LMC, School of Music to Host Musical Residencies

Posted January 20, 2023

Six metro Atlanta musicians and performers will be working out of the Technology Square Research Building through April as part of a new STEAM musical residency program jointly hosted by the School of Literature, Media, and Communication and the School of Music.

The artists will each have two-week residencies culminating in a free workshop and performance open to the Georgia Tech community and the public, said Noura Howell, an LMC assistant professor. Howell is organizing the project in collaboration with Alexander Cohen, technical director in the School of Music, a unit of Georgia Tech’s College of Design.

“These workshops will approach science, technology, engineering, art, and math education from different angles, with the overarching goal to provide a more arts-based, humanistic approach to using technology,” Howell said.

The Performance Residencies in Electronic Music for Interdisciplinary Education Research (PREMIER) program is part of a growing emphasis on media arts in the School, which has long counted subjects such as film and performance art studies, new media, and creative approaches to literature among its competencies.

Studying the relationships among music, performance, and art can help unearth surprising connections that can help students across a variety of disciplines, both within the Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts and at other Georgia Tech units, Howell said.

For instance, in the first workshop, artists Majid Araim and Benjamin Shirley, known collaboratively as “Whispers of Night,” will work with participants in using geophones — microphones that go into the soil and collect sound samples.

“Listening to soil offers a new way of listening to and appreciating the world and the environment around us, offering a creative and hands-on way to explore more-than-human relations, a growing theoretical area of interest in the humanities in post-Anthropocentrism,” Howell said.

Other workshops will center on topics such as the process of creating music using sampled sound, synthesis, and intentionally short-circuiting old electronics to produce new and unexpected sounds.

Araim’s and Shirley’s residency has already started. Their workshop is scheduled for Jan. 27 in Room 175 of the West Village Dining Commons. They will perform Jan. 28 at the same location.

The other artists and their performance and workshop times are: 

• Doctor Calico, a polymath musician and artist who built his own four-track home recording studio as a teenager and brings decades of experience as a performer, composer, producer, DJ, and artist. Workshop: Feb. 10 at 6 p.m.; performance Feb. 11 at 6 p.m.
• William Barrow, who repurposes old toys and tape recorders to create novel electronic instruments. Workshop, Feb. 24 at 5 p.m.; performance Feb. 25 at 6 p.m.
• Adia Davina, a multidisciplinary artist, vocalist, playwright, and performer. Workshop March 31 at 4 p.m.; performance April 1 at 6 p.m.
• Rafiana, a multidisciplinary artist who creates works that span performance, music, film, and painting. Workshop April 23 at 6 p.m.; performance April 22 at 6 p,.m.

The residencies conclude April 21. More information about the artists and the residencies is available at the PREMIER website.

The program is funded through a GVU/Institute for People and Technology (IPaT) Engagement Grant and the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) through its STEM@GTRI program.