Looking for College Courses That Allow Students to Develop Their Own Music/Sound Art Projects

February 2, 2005 2:26 AM

Sound Art/Music Tech/Interesting Music: Courses (MI)

I'm thinking about returning to University or College to further my ideas in music and sound art.

There's a quite interesting course in London (UK) at Middlesex Uni, but I'm also interested in living in another country for a while.

I'd be interested to hear about any courses in other places that would fit the bill.

I'm looking for something that allows students to develop their own ideas and projects. It would ideally be open to sound art as well as music.

I'm not really looking for a studio recording/dance music course, or something that focuses on classical electroacoustic stuff, but if they are flexible enough may consider them.

I have a BSc in Audio Tech, so could work at postgrad level, but I would prefer a broad base of work rather than a single dissertation.

Thanks for any suggestions.

posted by lunkfish to media & arts (8 answers total)

Are you interested in composition, audio processing, machine learning, dsp, computer science, machine listening, theory, design, what? What are your 'ideas' that you want to further? What do you mean by a broad base of work rather than a dissertation? Do you not want a degree but rather just take a few courses?

A general list that I recommend to students looking for grad degrees in this field:
In the US: Stanford/CCRMA, Berkeley/CNMAT, Dartmouth, Columbia CMC, Georgia Tech, MIT Media Lab, CMU, Princeton, RISD/Brown, Berklee, NYU/ITP.
Elsewhere: McGill, UPF in Barcelona, IRCAM, Gotenborg, Goldsmiths in London, OFAI in Vienna.

There's a lot more but that's a good start. It vastly depends on your current skills and the kind of things you actually want to do.
posted by neustile at 9:02 AM on February 2, 2005

Hmm, well I'm not quite sure if this is what you're looking for, but Mills College and The Art Institute of Chicago both offer an MFA in Sound Art/Electronic Music and I've heard very very good things about them. Mills's program sounds especially interesting.
posted by vitpil at 12:37 PM on February 2, 2005

You aren't very clear, but it sounds like you're more interested in the craft of sound design than technology research. If so, I don't think many of the places neustile listed have programs that do what you want. The ones I recognize are based around research, not teaching you craft.

I can only speak about McGill personally, and while I enjoy it, you do research and make tools rather than works. I assume it's true for most of the places you've just listed (CCRMA, CNMAT, Princeton, IRCAM, UPF all seem to be similar).

Have you considered going to film school? Vancouver Film School is very highly regarded, and has a diploma in Sound Design.
posted by too many notes at 12:43 PM on February 2, 2005

Yes, my list is towards people that want to do research and make new technologies and tools, not compose or make pieces. Although there's a lot of overlap. In short, need more info from poster.
posted by neustile at 12:58 PM on February 2, 2005

You may also want to check out RPI's iEAR program.
posted by stefnet at 3:17 PM on February 2, 2005

Dunno if anyone's still reading, but thanks for the ideas. I'll try and clarify.

I'm interested in making experimental music and sound art. I'd like a course with no or little academic music theory or history, that's assesed on my own music/sound art projects. I'd prefer to use software and hardware as tools for the job, rather than studying them seperately.

The Art Institute of Chicago looks worth looking into.

By broad based, I mean I don't have one specific idea for a postgrad project, and want to work in different areas.

It would be nice to get a postgrad qualification, but I'm more interested in the course what I need. I could do an undergraduate and probably skip the first year.
posted by lunkfish at 4:03 AM on February 3, 2005

course being what I need
posted by lunkfish at 4:48 AM on February 3, 2005

I'm currently in my second year at middlesex doing Ba/Bsc Sonic Arts, if you want to know anything about the facilities and whatnot, feel free to contact me.
posted by iamcrispy at 3:02 PM on February 15, 2005