How you would describe what you do?
I'm a computer musician.
What does that mean?
Well, that's always what comes next. I am a composer, and I'm a performer. My primary instrument is the computer.
What were the formative experiences in becoming the musician you are today?
Well, my introduction to musical performance was through choirs, often in a liturgical setting – in church, in this emotional ecstasy that one has in the religious singing experience. Another introduction would be coming to Berlin as a teenager and hearing Eurodance in the supermarket; also the crazy, synthetic pop music that was popular here. It's like a geographical point. Another one would be moving to Oakland, going to Mills [College], and starting to use a computer in a way that I had more control over. That's the trajectory.
What led you to Mills?
I was already writing music. I went to some master classes here [in Berlin]. I took some free improvisation with [vocalist] Lauren Newton. I was trying to teach my way through some things. I had downloaded SuperCollider [a real-time audio synthesis programming language] and was trying to figure it out without any community. That is hard to do if you are coming at it blind, without any reference point. There was already a deep interest, and I was trying to figure things out myself. I figured that if I wanted to take things to the next level technically, I needed to retool. So, I decided to go to Mills.
SuperCollider was the first music-making software you interfaced with?
It was, and it wasn't what I ended up using. I ended up using Max [Max/MSP/Jitter; a visual programming language for music]. It's random. At Mills, one semester they would teach Max, and one semester they would teach SuperCollider. I happened to start on the semester they were teaching Max. That's the only reason. It's actually probably better that way, because it's visual. Actually, I was in the beta testing of Max for [Ableton] Live at the time, when I was first getting started.
Around what years?
I was at Mills from 2008 to 2010. This always happens to people when they first start to use Max: I was building this complicated, insane, disgusting patch that I'd never use again. But that's part of doing it; to learn how it works. I was building this stupid performance system that was super complicated. I spent forever on it, and then the Max for [Ableton] Live beta came out and answered everything. All of a sudden it was so much easier to do all the things I wanted to do, because I could just put individual Max patches on individual audio tracks - things that were difficult to code if you were just starting with an empty Max patch. That was a massive self-own; but it was also good, because I had to learn how to do all that. Now I have the stability of this DAW [Ableton Live] but with the flexibility of all this weirdness I want to do [Max For Live]. That then became a powerful performance tool.
I know those messy Max patches. When I was in school, I was doing the same thing. It was like, "If only there were something else!"
Then that something else came. I think a lot of people had that moment. A lot of people who didn't know what Max was bought Ableton Live, and they found out about [Max] through [Live]. Then they got into programming. That's cool that it introduced people on that level. So, then I started writing Movement [her first album] towards the end of Mills, and after Mills. Movement came out right when I started at Stanford [University]. I had no expectation that anyone would care about it at all. It was just this weird thing I made and thought was cool; then somebody wanted to put out. Then, "Oh, you're invited to play this festival." That was exciting, but also weird timing, because I'd just started at Stanford, so I was taking classes and trying to tour the album at the same time. That was gnarly.
Can you talk a little bit about your work at Stanford's CCRMA [Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics, (pronounced "karma")]?
How would I describe Stanford? I was drawn to the history of it; John Chowning, and the whole legacy there. Also, there's just an attitude. Chris Chafe is the director there, and he's my advisor. He has this beautiful, super open-minded approach to experimentation; wherever that might take you. There's no real expectation of what will come out of something. A lot of that comes from Chowning. You have this example of someone who's just messing around in the lab, and the next thing you know it's one of the most valuable patents [FM synthesis -ed.] that the university has ever seen. That will embolden a community to be like, "My experimentation is valuable!" Experimenting without necessarily a goal in mind is something that's valued there, and I think that's a beautiful thing.
So, when you got there, did you know the direction you were going to go?
I didn't know. I was overwhelmed, in a sense. It's a very weird program. I'm in the composition department. The music department is one big thing, and then there's a composition track, a musicology track, and an engineering track. CCRMA is mostly the engineering track, but there are also composers there. A lot of the composition history at Stanford is a more traditional approach; very complex and score-oriented. One of the composers there is Brian Ferneyhough, who's famous for his contributions to the "new complexity" movement, which is all about the most ridiculously complex scores you could imagine; to challenge players that are extremely skilled and to push them to a next level of performance. It's a very different tradition or interest than I'm coming from. Maybe at times it was an awkward fit, but I always felt at home at CCRMA. Most of the people there are doing physical modeling, trying to improve a compression algorithm, or something like that. There's an openness to the community there. I like being around engineers and finding ways to integrate that work into my creative practice, even though that's not my focus. Some of that is just so insane. Like Jules [LaPlace]'s classes – some of the physical modeling – is super advanced math. It's a nice community.
