Live coding choreography: real-time programming with Terpsicode

ABSTRACT This article aims to explore live coding of choreography as real time scoring of the dance performance it is creating. It will define live coding as a performance practice, and way of creating choreographic scores, as well as consider some forms of esoteric programming languages (esolangs) as forms of multicoding and explanations of text. It will then explore the work Terpsicode, a live coding language created to make choreography in real-time resulting in duets for coder and dancer and discuss the ways in which Terpsicode is used in performance by creating visual scores from dance terminology. Terpsicode is a demonstration not only of live coding choreography but of multicoding, allowing for both text and visuals to notate the dance score in real-time while the dancers are interpreting the score into movement.