Keynote + Cage + Network Music in Colombia

On October 25, 2012 I delivered the opening keynote address at the Diseño+ conference in Cali, Colombia. The conference was the 5th International Meeting of Research in Design, a South American gathering of researchers in diverse areas of design, with a particular emphasis on music technology. My keynote explored the co-evolution of experimental music practice and electronic musical instruments, highlighting his recent research into the development of skill and style with digital musical instruments.

As a part of the Videosónica festival held in conjunction with the Diseño+ conference, I performed in a telematic concert of electroacoustic music on October 26, 2012. The concert featured performers in Cali and at Stanford University in California, joined by Stephen Rush’s Digital Music Ensemble in Ann Arbor. Although separated geographically, the performers were able to play together, supported by experimental technologies to deliver high-quality digital audio at low latency over dedicated research networks. This 3-way telematic concert was a first for Colombia as well as the University of Michigan.

The following night, I closed the festival performing a new realization of John Cage’s Rozart Mix in honor of the composer’s centennial. My gracious host Daniel Gomez took me on an adventure to find junk boomboxes and old cassette tapes to use as material for the performance.