Are you still working on your PhD?
I'm defending [it] in two weeks.
What's your dissertation about?
Because it's a Composition DMA [Doctor of Musical Arts], it's a body of work which is PROTO, and [the performance pieces] "Deep Belief" and "Chain Opera," and then an analysis of that. It's mostly writing about AI [artificial intelligence], as well as the aesthetic implications and subjects like that.
Do you have separate phases for writing and composing, and then taking those ideas in to record, or is the process fluid?
That would be the smart way to do it. My methodology is not always that perfect. I would write something, like a simple score, and then we would have regular rehearsals once a week, or every other week. The members would perform them, and I would record that. I'd then go back into the studio and work with it. Then I'd iterate on that and change the score; or I'd have them emulate a process that I applied to the score. Once it was at a certain point, I would go into the studio to record them, but I would still end up changing it and remixing it into its final iteration.
For the score, do you use traditional notation for the ensemble to read?
Yeah. Or sometimes I record a process and have them emulate a digital process. Then it, of course, becomes something entirely new when they're interpreting it.
What is the environment or studio that you work in like?
We had a very unusual setup in our old place. We just moved a couple months ago. We used to live in Kreuzberg [in Berlin], and we had a more industrial loft space with a large, open room where we could have rehearsals. I had a little studio room, where I could shut the door that was sound-treated and had a nice speaker setup. I could do single recordings in there. We would also rent a recording studio to do a proper final run of recordings. I would record our rehearsals in the main room and then iterate on them in my studio. Once we got it to a point where we were rehearsed, we would take that to a recording studio. We'd further rehearse there and get real-time feedback and try it with different approaches. "Okay, let's try it this time staccato" or, "legato" or, "add a glissando to these parts." Just workshopping.
When you're recording the vocal ensemble at your house, do you have a particular way that you like to capture that audio? Any certain mic'ing techniques or mics that you like to use?
It depends on what we're recording. Usually I was just recording as a reference, but we ended up using some of that. I probably should have paid a bit more attention. I find the Sony PCM [handheld recorder] to be quite good at recording. The fidelity is good enough. I did a piece called "Body Sound" years ago with a dancer, and that was all recorded with the PCM. I was just holding it to his feet as he was dancing and recording his foot sounds. It's actually really crisp and clear. But there were a couple times that I rented microphones and set them up in our space for a couple of sessions when I knew that I didn't need to rent the studio. It's expensive to do that. There were a couple of background parts I wanted to record where I would set up some microphones. I can't remember the microphones that I ended up using. There's this place here called Echoschall. I would rent a nicer microphone when I would record soloists in my studio.
What are you recording with in your studio? What DAW do you use?
Straight into Ableton Live, and I just record with whatever preamp I've rented from Carsten [Lohmann of Echoschall], and then I have a Focusrite Clarett series sound card.
What about any go-to studios here that you record at?
There are a couple that I've used. One is called LowSwing Tonstudio, in Prenzlauer Berg, and then there's one called Blackbird Music Studio in Kreuzberg that's also pretty cool. Then I just discovered a new one in Mitte that I can't remember the name of. It's more expensive, but it was beautiful. I want to be able to afford to record there!
What attracts you to certain studios?
That studio just had a good vibe. It had good lighting, and good acoustics within the live room. When I'm in the studio, it's mostly about recording the live room with the ensemble performing. I'm not really doing any production in those studios. The production all happens at home. I have nice ADAM speakers. Then I mixed in London with Marta Salogni. She's amazing. She just built her own studio in London. Before she was renting out a studio in the Mute [Records] office. She's a sick mixing engineer. She usually works with bigger pop artists, but she's friends with a friend of mine, Lafawndah, and they were working together on Lafawndah's album [Ancestor Boy]. She was playing me some of the tracks that she just released, and I was like, "Oh, this mix is amazing!" She said, "You have to meet my friend, Marta." Then we found a time to synchronize. She's so good. I love working with mixing engineers, because it's like hearing your music in a new light. The process of writing clouds your judgment, at least my judgment's totally skewed by the end of it. [Marta] has this almost psych rock vibe to the way that she mixes digital instruments. She gives it this space and weight in a way that worked. All of the ensemble music was recorded in a space with people, and you feel that liveness and atmosphere. When you have digital instruments with that, it can often feel disconnected. How do you make all of these digital instruments work together? Then you have this artificial intelligence [component] that has its own aesthetic and lo-fi sound to it. How do you make those all sit in the same environment? Marta was huge in that. Her drum mixes are so epic.
