EPSRC Networks
The UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
(EPSRC) provides funding opportunities to create Networks,
such as DMRN. Networks are aimed at creating new interdisciplinary
research communities and topics, by developing interaction
between
the research community and appropriate science, technology
and industrial groups.
On this page we list below some EPSRC Networks
relevant to the Digital Music Research area, including
DMRN.
Contents of this page:
For more on EPSRC Networks, see: EPSRC:
Networks.
Digital Music Research Network [website]
Recent years have seen sharp growth in interest in the
use of information technology for music. A number of interdisciplinary
collaborative groupings have bin formed within UK universities
over the last couple of years to link together departments
of Music, Electronic Engineering and Computer Science.
We will establish a Network to enhance UK research in the
Musical Signal Processing community. This Network will
primarily be concerned with analysis, transmission, storage,
generation and her processing of musical signals. The Network
is expected to lead to increased collaborative activity
in the field. The activities of the Network will include:
workshops and meetings, visits to conferences and other
laboratories (particularly for younger researchers), and
electronic communication such as email and a web site.
An important Network activity will be the production of
a "Research Roadmap" to help future research
planning and inform funding bodice on the state of the
art and future opportunities. Dissemination of activities
and information relevant to the Network will be an important
aspect of its work, tiding to increased opportunities for
exploitation and collaboration with UK industry and international
researchers. The Network will consist of 6 partners in
the first instance. Other relevant groups and researchers
will be encouraged to join the Network during its operation.
NB: DMRN was originally called Music Processing Network
(MuProNet)
EPSRC Funding: Jan 2003 - Jan 2006 [grant
details]
Investigators (on funding application)
HearNet: Processing and Representation of Speech and
Complex Sounds
This Network proposal aims to facilitate productive interactions
between three groups of research workers, namely those
involved in speech recognition, auditory perception and
auditory physiology. Speech recognition, through commercially
viable for speech produced under known, controlled circumstances,
lacks robustness when additional sounds are present or
when recording conditions change. This lack or robustness
is mirrored in our lack of knowledge about how biological
auditory systems solve two central problems in hearing:
how to separate independent sound sources (the cocktail-party
problem), and how to deconvolve the contribution of different
transfer functions (eg a close versus a distant talker
in a reverberant room). Novel signal processing approaches
to these problems (eg Independent Components Analysis)
could provide new insight for he biological investigation
of how brains represent and process complex sounds. Conversely,
results of psychological and neurophysiological investigations
could inform engineering implementations. In addition,
similar statistical methods are being brought to bear on
the way that the auditory cortex represents complex sounds,
an area of research which presently lags significantly
behind similar work in vision. Insight into the types of
representation used by the auditory cortex may also provide
novel approaches to automatic recognition.
EPSRC Funding: Oct 1999 - Apr 2003
Investigators (on funding application)
Multimedia Knowledge Management Network [website]
The approach of the Network to improve communication within
the UK Multimedia Knowledge Management area is primarily
through meetings, workshops and visits communication via
e-mail lists and web presence generation of joint resources
on the web horizontal special interest groups Support will
be given to young researchers to increase contact across
the interdisciplinary field, by assisting funding of travel
to conferences, meetings, or visits to other labs. Special
interest groups addressing sub-themes, for example efficient
multi-dimensional indexing or mufti-media summarisation,
will be encouraged. Some groups working in the multimedia
knowledge management area may only have one researcher
working on such a particular sub-theme. By having "horizontal" interaction
between groups there is the potential of mutual benefit
to all. The special interest groups will be encouraged
to share resources, create resources and make them available
for the Network and are expected to identify collaborative
funding opportunities.
EPSRC Funding: Aug 2004 - Aug 2007 [grant
details]
Investigators (on funding application)
LiveAlgorithms for Music
The vision for this network is the development of an
artificial music collaborator. This machine partner would
take part in musical performance just as a human might;
adapting sensitively to change, making creative contributions,
and developing musical ideas suggested by others. Such
a system would be running what we call a "live algorithm".
