“How To Design the Musical Instrument You Always Wanted to Play”
Distinguished Guest Lecture in Computer Music: Miller Puckette
Join us for a guest lecture by Dr. Miller Puckette, a pioneering computer musician who has been at the forefront of music technology for decades. As the creator of popular visual programming environments Max and Pure Data, Puckette has made some of the most foundational contributions to computer music research and real-time electronic generation and manipulation of sound of the past 40 years. His research runs the gamut from digital signal processing, spatial audio, and telematic performance to graphic notation, instrument design, and generative music systems. He is also active as a composer, improviser, and multimedia artist, and will perform as part of the duos the Higgs whatever and øther in two concerts this evening.
ACCAD Motion Lab
331 Sullivant Hall — 1813 N. High St.
Columbus, OH 43210
This lecture is generously co-sponsored by the Advanced Computing Center for Arts and Design (ACCAD).
Biography
Miller Puckette obtained a BS in Mathematics from MIT (1980) and a PhD in Mathematics from Harvard (1986), winning an NSF graduate fellowship and the Putnam Prize Scholarship. He was a member of MIT's Media Lab from its inception until 1987, and then a researcher at IRCAM (l'Institut de Recherche et de Coordination Musique/Acoustique), founded by composer and conductor Pierre Boulez. At IRCAM he wrote Max, a widely-used computer music software environment, released commercially in 1990 and now available from Cycling74.com. Puckette joined the music department of the University of California San Diego in 1994, where he is now Distinguished Professor, emeritus. He is currently developing Pure Data ("Pd"), an open-source real-time multimedia arts programming environment. Puckette has collaborated with many artists and musicians, including Philippe Manoury (whose Sonus ex Machina cycle was the first major work to use Max), Rand Steiger, Vibeke Sorensen, Juliana Snapper, Kerry Hagan, and Irwin. Since 2004 he has performed with the Convolution Brothers. He has received honorary degrees from Université de Mons and Bath Spa University, and major awards include the 2008 SEAMUS Lifetime Achievement Award and the Silver Lion at the 2023 Venice Music Biennale.