Hal got rhythm was written in 1999 as part of the Serenata for 2000 project, a sound fresco written by thirteen Belgian composers who were asked to illustrate a period or a significant event of the twentieth century with a work of more or less five minutes.

Michel Lysight wrote a piece devoted the the invention of the computer, hence the repetitive and mechanical inspiration of the music, but in which lyricism also finds a place. The title is based on a triple pun. It evokes the most famous computer in all of literature (Hal, the key character in Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick’s 2001 Space Odyssey), but also algorithmic calculations, and finally one of George Gershwin’s most famous pieces, I got rhythm.