I build instruments and systems that are in some way
unpredictable.
The system is called the ndial or the anything dial,
and it's a sampling sequencer that randomly
selects from audio files.
I like building systems that force
you to listen in new ways.
Sometimes they're acoustic, sometimes they're electronic,
sometimes they'll fill an entire room,
but they always have this element of unpredictability
and push back against what you might
expect in traditional musical structures.
This course is MICE, or the Mobile Interactive Computing
Ensemble.
It was started by Matthew Burtner
to think of ways of bringing electronic music to larger
audiences.
I plan on double majoring in computer science and music.
The way this class works, it's kind of
like the melting of the two majors perfectly.
So it's really cool to see how I can use both things
and like, make my own little world.
We build our own instruments.
We build acoustic and contact mic instruments,
and we learn to process audio using
Maximus P. These speakers allow the ensemble to be
portable or mobile.
The primary goal in my courses is
to learn techniques of exploring the world that
are less determined.
More focused on process, and exploring
the world with our hands and our eyes and our ears.
A pre-built synthesizers are going to sound wonderful,
and we're building synthesizers that sound kind of rough,
you know.
[HIGH PITCH SOUND]
They're gritty and nasty and they don't always sound great,
but they do produce some wonderfully musical results.
For the most part he's like, just have free rein.
Go do whatever comes to mind.
These are simple circuits, but there's endless possibilities
in what to do with them.
That's exciting, and it kind of creates this type of immersion
that I'm not sure you get by clicking around and finding
presets on a software synthesizer.
You get a lot of knowledge out of your professor,
but also you get that one on one experience with him.
He knows everyone in the class, so he
knows what's happening in your life
and he knows what's happening with your instrument.
I'm hoping to prepare students by giving them
a more experimental and exploratory toolset
to help them learn new ways.