COURSES, LECTURES, & SEMINARS

CalArts in 2023

Neuromusic—origins, progress, prospects

Beginning in approximately the late 1960s and continuing to the present day, a new kind of biocybernetics developed that spawned the emergence of biofeedback in the arts and direct, extended musical interfaces with the human nervous system. Historical and technical surveys and practical exercises are included.

Modeling Propositional Music

Propositional music is a point of view about composing that emerges from a unique philosophy, framework, and method for compositional practice that proceeds from proposing models informed by pandisciplinary interests, and then proceeding to make work consistent with those models. In this practice, composers might build proposed models of worlds, universes, evolution, brains, consciousness, or whole domains of thought and life, and then proceed to make dynamical musical embodiments of these models, inviting audiences to experience them in spontaneously emerging sonic forms.

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 2022

A series of invited lectures and workshops as part of a residency as G.A. Miller Visiting Professor at UIUC in October 2022. These included:

Neuromusic—propositions from an art-science convergence - MillerComm Keynote Lecture and Discussion for Center for Advanced Study and UIUC community

The first “interactive composing machine” from the University of Illinois: appraisal of multi-faceted compositional legacy of Salvatore Martirano – for Sousa Archives of American Music, (Scott Schwartz, Director), and School of Music and including participation of Ben Grosser, John Martirano, Greg Danner, and Ken Beck

Circuits and Fingers—composer-performer convergence in electronic instrument designs - for Experimental Music Studios Forum, School of Music

Playing with Algorithms—building individualized composer-performer software toolkits - for Introduction to Computer Music course, School of Information Science

Choose Your Universe—composing your improvisation practice - for Improvisers Exchange Workshop, School of Music

Mapping Numbers to Sound—From Scientific Exploration to Immersive Musical Experience - for UIUC community, including participation of Martin Gruebele and Carla Scaletti

Notation as Interface—configuration spaces, transformation tools, and multiple nows - for Composers Forum, School of Music

Music in Vitro—playing duets with living neuron cultures - for UIUC community, including participation of Mattia Gazzola and Kevin Hamilton

EXAMPLES OF COURSES DESIGNED AND TAUGHT FROM APPROXIMATELY 1968 TO 2023

Electric Circus for New York University

Intermedia Workshop on Computers in the Arts

Intermedia Institute Inc., New York

A Systems Theoretical Approach to Art Media

York University, Department of Music, Division of Interdisciplinary Studies in Fine Arts, Interdisciplinary University Graduate Studies

Sonic Imagery and Improvisation
Composition Studio I and II
Electronic Media Workshop I and II
Special Studies in Composition and Analysis
Sources of Contemporary Style
Instrumentation, Arranging and Studio Production
Introduction to the History and Literature of Electronic Music
Fundamentals of Musical Perception
Music Writing Workshop: An Introduction to Composition
Graduate Composition Seminar
Perceptual Processes in the Arts
Contemporary Media, Methods and Research I and II
A Systems Theoretical Approach to Art Media
Sound Design in Relation to Studies of Consciousness
Studies in Musical Perception (Graduate)
Interdisciplinary Honors Project and Seminar
Psychophysics and the Arts
Special Topics in Music Computation
Music Performance in Piano, Violin, Viola, Percussion,
Chamber Ensembles, Contemporary Music Ensembles, Orchestra,
Improvisation Ensembles, Live Electronic Music Ensembles,
Conducting, Interdisciplinary Performance Art Ensemble
Graduate Thesis Advisor (M.F.A., M.A., Ph.D.)

Mills College, Department of Music

Advanced Theory I and II
Research Seminar in Music Theory (Graduate)
Theoretical Foundations of Electro-acoustic Music
Score Reading and Conducting
Seminar in Electronic and Computer Music I and II (Graduate)
Selected Problems in Composition I and II (Graduate)
Individual Lesson Instruction in Piano and Composition
Selected Problems in 20th-Century Performance and Literature (Graduate)
Thesis Advisor (M.A., M.F.A.)
Seminar in Composition, Performance, and Improvisation

San Francisco Art Institute: Humanities and Interdisciplinary Divisions, Electronic Arts Program

Contemporary Music
Artificial Intelligence in the Arts
Interdisciplinary Colloquium/"Monday Night Lectures"

University of Illinois, School of Music

Graduate Composition Seminar (during visiting artist residencies)

California College of the Arts

Sound Workshop: Propositional Music

Simon Fraser University, Summer Music Intensive, Vancouver

Interactive Music Software and Composition

California Institute of the Arts

Graduate Composition Seminars (various special topics)
Graduate Composition Instruction
Faculty Contemporary Ensemble,
Conductor/Director, CalArts New Century Players,
(resident professional ensemble including graduate performers)
Advanced Interactive Music Software
Sound Design (digital signal processing and synthesis)
Advanced Interactive Languages (interactive software for music)
Seminars in Interdisciplinary Art
Piano Instruction
Improvisation Instruction
Chamber Music Coaching
Teaching the Teacher, modules on music cognition, music and neuroscience (DMA level)
Professional Development (DMA level)
History and Aesthetics of the Performer-Composer (DMA level)
Performer-Composer Seminar (DMA level)
Composers and Choreographers

Bard College, Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts, Annandale-On-Hudson, New York

Graduate Instruction, Music/Sound Arts

Center for Advanced Musical Studies at Chosen Vale

Summer sessions as composer-in-residence in International Trumpet and Percussion Courses; classes in performer-composer practices, technology and instruments, improvisation, ensemble direction

Ionian University, Korfu, Greece

Summer session on advanced propositional music, emergent forms and self-organizaing systems in music, algorithmic composition and algorithmic improvisation, perception of musical forms and ideas about time and interactive processes in the arts.