ɬ�﷬

Overview

In the 'Acoustics of musical performance rooms' workgroup, research revolved mainly around the ',' which created large-scale multitrack recordings of ensembles and orchestras using excerpts from the orchestral repertoire. At these recording sessions, each excerpt was broken down in different ways—i.e., separating melody and harmony, textures isolated from the whole, or entire passages re-orchestrated—and each element was recorded using many specific arrays of microphones. Also, extensive room acoustic measurements were taken of each hall, as an "acoustic camera" recorded a visual representation of the sound intensity distribution in the hall in specific frequency bands. The entire session was then mixed by Tonmeisters. While recordings made by the ODESSA Project can be used to highlight the various timbral and orchestrational perspectives of composers, conductors, and Tonmeisters, the room measurements documented the acoustic qualities of the concert hall and included acoustic parameters and spatial sound distribution.

Subgroups

• ODESSA
• CORE
• Online-Guide to Room Acoustics for Musicians

Active or Envisioned Projects

• ODESSA III Detmold
• ODESSA IV: New orchestra recordings – measurements – systematic analysis
• Online-Guide to Room Acoustics for Musicians
• CORE Round 2

Overview

The focus of the workgroup was to discuss the amazing wealth of current research in artificial intelligence and machine learning, and how these could be efficiently leveraged in the context of musical orchestration. The major framework that was discussed revolved around generative models, as recent work at IRCAM had produced deep variational learning with multivariate, multimodal, and multi-scale approaches, in order to bridge symbolic, signal, and perceptual information on creative processes into a joint information space. These models should be developed through the analysis of musical orchestration, which lies at the intersection between the symbol (score), signal (recording), and perceptual representations. Furthermore, as current research focuses on the generation of a single content, studying the interactions between different generated elements along with their different time scales represents the next paramount challenge in generative models. Hence, the workgroup was dedicated to opening up new paths and designing new tools for AI applied to orchestration, while trying to clarify how this can be instantiated and successfully implemented through pragmatic collaborative projects in the near future.

Subgroups

The different subgroups were:

• Interaction and control issues
• Co-creativity and emergence
• Generative probabilistic models
• Multi-instrumental generation
• Idealized tools brainstorming
• Research relationships inside ACTOR

Active or Envisioned Projects

• Generative probabilistic models for orchestration
  • We aim to develop generative models that would be able to perform various orchestration tasks on both the symbolic and the signal level, such as turning a piano score into an orchestral one based on inferred rules.
• Audio synthesis based on machine learning
  • High-quality audio synthesis of orchestral instruments aims to allow one to produce audio recordings of human-level performances directly from symbolic scores
• FlowSynthesizer - Audio synthesizer control
  • We aim to simplify the control for audio synthesizers, which can lead to whole new areas of creativity. This can be especially important in the case of electroacoustic music.
• Multi-instrumental generation
  • Most of the generative models are used for single instruments. We aim to target the co-generation of instruments, and the generation of instruments conditioned on others.
• Lightweight deep learning for embedded platforms
  • In order to enhance the usability of deep audio models, we aim to reduce their computational footprints in order to embed them and lead to innovative musical instruments.

Overview

• Identify the broad mosaic of humanistic, human-science, and arts disciplines and sub-disciplines whose working methods and theoretical traditions may be germane to the study of orchestration
• Articulate novel methodological approaches, demonstrating how they might come to bear on the study of orchestration
• Compare and contrast epistemological commitments across academic fields to better understand the purview of different domains of inquiry and their particular potential and vantage points vis à vis orchestration and the orchestral experience
• Facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration via outreach, especially to those domains, disciplines, and sub-disciplines underrepresented in, or not yet actively engaged with, Orchestration Studies
• Develop and promote novel theoretical frameworks and methodologies for the artistic, humanistic, or interdisciplinary study of orchestration
• Develop projects and resources, publish papers, and deliver conference presentations that address the many methodological, epistemological, ontological, cultural, sociological, and practical issues and problems that come to bear on the disciplinary or interdisciplinary study of orchestration. Emphasis is placed on outreach to adjacent arts and humanities fields
• Act as a central hub for those researchers interested in collaborating with other disciplines, and/or contributing work to the above-mentioned goals

