A three-armed robot capable of mimicking a human orchestra conductor has been developed by a team of scientists at Dresden's Technical University.

Making its debut in the German city of Dresden, conducting musicians from the Dresdner Sinfoniker orchestra, the robot directed music composed to complement its skills, the team explained.

Source: Dresdner Sinfoniker

To accomplish this feat, the conducting robot was trained to recognize beat time and indicate dynamics while its different arms move independently of each other.

While conducting a piece called "Semiconductor's Masterpiece," which is a work by composer and pianist Andreas Gundlach that was commissioned by the Dresdner Sinfoniker, the robot used its three arms to guide three sections of the orchestra separately — and in a manner that would be impossible with just one human conductor.

The conductor robot was developed and trained over two years with the scientists teaching the robot the movements necessary for conducting. Specifically, the team concentrated on teaching the machine "aesthetic arm movements which can be picked up well by the orchestra."

Further, two of the robot's arms also conducted the musicians through the premiere of "#kreuzknoten" by Wieland Reissmann, which is another piece that involved instruments played simultaneously at different tempos.