Two New Courses in Computer Music Performance @ Berklee: Alternate Controllers and the Techno/Rave Ensemble

At the Berklee College of Music in Boston, and with generous support from The Interval Research Corporation, I have added two new classes to the Music Synthesis curriculum – Research in Alternate Controllers for Performance and the Techno/Rave Ensemble. These performance-oriented courses balance my current advanced elective offerings in sound design and composition: Sound Design and Synthesis Theory with Csound; DSP-based Composition and Remixing with SoundHack, Hyperprism, Peak, Pluggo, and Csound; Interactive Multi-Media System Design with Max/MSP; ElectroAcoustic Composition & Aesthetics; and the Over the Edge concert series. In this studio report, an overview of the curriculum for the Alternate Controller class will be presented and several student projects will be showcased. Also, my “spin” on coordinating, managing and “writing” for the Berklee Techno/Rave Ensemble will be discussed and some video and audio footage from their Underground Ambient and Pure Voltage concerts will be featured.