Overview

Six graduate-level (CORE) groups were formed in Canadian, Swiss, and U.S. universities (HEM Geneva, ɬ�﷬, UBC, UCSD, UMontreal, UToronto) to promote and document collaborative orchestration problem-solving between performers and composers. In the first round in 2018-20, 22 short pieces or études for a quartet of violin, bass clarinet, trombone and vibraphone plus small percussion were composed. This unconventional instrumentation was selected in order to pose unusual challenges in achieving blended sounds and smooth transitions between instruments, thus bringing collective orchestration decision-making between performers and composers to the fore. Using the same instrumentation at all institutions and identical recording protocols developed by Martha de Francisco of ɬ�﷬ in collaboration with UCSD colleagues allowed for direct comparison of evidence from each institution’s activities, forming a basis for more elaborate analysis and experimentation (as well as sharing pieces between institutions). Concerts and readings were held at UBC and UToronto and recordings were made at UBC and UCSD. Although the pandemic halted final concerts and exchanges of pieces across four of the universities, which resumed in 2021, the project nonetheless has already given rise to a plethora of material for analysis. One primary aim of the current project is to analyze these materials from the perspectives mentioned above to better understand the conception and realization of orchestration in young musicians in a research-creation setting. An associated aim also explored was the utility of developing a shared vocabulary of well-defined terms to facilitate the explanation and discussion of composer and performer intentions. Throughout the CORE project, the creative processes of exploration, orchestrational problem-solving, and the realization of new music were recorded, documented, and archived for consideration. Sketches and scores, recordings of workshop sessions, rehearsals with transcriptions of performer-conductor-composer dialogues, and concert or studio recordings were being examined alongside transcriptions of video interviews with performers and composers and texts written by them. We had three analytical aims in mind: 1) to combine score and aural analysis of recordings according to taxonomies of perceptual effects and orchestration techniques, and formal analysis, 2) to examine the evolution of orchestrational and compositional thinking in young composers through sketch studies, interview analyses, and the terminologies for orchestration techniques, perceptual processes and timbre perception that arise in discussing orchestration, as well as the identity and structure of the materials orchestrated, and 3) to analyze verbal interactions between performers, composers and conductors in a problem-solving situation. For example, how do different types of orchestration affect the experience of interpretation and performance? Is the sense of “musicality” affected, restrained or renewed by a given approach to orchestration? Text and discourse analysis of interview transcriptions and written texts were also conducted using computer-based tools such as Nvivo.

Subgroups

• Haute école de musique de Genève CORE (Gilbert Nouno, Luis Naón)
• ɬ�﷬ CORE (Stephen McAdams, Guillaume Bourgogne)
• UBC CORE (Keith Hamel, Bob Pritchard)
• UCSD CORE (Roger Reynolds, Rand Steiger)
• UMontréal EROC (Caroline Traube, Pierre Michaud, Jean-Michaël Lavoie)
• UToronto CORE (Eliot Britton)

Active or Envisioned Projects

1. Archiving of all available materials from the six partner institutions on the ACTOR Data Repository for subsequent analyses
2. Seminar at UCSD following-up on Round 1 by examining the process, aims, and outcomes used. (A detailed Report was generated.)
3. In collaboration with Timbre and Orchestration Analysis group: score and aural analyses of a selection of pieces/études produced in Round 1
4. In collaboration with the Timbre Semantics group: analyses of transcriptions of interviews with participating performers and composers.
5. CORE/EROC Round 2 with an expanded ensemble for 2021-2022 academic year.
6. CORE/EROC Round 3 with an expanded ensemble and electronics for 2022-2023 academic year.
7. CORE/EROC Round 4 (at UMontréal) with variable and diverse instrumentation for 2024-2025 academic year.

Overview

Formerly known as 'Generative orchestration (Orchidea)', this group aimed at researching and designing new methods for computer-assisted orchestration, within the context provided by the Orchidea project (). The interdisciplinary research addressed in the group involved mathematical optimisation, machine learning, mathematical models for music and deep learning. The group also investigated the history of computer-assisted target-based orchestration.

Subgroups

• Research and developments (Carmine Cella)
• Max/MSP version of Orchidea (Danielle Ghisi)
• Standalone Orchidea software (Alessandro Petrolati)
• Pedagogical tools (Victor Cordero, Kit Soden)
• Video tutorials (Louis Goldford)

Active or Envisioned Projects

1. Orchidea software
   • web-based versions of the Max/MSP tutorials
   • video tutorials
2. Developing new neural-based approaches for computer-assisted orchestration
3. Researching new mathematical models of music information using functional analysis, representation theory and dynamical systems.

