Welcome to Musical Composition with Opus+ !

Score Opus+ is free computer software which offers composers a new way of creating serious musical compositions. Opus+ is a java program that uses artificial intelligence techniques to create musical passages, and the content of the compositions produced can be controlled by the user setting constraints on the action of the software. There are three basic ways of using Opus+

  • The first is to generate complete compositions and use them exactly 'as is'. This use falls under the category of 'Found Music'.

  • The second is to generate music and then either edit the generated composition by hand, or incorporate parts of the generated composition into other musical contexts. This uses Opus+ to 'confound compositional habits' by creating novel musical material from which to work.

  • The third is as a object-oriented java library which gives open access to the underlying object model used by Opus+. This allows java programmers to augment the normal operation of Opus+ by writing their own source code to control exactly how Opus+ generates its output. This means that students and researchers can use Opus+ to quickly implement literally any conceivable musical generation algorithm.

The outputs of the Opus+ program are a PDF file containing the musical score and a MIDI file containing a synthesized performance thereof, so the composition can be checked audibly. Currently, the primary purpose of Opus+ is to produce musical scores which, it is assumed, are then performed by real musicians; the MIDI synthesis is only secondary at this stage, but in later versions, more resources will be expended on producing first class synthesized MIDI performances.

A fully functioning version of Opus+ is provided completely free of charge to individual users, and this license has no time-constraints. A full copy of the Opus+ application and the underlying library is yours for non-profit use for all time, and all we ask is that wherever it is used, the fact that it has been used is clearly stated on public media or announcements. See our license page for a full description of the license agreement and conditions of use.

Unfortunately Opus+ is still in the process of being implemented, so it is not possible to actually download the software just yet. As the Opus+ project proceeds, test sequences are produced which exhibit varying degrees of musicality. The best of these, as subjectively judged by a small panel of non-specialist listeners, are available in our download section, where there are PDF files of the musical scores and 192KBit MP3 recordings of synthesized performances.