[ELECTRONIC MUSIC PLAYING]
Music technology takes
a really broad look
at the ways in which
current state of technology
interacts with the ways
we experience music,
the way we make
music, the ways we
analyze music, the
ways we consume music
and distribute it.
So there's a lot of
topics that we touch upon.
And music technology, just like
other computational fields,
students are trying to
grapple with how do we
get a interaction
with a computer
to represent our human ways
of experiencing the world.
Music and technology are
actually very intertwined.
Music depends a
lot on technology,
and technology has
a lot of potential
to change the way that
music can be expressed
and how people can listen to it.
I'm actually a
computer science major,
but I really like understanding
how come music works.
I'm very interested in
human-computer interaction,
and music is a medium
that really lends itself
to a lot of different ways of
human computer interaction.
There's a lot of
different places
around the country that offer
music technology programs.
But the thing that
makes MIT unique is--
well, it's actually two things.
One is our approach
to how we teach it,
and the second is the
students themselves.
The typical student who comes
in and takes a music technology
class really has
interests both in music
and in computers or engineering.
And what's amazing is that there
is quite a lot of MIT students
who totally fit that profile.
And in terms of how we teach
it, students who come and take
our classes in music
technology will
be able to build the tools that
everyone else around the world
will end up using to do
whatever they need to do.
Music is all about
presentation and performance.
And if you're just
doing engineering,
you know, a lot of the time
you're not thinking about that.
So combining engineering
and music, it forces you
not only to be a good engineer,
but a good communicator
and a good artist.
I think technology can't
really stand alone.
So it's very important
to have courses
that show you how technology
can be used in different fields,
including music.
One of the things that we
see is that, with increased
availability to
computational tools,
the creativity of people
around MIT campus and the world
is really exploding,
and music technology
is part of that whole explosion.
So we're providing tools for
students to be creative in ways
that they're already being
creative in their other
domains, and we're letting
them think about things
in slightly different ways.
The music technology
classes that I've taken
are very interactive,
super hands-on.
A bunch of my classmates
bring in their own instruments
in our Interactive
Music Systems class,
and they've used these
instruments in combination
with the technology
stuff that we've
been learning in our classes to
build some really cool tools.
Like someone put together
a Cello Hero game
where it gives you live
feedback about how well you're
playing a piece on the
cello, which is just insanely
futuristic and cool,
and really helpful
for people learning
how to play cello.
I was an undergraduate
student here at MIT
and I was also at the media
lab as a grad student,
and at the time, we
didn't have a lot
in terms of music
technology, certainly not
at the undergraduate level.
And one of the things that I'm
really excited about now coming
back, 20 years later, is to
be able to create classes
and introduce classes of music
technology to all the students
here, who I'm guessing,
kind of like when
I was an undergrad
here, really want
to combine this
great interest they
have with music and engineering
into one discipline.
[ELECTRONIC MUSIC PLAYING]