Overview

The ACTOR Diversity Working Group sought to explore the role of timbre and orchestration in repertoires beyond the Western symphonic tradition and to encourage diversity and inclusion in the demographics of the ACTOR project as a whole. Based on interests of the workgroup researchers, we've formed three subgroups to develop new research collaborations. The East Asian Music Subgroup focused primarily on music for Chinese orchestra, especially orchestrational strategies. We also explored new works that integrate Western and East Asian instruments and new compositions by East Asian composers. The Music and Gender Subgroup explored new projects on the music of women, trans, and non-binary composers, both historical and contemporary. The goal was to supplement the nearly all-white, all-male repertoire of the standard orchestral canon with increased gender diversity and also to encourage publications on gender-diverse artists and by underrepresented scholars. Research areas proposed by the Popular Music Subgroup included developing tools for the analysis of timbre in popular music and to encourage greater attention to BIPOC musicians and gender diversity in popular music studies.

Subgroups

• East Asian Music Subgroup: Lena Heng, Wang Mengqi, Linglan Zhu
• Music and Gender Subgroup: Juanita Marchand
• Popular Music Subgroup: Nicole Biamonte, Matthew Zeller
  • TIPS: Timbre in popular song project
• Sub-Saharan Africa/Diaspora Subgroup: Jason Winikoff, Joshua Rosner, J Marchand Knight
• Middle Eastern/Central Asian Subgroup: H. Khayam, R. Morteza, and S. Tavakol

Active or Envisioned Projects

• East Asian Music Subgroup: Research on orchestration in music for Chinese orchestra, ensembles combining Western and East Asian instruments, and contemporary works by East Asian composers
  • Timbre and Orchestration Resource modules for each group of instruments: | |
• Music and Gender Subgroup: Research on music by women, trans, and non-binary composers and musicians
• Popular Music Subgroup: Development of a more diverse and representative corpus for popular music studies, analysis of timbre in popular music
• Sub-Saharan Africa/Diaspora Subgroup: Study of timbre and orchestration in African and African-diasporic musics, including organology, traditional repertoire, intercultural musics such as jazz and contemporary popular genres in Africa and worldwide
  • Speaker Series: Afrological Perspectives on Timbre and Orchestration
• Middle Eastern/Central Asian Subgroup: Research on timbre in music of the Middle East and Central Asia, including theories of pitch organization and mode, orchestrational strategies, solo and ensemble genres, and contemporary musical creations

Overview

Timbre and orchestration practice are so complex and involving a plethora of dimensions and potential focuses that to approach their analysis in music requires the development of taxonomies that capture specific categories that are operative in orchestration practice from a given perspective. 

The initial approach, deriving from the psychology of perception, was to codify the role of auditory grouping principles (concurrent, sequential, segmental) that affect the structuring of sound into events, streams or layers of events, and delineated groups of events, with a particular focus on the role played by timbre through orchestration. A second approach was to categorize the different techniques used by orchestrators and taught in orchestration classes. A subsequent phase was to compare the results of the two taxonomies on analyses of the same pieces to determine overlaps and divergences that could be used to refine orchestration pedagogy. 

Another approach, phenomenological this time, was to develop Lasse Thoresen's method of into an analysis taxonomy. This method approaches the analysis of music-as-heard, with techniques of characterizing the perceptual properties that emerge from sounds and their combinations over time. The resulting taxonomies have begun to be implemented in a computer-based score analysis platform () and the analysis results were integrated into the (OrchARD) to provide a place for further research on orchestration practice. OrchARD was reprogrammed to include the updated grouping effects taxonomy implemented in OrchView into a new data model that allowed for direct import of data from OrchView. OrchARD allows a user to build queries to explore the database and pose specific questions in terms of the implemented taxonomy.

Subgroups

• Perceptual effects taxonomy (Stephen McAdams, Kit Soden).
• Orchestration techniques taxonomy (Denys Bouliane, Félix Baril, Dominique Lafortune)
• Aural Sonology taxonomy (Lasse Thoresen, Dominique Lafortune, Philippe Macnab-Séguin, Gabriel Dufour-Laperrière)
• Comparative analyses confronting perceptual effects and orchestration techniques (Stephen McAdams)
• Functional Orchestration related to musical aims of composers ( Fabien Lévy)
• Metatimbre and grouping related timbres (Victor Cordero, Kit Soden)
• Timbre and Form in piano music (Nathalie Hérold)
• Orchestration and Timbre-based structures and forms (Stephen McAdams, Matthew Zeller, Kit Soden)
• OrchView, analysis and annotation software (Félix Baril).

