I’ve been working with Harmony for about two years now – here’s the run-down for those of you not in the music software/social community space.

Hyperscore is music-authoring software originally created in the MIT Media Lab. You create music by drawing lines and adding in a Bach-style harmonization. Hyperscore won a 50k grant from MIT for new businesses, and Harmony Line was established to leverage the software into a business.

A bit of venture capital and key hires later (including myself), Harmony Line’s first project was H-Lounge.com – a website launched off of this Hyperscore, creating a music community for Hyperscore users to show off their music, rate, chat, hold contests and collect and upgrade rockstar-styled avatars.

You could also send your Hypscore music as ringtones to phones for $2, and keep 50% of the fee, and a little bit later mp3 support was added, so that any music artist using any software could upload music (essentially putting H-Lounge into competitive ‘sell your music’ space – PureVolume, IndieTunes, CDBaby).

This was a big shift in my opinion. The original users of the site had only been using Hyperscore and midi-format music and established their own rules and community (and worked hard to upgrade their avatars and gain points). Allowing anyone to upload mp3s created in Fruity Loops or Garage Band expanded the potential user base to anyone- not just Hyperscore users, but ended up pushing aside the original community.

Another side project I worked on was hyperscore.com – which spun off a educational-themed Hyperscore as a tool for teachers. It ended up with a different visual style along with another social community, tools and lesson plans for teachers, and evolution-styled avatars.