a picture of the Flute Playing Machine
The Flute-playing Machine(1979-82)
Alto flute, range g to g', blower, electro-magnets, electronics.150cm high.


On the right is the blower encased in its soundproof black box. On top of it is a valve that admits the air into the mouth piece of the flute. The horizontal brass tube is an especially made alto flute with a range of g to g'. It is fitted with 12 electro-magnetic keys corresponding to the fingers of a human player. The diagonal slide on the right guides the music roll over a row of 15 photocells. Their signals are amplified by circuitry in the box below the flute and operate the keys and the air valve. The box below that contains the power supplies and the speed controller for the blower motor.
the first sketch
initial sketch of the machine

Bottom right: the blower with its two layers of sound insulation. Centre: the flute with the valves and above it a section through the mouth piece of the flute - the embouchure. Below left: the transparent music roll being scanned by a series of photocells. The final design followed this scheme quite closely although the air valve at the top of the blower and the photocells were arranged differently.

Flute Playing Machine at the Musee d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris Écoutez par les Yeux, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (1980)
A visitor drawing a new music roll. The machine will of course play anything you choose to feed into it and, as it happens, this particular music roll was a good one but in the meantime I usually work with professional composers. This was the first international exhibition, both for the machine and for me. It was organised by René Block as a follow-on for his Für Augen und Ohren (For Eyes and Ears) exhibition in Berlin. Jacques Chirac, at that time mayor of Paris, wanted to buy the machine and also Joe Jones's Music Store for the museum but this didn't work out - and probably just as well, because the machine has since taken part in innumerable concerts and exhibitions and this would have been difficult if it had been located in Paris, whereas I am usually in Berlin.

Flute Playing Machine: a score
How the machine interprets a music roll.

The lowest 12 tracks operate the keys of the flute, the next one up opens and closes the air supply and the two upper tracks are spare. In the score above one of these two spare tracks is used to put a stress on a note. When the machine is playing a duet these two spare tracks are used to send cues to the live player - two LEDs on the music stand. The example is taken from Afternoon Loop by Hartmut Westphal (1980).

Several composers have written for the machine: works include All Change by Schaun Tozer (1982) a twelve minute flute duet for the machine and a live player;The Reversibles by Tom Johnson (1983) where the music roll is turned over and played upside down and in the reverse direction and Zure Study by Suguru Goto (1995) which explores the transition from order to randomness and back again.
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