Active or Envisioned Projects

• Publishing of “” by Stephen McAdams, Meghan Goodchild, and Kit Soden (2022) on Music Theory Online
• Workshop: Applying all the taxonomies to the analysis of one composition (May 2021)
• Publishing the perceptual grouping effects taxonomy
  • Beta-testing the implementation of the grouping effects taxonomy in OrchView
• Refining the orchestration techniques taxonomy
  • Implementation of the techniques taxonomy in OrchView
  • Beta-testing the implementation of the techniques taxonomy in OrchView
  • Publishing the orchestration techniques taxonomy
• Comparison of the grouping effects and techniques analyses.
• In collaboration with Timbre and Orchestration Analysis group: applying the effects and techniques taxonomies to a selection of pieces/études produced in Round 1 of the CORE project.
• Integrating these taxonomies into orchestration courses.
• Publishing the Functional Orchestration taxonomy
• Publishing the Metatimbre-based research
• Studying emergent perceptual and affective qualities of instrumental combinations or sound-processing techniques and their cultural associations
• Investigating instrumental playing techniques, particularly extended techniques used in the contemporary music repertoire
• Optical Music recognition score entry
• Aural sonology taxonomy module

Overview

As the ACTOR project entered the final year of its 7-year partnership grant, we believe that our workgroup played an important role in synthesizing and implementing the project's cumulative findings and innovations. By drawing on ACTOR's groundbreaking research and pedagogy across partner institutions, we aimed to create flexible and accessible tools that deepened students' understanding and practical application of orchestration across various musical fields and contexts.

Our mission was to provide educators with adaptable, targeted resources that maximized the accessibility and impact of ACTOR's research. These materials were designed for easy integration into existing orchestration courses or combined to create standalone units on orchestration-related topics. By employing a modular design, we hoped that educators could easily incorporate new insights and methods into their courses.

Building on successful models like the Teaching Timbre Topics modules, which organize teaching materials drawn from timbre-themed courses at various institutions, our workgroup extended this approach to orchestration more broadly. 

Through this work, we hoped to lay the foundation for a new era in orchestration education, one that reflects the richness and relevance of the field as illuminated by ACTOR's initiatives. We invited educators, researchers, and music professionals to collaborate with us in this essential endeavour to advance teaching and learning about the art of orchestration.

To learn more or get involved, please contact christopher[dot]soden[at]umontreal[dot]ca

Envisioned Projects

As the main goal was to create output, the plan revolves around Modular Resource Development:

1. Identifying Key Themes and Current Practices
   • Survey ACTOR's research outputs and existing orchestration curricula
   • Survey how other institutions teach orchestration
2. Creating Adaptable Modules and Submodules
   • Develop self-contained units on core orchestration concepts, techniques, and applications, drawing on ACTOR's findings
   • Design materials to be scalable for different educational levels and customizable for various course formats and durations
3. Piloting and Refining Resources
   • Partner with educators at ACTOR institutions to test modules in real classroom settings
   • Gather feedback from students and faculty to optimize content, organization, and usability
4. Dissemination and Support
   • Make modules widely available through online platforms and partnerships with music education organizations
   • Offer workshops and guides to help educators effectively incorporate modules into their teaching

Overview

The Timbre and Orchestration Analysis Working Group focused on the development and application of music analysis tools that consider timbre and orchestration, including tools developed within ACTOR by the Orchestration Taxonomies Group and new methodologies that relate timbre and orchestration to other analytical categories including pitch, rhythm, and form. As music analysts, we sought to explore the role of timbre in a variety of musical contexts from the Baroque Era to the present day. By creating and sharing analyses that address timbre through conference and journal pubilciation, the group sought to encourage a wider engagement with timbre and orchestration within the fields of music theory and musicology.