This term reflects the idea that the target system would
be capable of live interaction under the rigorous demands
of a concert performance, and also would be system uninhibited
by rules and conventions - a kind of musical artificial
life. It is projected that this goal will be achieved by
looking for novel patterning algorithms from apparently
non-musical fields such as artificial life, evolutionary
computation, neural computation, and swarm intelligence,
and finding mappings from these patterns into musical structure.
This quest would result in a machine with an unusual musical
identity: in order to make this identity understandable
to people it will be necessary to link the patterning algorithm
to the outside world through a sensitive but human-understandable
interface. The live algorithm differs radically from existing
computer music paradigms in that it actively takes part
in the ongoing musical dialogue, rather than just reacting
to events.
EPSRC Funding: Jan 2005 - Dec 2006 [grant
details]
Investigators (on funding application)
Musical Acoustics Network [website]
A musical acoustics research netwrok is proposed. The
aim is to provide opportunities for meetings between
scientists working in musical acoustics and musical technology,
creative
performers and composers, and manufacturers of musical
instruments. The network will foster links between university
work and the music industry. It will allow academics
in the new universities, teaching vocationally-oriented
courses
in music technology, to exchange ideas with those working
on related problems and courses in more traditional disciplines.
it will allow performers on traditional acoustical instruments
to meet those from the rapidly-developing electronic
sector, and also the scientific community which lies behind
both
types of musical activity. It will promote collaborative
projects between the key disciplines of physical science,
electronic engineering and computer science, psycology,
music theory and ethnomusicology, education and therapeutics.
EPSRC Funding: Feb 2005 - Jan 2007 [grant
details]
Investigators (on funding application)
Netvotech- Network
on Technology and Healthy Human Voice in Performance [website]
The network includes practising creative vocal artists,
professional voice coaches, vocal health professionals
as well as scientists and engineers. This team provides
the range of disciplines and experience necessary to fulfil
the aims of this Research Network in the area of technology
and the healthy human voice in performance under the Culture
and Creativity Programme. Experts are drawn mainly from
the UK, but colleagues from the international voice research
community have agreed to contribute to the network, mainly
by electronic means. Many colleagues are drawn from the
British Voice Association (http://www.british-voice-association.comn,
an organisation to nurture an interdisciplinary approach
to understanding the human voice from medical, performance,
and scientific viewpoints The purpose of the network is
to consider how technology might be employed to enhance
professional vocal performances (spoken and singing), how
it might be used to enhance the audience experience during
live vocal presentations, and how technology might be used
during vocal training. By its nature, the network will
involve sharing of information between the scientific,
artistic and health communities involved, brainstorming
of these issues, and it will culminate in a live vocal
performance in which technology is used in a novel manner.
A website will be maintained throughout, and the vocal
performance will be video recorded.
EPSRC Funding: Feb 2005 - Jan 2007 [grant
details]
Investigators (on funding application)
SpACE-Net - The Spatial Audio Creative Engineering Network
[website]
Spatial audio research is concerned with the presentation
of music and audio material to an audience in a manner
that is optimized according to the spatial properties of
the human hearing system. Ultimately this work seeks to
rise to the challenge of synthesizing a complex three-dimensional
acoustic world that is indistinguishable from what we normally
hear around us. Work in this area has reached a point where
multichannel delivery systems are finally becoming accepted
in the domestic environment, predominantly through applications
in the entertainment industry such as DVD, home-theatre
systems and multimedia computing technology. These recent
developments therefore precipitate the need to identify
future directions for research in this increasingly demanding
area. UK spatial audio research is currently small although
there are a number of unique areas that ensure visibility
in the wider international community. The proposed network
aims to build on this current work to create a community
of researchers, practitioners and artists, drawn from the
fields of science, audio engineering and the arts. It is
anticipated that through this network and the interface
between theoretical, experimental and creative approaches,
the effective coordination of these researchers and practitioners
will lead to the identification, articulation and development
of important directions in future spatial audio work.
EPSRC Funding: Jan 2006 - Jan 2008 [grant
details]
Investigators (on funding application)
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