Artist Statement

Observations of Hyperion, a small, irregularly-shaped moon of Saturn, have shown that it tumbles end-over-end in sometimes periodic, sometimes chaotic fashion, subtly influenced by gravitational forces. In principle, computer chaos can be used to model on any level, from musical structure to musical sound. In Hyperion’s Tumble for tape (1993), two computer programs based on chaos theory enabled me to generate voltage fluctuations for electroacoustic synthesis. Irregular motoric sounds resulted from the transcription of the output of these algorithms.

• David Clark Little. Born in the United States in 1952,  he received a B.Sc in chemistry and then studied harpsichord with Gustav Leonhardt and composition with Ton de Leeuw in the Netherlands. Recipient of many prizes, grants and commissions, he has worked since 1988 on compositional methods using computers based on “chaos science” and “fractals”.