Subgroups

• CORE Analysis Subgroup: Robert Hasegawa, Stephen McAdams

Active or Envisioned Projects

• CORE (Composer-Performer Orchestration Research Ensembles) Analysis Subgroup: Research on scores, recordings, and other data collected from the CORE project, including perspectives from music perception, analysis of instrumental blend, timbre semantics, and study of orchestrational problem solving.
• Individual and collaborative projects on music by composers including Rebecca Saunders, Georgia Spiropoulos, Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern, and others.
• Oxford Handbook of Orchestration Studies
• Les espaces acoustiques
• SMT Timbre and Orchestration interest group
• TOR publications
• CNSMDP project

Overview

This innovative, pedagogical, web-based resource is a tool for timbre and orchestration education, bringing together the knowledge and expertise of the Analysis, Creation, and Teaching (ACTOR) Project. The Timbre and Orchestration Resource (TOR) offers collaborative resources on a vast range of orchestration issues. The TOR serves as the public face of all ACTOR Project research and provides an exploration tool for students, composers, and orchestrators.

Our goal was to help people learn and explore the exciting topics of Timbre and Orchestration, through the lens of the research taking place at the ACTOR Project. 

Subgroups

As the TOR represents the public face of the research of ACTOR's Workgroups, its “Subgroups” are essentially all the Workgroups themselves; each will be contributing to the TOR in many ways.

Active or Envisioned Projects

Proposed Development Plan for the Timbre and Orchestration Resource (TOR) 

Educational Modules

1. Research-Creation Modules: for ACTOR members’ composition methodologies, or performance practice, or creative software applications, or multimedia work, or recording techniques, etc.
2. Timbre Research Modules:
   • highlight ACTOR members’ timbre research
3. Instrumentation / Organology : in depth information about instruments
   • Instruments overview
   • History
   • Construction
   • Acoustics
   • Classification(s)
   • Extended Techniques
   • Ranges
   • Descriptors / Qualities
   • Orchestral exemplifications (examples from Treatises)
4. Edutainment
   • Lesson Plans for younger children built around ACTOR deliverables and member creations like Sonic Solveig apps, Cameron Chameleon, etc.
   • Timbre and orchestration oriented companion curricula to existing pieces (similar to but not limited to the ones that are “always” taught)
5. Taxonomy modules: text and audio modules exploring the taxonomies being worked on by some members of the ACTOR Project:
6. CORE: Recordings, scores, interviews, analysis, etc.
7. Reorchestration module: audio and score-based examples of reorchestrations
8. Orchestral Repertoire: lists, audio links, and descriptions
9. Video Presentations: Paper presentations (conference), Long presentations (visiting lecture)
10. Tutorials: Text-based or Video-based tutorials.
11. Sound Recording Module: Expand on ODESSA pages, include more recordings from the ODESSA’s in Geneva and Detmold
12. Assisted orchestration module

Timbre and Orchestration Blogs

1. Amazing Moments in Timbre Blog and Timbrelingo Blog: Solicit more blogs from student members or as class projects.
2. Possible New blogs:

• Teaching Orchestration (could link to some of the curricula and lesson plans)
• Teaching Timbre  (could link to some of the curricula and lesson plans)
• Timbre and Performance
• A music theorist’s guide to timbre

Resources/Links

1. Timbre and Orchestration bibliography.
2. Support for published edited volumes: Web compliment with audio files and scores on ACTOR website protected page
3. Links to resources for teaching, learning, and composing with extended techniques

Internal:

1. TMC and KMC
   • create modules for resources for students
   • research methods
2. Timbre thesaurus
3. Linking to ORCHARD

Overview

What does it mean to teach timbre? This working group was launched by a working group session in July 2021.  In advance of the session, syllabi exploring timbre by Jenny Beavers, Emily Dolan, Bob Hasegawa, Megan Levangood, Judy Lochhead, Stephen McAdams, and Landon Morrison were made available. During the session, each syllabus creator will gave a short (5-minute) lightning talk discussing their course design and their teaching experience before the session opened up for a broader discussion about timbral syllabus design. In particular, participants were encouraged to share specific assignments that were particularly effective: these were individual reading or listening assignments, in-class exercises, creative assignments, etc. The goal of this working group is to create a useful repository of both syllabuses and assignments that others can draw on in their teaching. 

