Gérard Assayag is Research Director at the IRCAM STMS Lab. He is the founder (in 1992) and head of the Music Representation team which explores thoroughly Machine Musicianship, an ensemble of computational methods for modeling the structures and processes of sound and music from a broad spectrum of interdisciplinary points of views. Assayag has been head of the STMS Lab (operated by IRCAM/CNRS/Sorbonne Université/French Ministry of Culture) from 2011 to 2017 and, as such, involved in national and international research policy making. He had a population of 125 people (researchers, engineers, techs, admin and PhD students) in his jurisdiction and oversaw the formation of spinoff companies out of the lab (Antescofo, Hyvibe, Ircam Amplify) and the hosting of INRIA project-teams (MuSync). 

Assayag led his research team to international recognition through the production of a number of widely distributed flagship computer music software (OpenMusic, AnteScofo, Orchidea, Omax, Somax, Djazz, Dyci2, RAVE, with > 100.000 downloads, more than 1000 scientific publications, over 60 PhD and 120 Master student theses. The team’s sustainability is extremely strong and has been confirmed every 5 years at the national evaluation by the HCERES (High Council for Evaluation of Research), including the last one in 2024 stating that under Assayag’s leadership “the team's scientific output is of a very high standard. Software production is remarkable for its impact on composers and musicians. The team's visibility is exceptional, with two ERC grants obtained during the period. The team's attractiveness reflects its visibility, and is exceptional with the arrival of world-renowned personalities.” 

Assayag has produced seminal work on creative Interaction and machine improvisation and has been awarded an ERC (European Research Council) Advanced Grant for the project REACH: Raising Co- creativity in Cyber-Human Musicianship (2021-2025, 2.5M€), the first ERC ever received by an Ircam researcher. Assayag’s research interests are centered on machine musicianship and cyber-human systems, including advanced programming languages, machine learning, sound and music computing and real- time interaction. He has fostered theoretical publications and popular technologies such as OpenMusic, Omax and Somax the concept of “symbolic interaction” accounting for rich and versatile content-based musical dialog between machines and humans through several levels of information, from raw acoustic signal to higher symbolic and cognitive structures. This has led him to strongly assert his concept of cocreativity as an emergence in complex systems of interaction between human and/or artificial agents engaging their listening, learning and generativity skills into cross-feedback loops during live performance. With new AI technology such as Somax2 exploring the cocreative paradigm already used on major artistic venues with internationally renowned artists Assayag aims to shape the next generation of artistic human-machine interaction systems.