Music Visualisation: Platform Principles

The music aggregator platform in focus here has been conceived around a number of simple guidelines, which, taken together are aimed at simplifying and speeding it's development into a credible force for musical community. These cover areas such as technology, social value generation, empowerment, implementation cycles, finance and advertising.

To a certain degree, simplicity and platform are bound together (a technology stack is, for example, only as good as the supporting delivery workflows, which, for javascript and the browser have been greatly simplified in recent times).

Data Is Central

Regardless of Mediating Technology, Data Is Central

Any instrumental and theory tool modelling expertise to be won from open-source SVG modelling can also find re-application in virtual environments, driving social value into those entirely new areas.

Could this be the unreachable itch currently dampening enthusiasm for VR music applications? Perhaps designers have simply not (yet) seen the potential for transformable notation in graphical object overlays (skins) and ad-hoc VR drama. With artificial intelligence and endless other application possibilities to squabble over, it's daft to get hung up on data. Let's get it out there - and used.

Quality Assurance

Potential Crowdfunder? First Name Email Address

Is the functionality or behaviour part of the core platform, or is it going to be exclusive to 3rd party sites?

Clearly, the closer to the platform core (the trilogy of notation, instrument models and theory tools), the more imperative platform principles are enforced. What a 3rd party site does is, it could be argued, their responsibility.

Core functionality such as a new instrument model can be expected to meet stringent requirements, whereas a 3rd party site is likely to be free to improvise an own, custom solution.

A 3rd party site may, for example, wish to embed only a specific instrument model, go with it's own customised tools, perhaps embed tools specific to own culture and supporting specific learning goals. This they should be able to do, and free of interference.

Big, brave, open-source, non-profit, community-provisioned, cross-cultural and tazed crazy. → Like, share, back-link, pin, tweet and mail. Hashtags? For the crowdfunding: #VisualFutureOfMusic. For the future live platform: #WorldMusicInstrumentsAndTheory. Or simply register as a potential crowdfunder..

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Platform Principles

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Don't Reinvent The Dataviz Wheel Adapt Liberally Licenced Code	Aggregator Platform One Platform, Myriad Applications	Configuration Freedom Simple And Flexible
Directly Linked Theory Tools Genre & Music-Cultural Fluency	Community Provisioning Open Source=Social Value -Permanently-	Deep Insight and Understanding Score-Driven 2- and 3D Theory Tools

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Musical understanding implies deliberate score step-through, where changes to fingering and abstract music theory patterns are tracked and absorbed at a user's pace. In this way, every score or exercise assumes (in some cases multiple) new dimensions.

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Musical Properties Modelling Kit Defined Once, Usable Anywhere	Clarity And Simpliciy With Detail Delegated	Fire Musical Curiosity Widen Horizons
System - Instrument - Theory Tools Interworking Pure	Awareness Of Harmony In All Around Us	Basics Working First Then Simplify
Work Out From The Familiar And Easily Represented	Presentation Priorities A Clear Focus On Visual Models	Distilled Visual Patterns Driven *Directly* By Notation Examples

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Notation exercises can project subtle transformations by means of relevant theory tools: characteristic cultural/modal sequences, inversions, reflection, rotation, key and chord transformations, and the qualities associated with specific chord types and intervals.

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Support This Without Distractions, So.. →

Ads, No Curated Instrument-To-Builder Links, Yes

Augment/Improve Existing YES Replace Existing NO

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Beyond these are questions of workflow and architecture, for which we have, for example, the likes of the current JAMstack good practice:

Decouple Building And Hosting	Decouple Front And Backend
APIs Rather Than Databases	Pre-baked Markup Enhanced With Javascript/D3.js

... which in turn suggest the following:

1. Entire Project on a CDN	2. Everything Lives in Git	3. Modern Build Tools
4. Automated Builds	5. Atomic Deploys	6. Instant Cache Invalidation

Dynamic content in the form of user-preference-driven menus, notation, and instrument and theory building models, and the underlying code factories suggest at least in part an API approach, perhaps in conjunction with other recent concepts, such as serverless functions. Should these or other aspects of delivery pipeline strategy need radical change, this can be done using Git as the fulcrum around which the move is coordinated..

To finish off this post, there have been a number of recent ideas and advances in pursuit of 'idealized' continuous Delivery / Deployment / Integration workflows. This is something I expect to be able to write about in the context of this platform in the near future.

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Keywords

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online music learning, online music lessons	distance music learning, distance music lessons	remote music lessons, remote music learning
p2p music lessons, p2p music learning	music visualisation music visualization	musical instrument models interactive music instrument models
music theory tools musical theory	p2p music interworking p2p musical interworking	comparative musicology ethnomusicology
world music international music	folk music traditional music	P2P musical interworking, Peer-to-peer musical interworking
WebGL, Web3D, WebVR, WebAR	Virtual Reality, Augmented or Mixed Reality	Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning
Scalar Vector Graphics, SVG	3D Cascading Style Sheets, CSS3D	X3Dom, XML3D