by reading scores and listening to recordings, then composes new music based on what it learns.

The challenge: Musical language is abstract — it doesn’t contain lexical morphemes (units of grammar that carry specific meaning). This freedom from restrictive definitions is one of music’s most compelling features, but it makes parsing its largely self-referential and often emergent grammar extremely challenging.

My approach: Isomer interprets raw audio input, identifies musical patterns, and applies learned principles of musical expectation and construction. It bridges the gap between raw features and musically meaningful analysis.

The collaboration: I don’t use Isomer to “generate” finished pieces. I use it as a creative partner — a system that proposes musical ideas based on what it has learned, which I then shape, refine, and integrate into larger compositional structures. The three Isomer tracks on this album represent this human–AI dialogue at its most refined.

The Academic Foundation

Two tracks on this album (Persona and Vyšehrad) come from my time at Eastman School of Music — Persona from my Master’s work, Vyšehrad from my doctoral dissertation.

Both pieces were created in software using SGI Indy computers with help from NeXT Cube systems. Tools included csound, RTcmix, Move-Space-Place, PVC, Cecilia, and other open-source software available in the 1990s and early 2000s.

These works represent the foundation of my compositional voice — the idea that electronic music can be both intellectually rigorous and emotionally compelling. They belong on this album because they resonate with the musical spirit and continuing pursuit of my career.

The through-line from Persona (1990s) to Dark Paths (2021) is clear: I’ve always been interested in how technology can expand compositional possibilities without replacing human creativity.

Answers to WHAT Question?

Answer is Waves (2020) was a series of short AI experiments — études that explored what Isomer could do. I was searching for answers in the data: Can a machine learn musical grammar? Can it generate emotionally resonant material? Can it surprise me?

The answer was yes. But the études remained études — interesting experiments, not finished compositions.

What Was the Question? (2023) takes the best of those experiments and asks something different: Can these AI-generated materials become the foundation for fully realized musical works?

The answer, again, is yes. But this required human intervention — shaping, refining, contextualizing. The machine proposes. The human disposes.

And this album is the result of that dialogue.

Track Listing

1. Zaïs: Overture (4:33)
2. 13th Hour (3:47) — with Isomer
3. Persona (7:07)
4. Little Spells (1:49) — with Isomer
5. Vyšehrad (10:36)
6. Atlas (2:09)
7. Dark Paths (4:36) — with Isomer

Historical Context

• Tracks 3 & 5 — Created at Eastman School of Music (1990s–2000s) using SGI Indy and NeXT Cube computers
• Tracks 1 & 6 — Composed for Music in the Constellation at National Sawdust (2022)
• Tracks 2, 4, 7 — Created with Isomer software (2019–2021)

Credits

• Composer: Greg Wilder
• AI Collaboration: Isomer software (tracks 2, 4, 7)
• Recorded: 2017–2022
• Released: January 20, 2023
• Available: Bandcamp and all fedi-friendly streaming platforms

See also