The dates given in the Week column are for the Tuesday of the week.
Reading, History, and Listening Responses are due by the beginning of the Tuesday class.
Assignments and Exercises should be substantially finished by your tutorial time and are due Thursday at midnight.
| Week | Topic | Reading, Watching, Listening | Assignments |
|---|---|---|---|
| Week 1 (8/22) | Overview; scheduling | Jonty Harrison: Internal Combustion and Manuella Blackburn: Switched On | Fill out Questionnaire in Canvas |
| Week 2 (8/29) | Acoustics 1 (sound, speed of sound, waves, frequency); microphones, recording |
Reading: Acoustics 1 in Canvas
Reading: Studio Gear 1 in Canvas Natasha Barrett: “In the Rain,” from Three Fictions (2000) |
Start Assignment 1: Recording. |
| Week 3 (9/5) | Acoustics 2 (amplitude); Digital Audio Workstation concepts; creating phrases with audio in DAWs |
Reading: Acoustics 2 in Canvas
Reading: Studio Gear 2 in Canvas Panayiotis Kokoras: Construct Synthesis (2010) |
DUE: Assignment 1: Recording
Start Assignment 2: Editing. |
| Week 4 (9/12) | Acoustics 3 (partials, phase, timbre, spectral analysis); History 1 (musique concrète and precursors) |
Reading: Acoustics 3 in Canvas
Reading & Listening: History 1 in Canvas Watching: DAW Concepts in Canvas Watching: Basic Logic Pro in Canvas |
DUE: Assignment 2: Editing
Start Assignment 3: Short Piece. |
| Week 5 (9/19) | Acoustics 4 (resonance, formants, psychoacoustics, pitch and tuning, loudness, timbre); pitch-shifting and time-scaling audio; granulation |
Reading: Acoustics 4 in Canvas
Leah Reid: Sk(etch) (2018) |
Work on Assignment 3. |
| Week 6 (9/26) | Acoustics 5 (reflection, natural reverberation, standing waves, localization) |
Reading: Acoustics 5 in Canvas
Hildegard Westerkamp: Kits Beach Soundwalk (1989) |
Work on Assignment 3.
TEST 1: Acoustics, Microphones, History 1 DUE Monday, 10/2, midnight |
| Week 7 (10/3) | Effects (EQ, delay, reverb); busing in the mixer |
Katharine Norman:
Hard Cash (and small dreams of change) (1997)
Reading: Effects and Routing in Canvas |
DUE: Assignment 3: Short Piece |
| Week 8 (10/10) | MIDI hardware; MIDI protocol; MIDI in DAWs; virtual instruments |
Reading: MIDI in Canvas
Kui Dong: Flying Apples (1994) |
Start Assignment 4: MIDI Sequence. |
| Week 9 (10/17) |
Using MIDI cc’s: automation and real-time control;
digital audio theory
History 2 (elektronische Musik and synthesizer music) |
Reading & Listening: History 2 in Canvas
Watching: Digital Audio in Canvas |
Work on Assignment 4. |
| Week 10 (10/24) | Intro to synthesis (part 1): the voltage-controlled analog synthesis model, waveforms and spectra, envelopes |
Reading: Synthesis 1 in Canvas
Yvette Janine Jackson: Destination Freedom (2017) |
DUE: Assignment 4: MIDI Sequence
Start Exercise A: Basic Patch. Start Final Project. |
| Week 11 (10/31) | Intro to synthesis (part 2): sub-audio rate modulation, more complex patches |
Reading: Synthesis 2 in Canvas
Morton Subotnick: Silver Apples of the Moon (1967) |
DUE:
Exercise A: Basic Patch
Start Exercise B: Modulation. Work on Final Project. TEST 2: Digital Audio, MIDI, History 2 DUE Monday, 11/6, midnight |
| Week 12 (11/7) | Intro to synthesis (part 3): filters, sequencers |
Reading: Synthesis 3 in Canvas
Little Dragon: Butterflies (2017) |
DUE:
Exercise B: Modulation
Start Exercise C: Sequencers. Work on Final Project. |
| Week 13 (11/14) | spatialization and multichannel mixing; | April + VISTA: “Cooperators / Spite the Face,” “What is Enough” (2021) |
DUE:
Exercise C: Sequencers
Work on Final Project. |
| 11/21 | Thanksgiving Break | ||
| Week 14 (11/28) | Dynamics processing (limiter, compressor, gate, expander); side-chain compression; parallel (upward) compression |
Reading: Dynamics Processing in Canvas
Autechre: Nil (1994) |
Work on Final Project.
TEST 3: Synthesis DUE Monday, 12/4, midnight |
| Week 15 (12/5) | Moor Mother: Matter of Time, The Myth Hold Weight, and Black Flight (2017-19) | Complete draft of Final Project. | |
| Exam Week (12/12) | Project presentations: Tuesday, 12/12, 11:30-1:30 PM (tentative) | DUE Monday, 12/11, midnight: Final Project | |