Ch4o$
Opens in the violence of origin.
Soon▶
The EP
One work, three movements
Ainthropos is the first EP: a single work for string quartet and live electronics, written as one arc. On stage, a machine learning system performs alongside the four musicians as a fifth member — listening and responding in real time. Nothing is pre-programmed; every musical decision remains human.
An Exercise on Trust and Expectations
Holds the suspended moment of something forming.
Salar
The stillness of what remains.
Soon▶
Three movements, one arc.
Composed and produced by Mara Tieles Cutié, performed by StringLAB·More music follows
Released one movement at a time. First single: to be announced.
Position
Offline, open, human
The system runs entirely offline, on a single computer on stage. Cloud AI consumes vast amounts of power and water; Ainthropos refuses that cost. Built with open tools, the system belongs to the artists who train it — and it follows them, never the other way around.
Offline
Everything runs offline, on a single computer. No data goes online; no data centre, no cloud — none of the energy and water they consume.
Open
Open-source tools. The system belongs to the artists who train it, not to a platform.
Human
The players lead. The machine learns to follow; interpretation is never automated.
The ensemble
StringLAB
StringLAB is the quartet that brings Ainthropos to the stage.
Mariana Hutchinson violin CU / DE / NL
A contemporary-music specialist, she has performed extensively with new-music ensemble Oerknal, recorded with Curaçao musician Jean-Jacques Rojer, and collaborates with the Royal Conservatoire The Hague on music outreach programmes in Cuba. Her solo performances of new works by Cuban composers include Splendor Amsterdam.
Teddy Wiggins violin US / NL
An alumnus of the New World Symphony and former member of the New Jersey Symphony, now based in Amsterdam. He has performed at Carnegie Hall alongside the Kronos Quartet with his Annex Quartet, played under conductors including Michael Tilson Thomas and John Williams, and collaborated with artists ranging from Andrea Bocelli to Regina Spektor.
Mara Tieles Cutié viola · composition · electronics CU / ES / NL
Cuban violist, composer and electronic producer. She has performed and recorded with Snarky Puppy — on the Grammy-winning album We Like It Here — ROSALÍA, Stromae, José James, the Cinematic Orchestra, the Mondriaan Quartet and Hansjörg Schellenberger, and served as principal viola of the European Union Baroque Orchestra. Her studio experience includes Wisseloord, Power Sound, Galaxy Studios and BBC Studios. She holds a master's degree with research into machine learning and live performance, resulting in the Wekinator Etudes — works in which a machine-learning system responds in real time to the musician's gestures. That research is the foundation of Ainthropos.
Joel Siepmann cello DE / NL
Principal cellist of the Metropole Orkest since 2020 and a member of the cello quartet Metrocelli, which released its debut album in 2021. Trained at the Folkwang University of Arts and the Royal Academy of Music in London, he won prizes at the Trondheim International Chamber Music Competition with his Trio Opal and has performed in the major concert halls of London, Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, Seoul and Tokyo.
Live
The fifth performer
In performance, the system listens to the quartet through microphones and reads the sound as it happens — its weight, its density, its direction. It learns from the players in rehearsal: which responses belong to which musical situations. On stage it answers in sound, live, through the electronics.
Nothing is sequenced in advance. The fifth voice exists only in relation to the four in the room.
the quartet plays→ the system listens→ the system answers in sound→ the quartet hears, and replies → and the loop continues, live
Contact
Programming, commissioning, press
A press kit follows the first recorded material.