Invited TalkPhysics & Music: Practical Physics Solutions to Creative Problems in New Music.

As Technical Director of the Center for New Music & Audio Technologies (CNMAT) at UC Berkeley, a large portion of my job is devoted to finding technological solutions to creative problems in music and the media arts. Central of much of our hardware and software development is the contemplation of niche applications of technological apparatus and the solution of unique problems in the physical sciences. In this talk I will provide a brief overview of a few of my recent projects that enable new sounds and modes of expression. Topics will include best practices for resonating concert grand pianos with magnetic fields, with notes on the design of custom magnetic coils; making robotic percussion performance more reliable and repeatable with rapid prototyping; MoCap for the Masses: affordable 9-Degree of Freedom sensors for realtime motion and gesture capture; Sound Spatialization: Acoustic Holography in the Concert Hall and in the head; The Physics of Perception: what the humble harmonic oscillator can teach us about rhythmic perception; and finally, physics in music composition: how physics inspires my own creative work.