Researcher Turns Producer of Virtual Artist's Debut to Democratize Music Making

SINGAPORE, October 02, 2010

Signature Music, a Singapore-based technology start-up, appoints Simon Wun as Executive Producer to launch DJ Rubbit, the true virtual artist behind a coming Facebook music app. The partners set out to share fun in making music with people untrained in music skills using the latest casual music creation technologies.

Simon develops DJ Rubbit's live performing style, and supervises his backing and sound engineering crew. Also, Simon is responsible for the promotion of DJ Rubbit's music and its distribution through Facebook, iTunes, and other online music stores. "The idea of DJ Rubbit is fresh - he is Gorillaz powered by a musical robot, and he jams with you," says Simon, "and my job spec more or less reads 'to improvise'."

This venture is grounded in his belief that humans are all born musical. Wearing a kind of frizzy hair that reflects an unfulfilled teenage dream of becoming a rock star, Simon, 35, explains how education can bury our gifts for music: "My first music teacher would play a few songs on the piano. I could never tell 3/4 meter from 4/4, and was declared music illiterate. It's only much later that my desire for a sense of identity convinced my deluded self to pick up the electric guitar. It's a moment of revelation.

"Did I play like Jimi Hendrix? Not really, but I've learned to express myself in the language of music, and been building my vocabulary gradually. If children can develop speech naturally, why does music have to be a school subject? Increasingly, music technologies would empower the 'music illiterates'."

Simon is a world expert in wavetable synthesis of musical instrument sounds. He received his PhD degree in computer science in 2005, then joined the Institute for Infocomm Research, where he co-invented some music creation technologies that would form the basis for DJ Rubbit. The institute's commercial emphasis challenged his perspective on R and D. He got bothered about the fantasized impact on people's lives that his own research and some other academics' would make. "I doubted my stewardship of what I was given. The question was, am I serving humanity proactively? I realized publications wasn't my aspiration," says Simon in an opinionated tone typical of someone of his Hong Kong origin. He views collaboration with DJ Rubbit as an inevitable pursuit of real value for real people.

Unlike many technology spin-offs, Signature Music isn't backed by venture funds, but it takes out a seed loan from the local Media Development Authority. Simon knows the price of his choice. "Risk and comfort are overshadowed by purpose to me," he comments, "in our culture which arrests passion, people's commitment often comes after resources. But I believe that our whole crew's commitment is a prerequisite for relationships between DJ Rubbit and his fans."

DJ Rubbit features in Scratune Gift, where Facebook users create music greetings with him. The Facebook app is open to sign-up on DJ Rubbit's website at http://www.scratune.com, and due to be launched in late October 2010.

Signature Music develops casual music making software that empowers end-users untrained in music skills. Unlike other computer-aided music creation software, Signature Music's products require no musical background of the users, and provide simple and fun ways of creating personalized tunes which sound professional and unique. For more information, visit its website at http://www.signaturemusictech.com.