A microworld approach to the formalization of musical knowledge

This paper is about the importance of applying computational modeling and artificial intelligence techniques to music cognition and computer music research. The construction of microworlds as a methodology plays a key role in the different stages of this research. Several uses of microworlds are described. Microworlds have been criticized in the domains of artificial intelligence and the cognitive sciences, but this critique has to be seen in its proper context (i.e. in modeling of human intelligence, not as a methodology). It is shown that the microworld approach is still an important methodology in music cognition and computer music research, and a promising strategy in the design of a general representation formalism of musical knowledge.Henkjan Honing is research fellow at the University of Amsterdam, where he is doing research on the formalization of musical knowledge concentrating on time and temporal structure. With Peter Desain he wrote the bookMusic, Mind and Machine: Studies in Computer Music, Music Cognition and Artificial Intelligence.