Digital Innovation Grant

I am proud to announce that I have received a Digital Innovation Grant from the Digital Innovation Lab at the MacPháidín Library. The project will be centered on learning sound synthesis in Pure Data using Critter & Guitari’s Organelle. An additional component of the project will be in using video synthesis using the EYESY (also made by Critter & Guitari). The EYESY generates video in real-time that reacts to MIDI data, and / or audio. Programs for the EYESY can be written in Python or openFrameworks/LUA.

The format of this project will be a series of monthly experiments that will include both the Organelle and EYESY. Some of these will use the Organelle as an audio processor (similar to a guitar effects pedal), while others will use it as a synthesizer / sampler using a variety of approaches to sound synthesis / sampling. Many of these experiments will make use of computer-assisted composition algorithms created in Pure Data, building off of research I’ve been doing already over the past year. Each experiment will also be a brief musical composition inspired by the Experimental Music as defined by Lejaren Hiller in his seminal book Experimental Music: Composition with an Electronic Computer.

The outcome of these experiments will be monthly informal reports made through this blog, as well as a series of YouTube videos of the works themselves, which will be embedded into the blog entries. A year from now, once I’ve created 12 such musical experiments, I will give a lecture recital that presents these experiments. One final outcome will be to consider adding Pure Data oriented assignments to VPM 248: Sound Synthesis. I look forward to working on this project, and will commence working on it once the materials come in.