University of Richmond Computer Science Professor Yucong Jiang Awarded Nearly $75K NEH Grant for AI-Assisted Music Research

UNIVERSITY OF RICHMOND ─ Yucong Jiang, an assistant professor of computer science at the University of Richmond, has received a nearly $75,000 National Endowment for the Humanities grant to support her research on AI-assisted music analysis. 

Jiang’s funding through the NEH’s Digital Humanities Advancement program will support the development of an automated music annotation software tool that will assist music scholars, archivists, and musicians in studying and better understanding recorded music performances.

Called Performance Precision Annotator, the tool will integrate advanced artificial intelligence technologies into a user-friendly format that requires no programming skills to use. PPA will offer a replacement for traditional music analysis and editing software, which typically requires time-consuming manual annotation and doesn’t incorporate musical score information.

“I’m excited to work with an advisory board of specialists in musicology, digital humanities, and related fields,” said Jiang. “I hope this project will provide benefits to both musicians and scholars.”

When complete, the prototype will be offered online as an open-source tool for public use. Jiang anticipates that PPA will help scholars and other users analyze music with greater efficiency and accuracy; examine larger sets of performances; and discover patterns between performance and theory. The tool will also allow musicians and instructors to review past rehearsals or performances more closely and make any needed adjustments.

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