Journal of Music, Technology & Education - Volume 7, Issue 3, 2014

The Vocal Tract Organ is a new musical instrument that consists of three-dimensional (3D)-printed vocal tracts (throat and mouth) for individual vowels sitting on loudspeakers to enable static vowel sounds to be produced. The acoustic excitation from the loudspeakers is a synthesized version of the typical waveform produced by the vibrating human vocal folds during pitched sounds, which enables the instrument to be played from a keyboard. The synthesis engine is implemented in Pure Data. This article describes the implementation of the Vocal Tract Organ, how it has been used musically to date, and the similarities and differences between it and the Vox Humana pipe organ stop. It is suggested that the Vocal Tract Organ will become an instrument in its own right and that it could be used as a direct replacement for the Vox Humana organ stop, given that its acoustic output is a much closer representation of the human vocal output than that from a Vox Humana organ pipe. In addition, the author makes use of the 3D-printed tracts in vocal and choral workshops as well as degree-level music technology education.

Kudac (Kingston University Digital Arts Collective) is an electronic improvisation ensemble that brings staff and students together for weekly musicking with technology – incorporating resources ranging from conventional instruments, to computers, to hacked circuit boards. A central element of the ensemble from its inception has been its democratic approach – staff and students explore the musical possibilities and challenges together and gradually mould their practice through a free exchange. In this article we consider the contribution of this ensemble in several overlapping domains: in relation to the individual students, in the context of a higher education music department, and at the intersection of research and teaching. We first survey the structure and activities of the ensemble, contextualizing this with reference to existing research in the fields of laptop performance, free improvisation and musical identity formation. We use this as a platform for tracing how such an ensemble may aid the social construction and shaping of creative identities at both an individual and collective level. We then examine the opportunities and challenges for a music department hosting such an ensemble before highlighting areas for future study.

Historically there has been a literal and figurative divide between the roles of musicians and audio engineers in the recording studio. The emergence of the Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) enabled the home recording studio to rival the sonic results of the professional studio, encouraging musicians to develop skills traditionally associated with audio engineering. A non-intrusive video-based method for conducting a qualitative case study in a private home studio is outlined and was used to document the music-making processes incorporating modern recording technologies by a 26-year-old male singer-songwriter based in New York City. Findings reveal that once the participant was engaged in the practice of recording his pre-composed songs, a reflexive approach to recording was adopted, integrating improvisation, rewriting and re-recording of song elements. The participant’s hybrid approach is demonstrative of how the musician–engineer barrier is challenged in the DAW home studio paradigm.

The growth in popularity of Music Technology degree programmes in the United Kingdom has been paralleled by the apparent decline in informal apprenticeship systems that have typically provided a gateway to employment in the recording industry. This article takes a critical approach to the tensions that exist between higher education and the music industries by exploring contemporary and historical approaches of apprenticeship. Drawing on interviews with industry professionals, current students and recent graduates who have achieved some success in the music industries, this article explores some of the perceptions, myths and contradictions of the apprenticeship-training model with changes in the contemporary professional environment. Our findings suggest that training for the music industries is more flexible and open-ended than some of the published narratives on apprenticeship would suggest. In addition, educational frameworks over the past twenty years have often focused on the technical aspects of studio practice at the expense of the social, aesthetic and human skills required by the industry. These formal frameworks often only focus on the transference of knowledge to the individual diminishing or ignoring the important processes of interaction with the participants in the field. Using the metaphor of a professional ‘toolbox’, we argue that there is a need for an approach that reconsiders the industry-education divide and considers the value of the educational process in a much wider, contemporary framework. Some twenty years since the initial development of Music Technology programmes in the United Kingdom, and in the context of the rapidly changing nature of the music industries, it is an appropriate time to reconsider the nature and relevance of Music Technology programmes in higher education.

The benefit of higher education institutions working with industry professionals has received significant attention in literature and policy. Despite this, the challenges in institutions themselves, and the nature of the music industry makes this concept challenging to manage. In response to this, a project was funded by the Higher Education Academy for Coventry University to examine a model for embedding the involvement of industry professionals in the development and assessment of Music Technology student portfolios. This article explains the background, the rationale, realization and outcomes of the project. First, it outlines the issues of employability within music and creative industries courses as reflected in the literature. It then examines the contextual challenges of the music industry and higher education. It continues by describing how the project embedded industry professionals in student portfolio development and assessment. Finally, it outlines the outcomes of the project, its implications and the key risk factors to its implementation in other disciplines and institutions.