THE FOUNDATIONAL COMPOSER
Where every path starts: notation, harmony, seventh chords, chromaticism and the phrase. The bedrock the rest of the platform stands on.
DIGITAL AUDIO
The signal, end to end: sampling, analysis, effects, synthesis and the acoustics that explains what you are hearing.
COUNTERPOINT, FORM AND ANALYSIS
From plainchant to the sonata: modal counterpoint, species, the forms of concert music and the analysis of whole works.
ORCHESTRATION & 20TH C.
Write for symphonic orchestra, master instrumental timbral blending, and explore post-tonal techniques.
THE TRAINED EAR
Sing it, hear it, read it. Solfège, dictation, keyboard and score reading: what turns theory you know into music you can follow.
THE COMPOSER'S WORKSHOP
Your own music, engraved so others can play it, and the freedom to improvise before you write it down.
20TH AND 21ST CENTURY LANGUAGE
Pitch-class sets, rows, symmetrical collections and the mathematics behind them, up to music that leaves the concert hall.
MUSIC PROGRAMMING
Code that makes sound: patching, real-time audio, live coding, algorithmic composition and machine learning.
ELECTROACOUSTIC COMPOSITION
The finished work: fixed media, immersive space and pieces performed across a network.
THE MEDIA COMPOSER
Scoring to picture and to play: film, television, adaptive music and the middleware that triggers it.
THE JAZZ ARTIST
From chord symbols to the big band: jazz harmony, improvisation, arranging and composition, in the sequence every jazz program teaches them.
THE SONGWRITER
Write complete songs: form, melody, lyrics, popular harmony and the demo that sells them.
THE PRODUCER
From microphone to master: recording, mixing, mastering and electronic production.
THE MUSIC PROFESSION
The two ways of living from music that are not composing it: running it as a business, and teaching it.
ETHNOMUSICOLOGY: THE METHOD
Before any atlas: how to listen, transcribe and theorise music that does not use the tempered scale.
ATLAS: COLOMBIA
The five regions, one by one: Andean, Caribbean, Pacific, Orinoco and Amazon.
ATLAS: CARIBBEAN AND IBERIA
Mexico, Cuba, Venezuela and Spain, and the composers who tie the two shores together.
ATLAS: ANDES AND SOUTHERN CONE
Peru, Argentina, Chile, Ecuador and Brazil: from the huayno and the tango to samba and bossa.
ATLAS: NORTH AMERICA
The roots: blues and gospel, country and the Appalachians, and the music of the native peoples.
ATLAS: EUROPE
The folk traditions: the aksak metres of the Balkans, and the Celtic, Nordic and Eastern European musics.
ATLAS: SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA
The matrix of almost all American music: Mande and Yoruba polyrhythm, the mbira, taarab and the music of the south.
ATLAS: MAGHREB AND THE DIASPORA
The Andalusi nuba, the Maghreb modes, and how Africa crossed the Atlantic and came back changed.
ATLAS: MIDDLE EAST AND CENTRAL ASIA
The world of the maqam: the Arab, Turkish and Persian modal systems, and the shashmaqam of the Silk Road.
ATLAS: INDIAN OCEAN AND PACIFIC
Raga and tala, the gamelan and its cyclic time, and the music of Oceania.
ATLAS: EAST ASIA
China, Japan and Korea: modal systems, notations and instruments that never passed through the tempered scale.