The embodiment issue is still controversial within the computer music community, and reservations were put forward at the meeting. However this suggests to me that there is something important that can to be done here.

My arguments revolved around these points:

1. Desirability of visualising musical actions, both for the audience and for fellow musicians. We can infer from facial expressions, gestures etc. whether a musician is bored, deeply involved, going through the motions... and this would be desirable for a Live Algorithm (LA) too. A simple VDU visualisation could distinguish when the LA is reflecting (i,e, analysing material and preparing for playing) and when it is engaging (i.e. synthesizing). Even a simply animated face could reflect algorithm "emotional" states.

2. Question of belief that the LA is actually attending to what is being played and that its contributions are valid. Here a simple trick like a rotating microphone that spins to point to any musician which the LA is specificallly analysing. Also, the sound source should be localised, so that the computer, mic and loudspeakers all occupy a small and confined region of the stage.

3. A dynamic, rich and physical external environment has driven the evolution of species, and of intelligence, adaptation etc. in a way that is familiar to us all. The interface between an algorithm and a challenging physical environment could similarly push the LA forward. The physical environment would in this case be an actual instrument, either conventional, or better still, original, replete with servos, pistons, valves, bellows etc.?

4.? Embodiment seeks to exploit the parallel processing capability of nature. The simulation and the embodiment form an integrated system. For example, apart from the purposes of miniaturization, there is little point in modelling any actual instrument by a finite serial algorithm. Similarly, the patterns formed by speckled sunlight are irreproducible in any serial algorithm (of course quantum computing might change all this, if David Deutsch's arguments are correct), so even the patterning algorithm implicit in the LA (remember the PQf modular architecture) could have an embodied component - for example a camera pointing at the speckling.

Conscious Algorithms