This year for Music In Our Schools month, we wanted to make learning about music a bit more accessible to everyone by using technology that’s open to everyone: the web. By combining the power of Chrome and the Web Audio API, an open web standard that lets you create and manipulate sound right in the browser, we were able to create a set of experiments that inspire exploring music and sounds instantly, whether you’re on a tablet, phone, or laptop. Users can play with sound, rhythm, melody, and more without having to download an app. We wanted to highlight the power of the mobile web and inspire people – whether it gave them a new perspective on music, sparked curiosities about math and science, or even new ways to teach or code. We also provided open-source code so that others can build new experiments based on what we’ve started.

We collaborated with musicians and coders to build simple easy to use tools that worked seamlessly across devices. We wanted a range of types of experiments that would allow anyone of any age discover music and by putting together a diverse team and remembering simplicity beats complexity, we were able to achieve that. The main technologies used are open libraries such as Tone.js and The Web Audio API which are available to the public.

Chrome music lab went live in parallel with a Google doodle celebrating the 105th birthday of the first women theremin player Clara Rockmore. The Music Lab experiments were translated into 40 different languages.

Google believes in creating open and accessible tools and allowing for anytime anywhere access to information. The experiments were accessible via the web and extended beyond Chrome for any browsers that supported the technology used in the build. Google also believes in better education available to all and we were thrilled to see teachers across the world pick this up and use it in their classrooms.

We had 1.34 billion users in the first 24 hours and an average time spent on the site of over 4 minutes. There were roughly 40,000 clicks to download chrome and we saw a hugely positive outpouring for Google and #ChromeMusicLab across social media channels and have been contacted by several schools and musical professionals for collaboration opportunities to extend the idea past its launch.