Production and performance of Untitled for Cyborg String Quartet by artist Michaela Davies for V&A Digital Design Weekend.

Cyborg String Quartet description from Michaela Davies' website:

"Davies’ Compositions for Cyborg String Quartet explore sonic possibilities and human limits, at the interface of technology, live performance and composition. Davies harnesses the bodily convulsions produced by electrical impulses to control performers in a string quartet, who are literally shocked into playing their instruments. Two performers in the quartet are connected to a custom-built electric muscle stimulation (EMS) device, which sends electrical impulses to their muscles, generating specific involuntary movements. [1]

The involuntary elements of the work are controlled via a composed MIDI sequence, while the voluntary parts are written as a notated score. The Cyborg Quartet creates an absurd dialogue between the ‘robotic’ players and the professional musicians through the use of repetition, call and response and other techniques from the classical lexicon.

The use of EMS in this context extends the potential of the human body, enabling the performers to execute tasks beyond conscious capabilities. The performers’ bodies become a technological resource controlled by the musical score, to execute complex rhythmic structures, precision phasing, and other techniques they would otherwise be unable to perform of their own volition. The interface also enables the performers to play in rhythmic unison without any external cues or obvious tempo.

By placing non-musicians in a formalized performance setting with trained musicians, and controlling their limbs so that they execute complex rhythms and techniques which would otherwise be impossible, the work speaks to the ‘democratization’ of music with the advent of user-friendly technology, and the subversion of cultural traditions previously reserved for the elite or trained initiates.

Inserting these ‘robotic’ elements into an enduring emblem of Western classical tradition, this 18th-century-meets-cyborg string ensemble provides a stark example of the man/machine interfacing that is central to most contemporary music creation, production and performance, and points to a growing reliance upon machines to perform repetitive or difficult tasks previously relegated to humans.

In a broader context, the Cyborg String Quartet is a creative enquiry into the nature of agency within systems where cognition is distributed across people, objects and environment through technologies of connection. The work aims to inspire reflection upon assumptions about agency and free will both in and beyond the context of musical performance.

1 Electrical muscle stimulation (EMS) is the elicitation of muscle contraction using electrical impulses. The impulses are delivered through electrodes on the skin near to the muscles being stimulated. The impulses mimic the action potential that comes from the central nervous system, causing the muscles to contract."

https://michaeladavies.net/portfolio/cyborg-string-quartet/

https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/24557