Active or Envisioned Projects

• Creation of repository of
• Creation of Teaching Timbre Topics modules and sub-modules

Active or Envisioned Projects

• CORE Timbre semantics: Explores how composers and performers in the COREs conceptualize timbre semantics (related areas: orchestration pedagogy, creation, ethnography, qualitative analysis; project leads: Roger Reynolds, Jason Noble, Caroline Traube)
• Mapping the semantics of timbre across pitch registers: Large online perceptual study supported by ACTOR Strategic Initiatives funding exploring the semantic correlates of orchestral timbres, including CORE instruments, across registration (related areas: perceptual research axis; project leads: Lindsey Reymore and Jason Noble)
• Acoustical correlates of timbre semantics across pitch registers: Acoustical analysis of perceptual dataset above (related areas: acoustics; project lead: Charis Saitis).
• Timbre synthesis in response to semantic prompts: Developing an app that will enable participants to produce digital timbres and sound textures to embody or express given semantic associations. Online experiment to follow. (related areas: sound synthesis, interactivity; project leads: Jason Noble and Zachary Wallmark)
• Dialect-based composition: Using formant-based acoustical analysis of guitar timbres to evoke analogies with spoken vowels, applied in compositions drawing on source material from the dialects of Newfoundland and Québec. (related areas: acoustical analysis, dialectology; project leads: Jason Noble and Caroline Traube)
• fMRI study of crossmodality in timbre perception
• SpeaK Web Project: an online tool, free, to create sound lexicons
• Orchestration semantics, timbre-vowel analogies
• Voice timbre semantics
• Description of vocal timbre as influenced by gender perception
• Sound symbolism and vocables in Zambian Luvale
• Semantic description of a piece of music and its relation to perception of musical affect
• Acoustical correlates of felt tension and semantics of tension
• Interview with Martha di Francisco about piano timbre and piano recording
• Study on teaching style in baroque music piano performance
• Piano timbre and gesture semantics
• semantics of the sinewave
• Seeing Music
• Timbre Explorer
• Timbre synthesis in response to semantic prompts
• Navigating noise

Overview

The ACTOR Voice Workgroup brought together researchers and performers from all the fields represented in the ACTOR network, such as musicologists, composers, acousticians, performers, and theorists. Our joint mission was to explore the place of voice timbre research in orchestration theory and practice. Some questions we sought to answer were: What does it mean to play the piano, violin, or flute in a ‘singing style’? What guidance is available for writing vocalizations into orchestral parts – for composers and the instrumental players asked to produce these sounds? What are the various extended techniques available to singers/soloists and composers and how are they communicated? How are voices described in relation to other sounds? If, as Joan La Barbara said, “Voice is the original instrument,” Then we wanted to look to the voice to see how it could inform instrumental orchestration and timbre studies, while also situating it within the orchestra as a valid instrument in its own right.

Subgroups

• Interactive catalogue of extended vocal techniques: orchestral vocalizing, how to orchestrate “around” extended techniques, effects of techniques, guide for singers, notation guides, etc. (Juanita Marchand, Laurie Radford, Jason Noble)
• Voice and orchestration in opera (Kit Soden, Lindsey Reymore, Juanita Marchand)
• Semantic description of vocal timbre, and comparison with instrumental timbre (Lindsey Reymore)
• Vocal fry in musical contexts (Fabien Lévy, Malte Kob)
• Choral orchestration/blending of vocal timbres in choirs (Caroline Traude, Malte Kob)

Active or Envisioned Projects

• Voice timbre semantics (also mentioned on the Timbre semantics wg)
• Opera orchestration
• Choral blending: voice and space
• Extended techniques catalogue
• robustness of vocal metaphors in instrumental music
• Voice and timbre in rap

Member Interests

• Jason Winikoff: timbre & orchestration in Luvale makishi spirit manifestation in Zambia; Sub-Saharan African drum timbre; timbre and orchestration in (jazz) drumset; timbre & culture
• J. Marchand-Knight: perception of Blackness and Black vocal timbre in opera; voice & timbre as culture in American rap
• Joshua Rosner: jazz arranging/orchestration; big bands/jazz orchestras; timbre & personhood
• Danielle Davis: southern hip-hop; record production; Afro-Filipino musical collaboration
• Chidi Obijiaku: contemporary music composition; urban sounds as a resource for hybridity in African contemporary music

Active/envisioned projects

• Afrological Perspectives on Timbre & Orchestration speaker series
• various additional outputs from the speaker series including public scholarship, teaching tools, and summarizing articles
• colonialism in opera
• influences of language and culture on timbre in South African sopranos
• buzz aesthetic in African music
• pushing technology for timbral goals