Robot Music

Opening this week in Gowanus (3rd Ave between 9th & 10th), Brooklyn, is the headquarters of a very unique New York City musical group. LEMUR (League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots) is the brain child of the multi-talented Eric Singer and will now have permanent performance, gallery and teaching space at what is being called 'LEMURplex'. This group is in it's 6th year of existence and they are starting to spread some serious roots in this hip little corner of Brooklyn.

The music is difficult to describe. The short story is that this group of musicians/engineers/artists build robots that will play music that has been composed and programmed into a computer. The most basic way to look at each of these robots is to view each of them as technologically updated, customized and visually interesting player pianos. Each robot has a one-of-a-kind look and sound and can be used to make some amazing and haunting music. I particularly like this one piece called "Emergency Bot TV Theme" by Joshua Fried.

LEMURplex is currently offering a range of courses, many revolving around the Max/MSP/Jitter programming environments. This unique musical community is an exciting addition to an neighborhood that has been steadily filling up with artists of all types for the last several years.