The recent emergence of robot opera, in which robots and robotic entities have served polyvalent and at times ontologically ambiguous roles, has challenged the distinction made by Bauhaus artist László Moholy-Nagy between anthropocentric and mechanized eccentric theater, as is outlined in his 1924 essay “Theater, Circus, Variety.” When incorporated into the context of music theater, is the robot dimension intended to replace human activities and modes of expression; to augment, disembody or dislocate them; or rather to absorb them, such that the robot becomes an ersatz human presence in and of itself? If the latter, does the robot adequately emulate human attributes of musical expression, or does it establish its own artificial expressive mode and set of performance techniques? With Moholy-Nagy's criteria for a so-called Theater of Totality and these leading questions in the background, salient robot opera examples of the past several years will be discussed. Repertoire examples include Tod Machover's pioneering Death and the Powers (2010), the Komische Oper Berlin production My Square Lady (2015), Keiichiro Shibuya's Scary Beauty (2018), and works emerging from the University of Sussex Centre for Research in Opera and Music Theatre Robot Opera Mini Symposium, held in 2017.

An ongoing international arts-research-industry collaborative project focusing on the design and implementation of innovative car alarm systems, alarm/will/sound has a firm theoretical basis in theories of sound perception and classification of Pierre Schaeffer and the acousmatic tradition. In turn, the timbre perception, modelling and design components of this project have had a significant influence on a range of fixed media, electroacoustic and media installation works realised in parallel to the experimental research. An examination of the multiple points of contact and cross-influence between auditory warning research and artistic practice forms the backbone of this article, with an eye towards continued development in both the research and the artistic domains of the project.

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The present chapter examines the interaction between information needs and musical creativity in light of a case study concerning auditory warnings. As the object of study (auditory warnings or more specifically, audible alarms) is outside the scope of a sensu stricto musical field, the chapter offers a broader discussion of the role of information within the sound creation practice or sound design with the aim to explore the development of new car alarm sonic vocabularies and interactive systems, extending the conventional and rather limited current research domain of audible alarms. The chapter also presents the underlying collaborative model of a scientist and an artist who worked together to exchange know-how and knowledge in the context of an innovative project with research, artistic, and industrial implications.