On this page, you can find the Culminating Experience (CE) Projects for all graduate students from the Berklee College of Music master’s program Music Production, Technology, and Innovation (MPTI) from 2015 – present. Click on any title for more information and access to the full paper and other deliverables (if available).
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Building the New Label: Family First Records, LLC
Matthew L. Maxwell
2019This paper analyzes the current state of the record label in hopes of building the foundations for a new one. The project focuses on the present structure of the label and current innovations in the music space that have disrupted some of the historic strengths of the record label. The first part of the paper gives a brief overview of the organization structure, different types of labels, and current “pain points”. The second part highlights ways The New Label (aka Family First Records, LLC) seeks to offer healthy change to the space. The final section of the paper reflects on the year spent at Berklee Valencia and future implications of the label, Family First Records, LLC.
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Ambisonic Headphones
Brett Mayer
2019This project produced a pair of multiple driver headphones which are intended to reproduce ambisonic audio for the listener. Three discrete drivers are placed in each side of the headphones, arranged in a triangle surrounding each ear, allowing sound to be localized in a 360 degrees sound field. The second step of this process was to add a gyroscopic sensor to the headphones which tracks the movement of the user’s head. Information from this sensor is delivered to an encoding program which modulates the audio based on the user’s head position.
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BREAKING DOWN THE BREAK UP
Thomas D. Mills
2019This is a culminating experience, titled, Breaking Down the Break Up! (BDTBU). BDTBU is a five song EP by the author, Tommy Mills. The songs on this EP span a wide range of genres such as rock, electronic, funk, orchestral, ragtime, and pop. The goal of the project is to explore different approaches towards making marketable pop music. This project challenged the author to modernize his composition and production techniques. Upon graduation, the songs on BDTBU will be released on Spotify, iTunes, and Apple Music. Key Words: EP, popular music, modern production, composition, sound design.
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Masterclasses with Cojemo_
Connor J. Moen
2019This project aims to find a new medium for conventional teaching environments by incorporating www.twitch.tv as a streaming platform to engage students. Using a program called Open Broadcaster Software, the author was able to simultaneously record and stream video of myself giving lessons on music production aspects such as compression, EQ, sampling, etc. The full streams remain on the author’s twitch channel (twitch.tv/cojemo_) while edited versions became part of the Cojemo_ YouTube page. While growing the viewers remains a challenge, this project was successful in that these videos can be used by future students, as well as whoever finds them online.
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Conversations With Myself
Mariah Elyse Moore
2019This purpose of this project was to grow and evolve as a storyteller. Ti is of great importance of the author to be able to communicate her ideas effectively while being able to affect the emotions of those around her. It explores the process of taking words from a piece a paper and turning them into a living breathing sonic environment, in the hopes of developing the voice and music production process for the author. Interestingly enough, it resulted in a full length spoken word album. Each track (or piece) consists of an original prose or poem, musical composition, and sound design. Major challenges, originating from mental illness, greatly impacted the project execution and its contents both positively and negatively. The resulting album will be released on all digital platforms in September of 2019. This entire process allowed the author to realize her artistry and grow not only as an artist, but as a person as well.
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Electro Shock
Leanne Moser
2019For her Culminating Experience project at Berklee College of Music, Leanne Moser used her composition and engineering skills in collaboration with a talented electronic producer, Javier Martin, and created a 4 track EP of original music, which was later on performed as an audio-visual set. Their goal was to combine their strengths, and produce audio and visuals united to highlight messages for social change. The tracks are hybrid electronic compositions with lyrical content that promotes social themes, the visuals showcase the discussed themes in a hyperbolic, ironic sense. She was challenged by cooperating the several different styles together in her arrangements, and the amount of new technologies she needed to get comfortable with. She learned how to work as part of a duo, and how to use several new software and hardware. With hard work and passion, the project was successfully completed and presented as part of her master’s degree.
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KlipKnob
Siavash Mozaffari
2019Klipknob is a max software that enables users to create engaging visuals for a live performance. The software allows musicians to use midi and audio to manipulate visuals to further drive the narrative for their live performances. It is aimed to make the visual making process fun, fast and easy. This is achieved via a simple user interface that can source content from the user’s hard drive or from simply copy and pasting a youtube link into the software.
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Spatial Illusions
Li-Ying Ooi
2019The EP, Spatial Illusions, will be presented in the form of a traditional CD album, but instead of opening up to a compact disc, a pop-up structure will emerge when opening the CD case, and that will be the object that is to be projection mapped with some original music. The music itself will be in a hybrid genre called Melodic Dubstep. This genre was chosen because it embodies the beautiful and lush elements of genres like Trance and Future Bass, but also have the grittiness and the sprightly energy of Dubstep. The music will be accompanied with vivid, vibrant visuals to create a unique audiovisual experience which will be executed via projection mapping. This paper will not only address the different audio and visual aspects of the project, but also the challenges faced and next steps of the EP.
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Room 90: The EP, Performance, and Emergence of Wavewalk
Alex Page
2019Room 90 is a project by Wavewalk that will mark the beginning of the true emergence of him as an artist. Since he started making music in his dorm room three years ago, Wavewalk has been working hard to create electronic music that evokes emotions and truly captures the story he is trying to tell. The project name comes from the current room number of his residence in Spain, which is where most of his ideas have stemmed from throughout this academic year. By capturing sounds and feelings that he has experienced in this apartment, Wavewalk will create a cohesive body of work accompanied by a live performance video and branding across social media and a new website.
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Love U Be U
Avril S. Pryce
2019Love U Be U is a compilation of a track, lyric video, and live performance that weaves between the genres of house, disco, funk, r&b, and rap created by Avril Shawn Pryce. This project aims to examine the topic of self-love and being comfortable in your own skin. The end goal of this work is to engage the viewer and educate them about self-love and acceptance of people that are different from them. There were many challenges faced including the lack of finances, expertise, and time. Against all odds Avril was able to successfully complete Love U Be U with having acquired music production, video editing, and project management skills. Love U Be U fostered Avril’s self-innovation and is the first step in starting his career as an artist to create future innovative works.
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FLY on THE WALL: Interactive Visual and Audio Installation
Erin Ragonese
2019Fly on The Wall is a visual-audio installation that incorporates an interactive walk thru; staged lighting, props, and visual components for each movement of the eight-minute piece of music. It utilizes and applies dramatic theory; French Scenes, color theory, and character development. The set is cyclical in design and shape, and divided into three sections, bestrepresenting an exposition/point of attack, climax and denouement. The purpose of the installation was to serve as an experiment in the delivery of character, narrative, commercial audio and reactive interaction with the individual listener. All challenges throughout the process were met and resolved with ease. Ultimately the installation was completed and opened to the public at the Centre del Carme Museum in Valencia for a weekend. Moving forward it is the intention to erect this installation again in varying venues, as an integral way of marketing the future business endeavor for the creation of community computer labs and creative space. In addition, the artistic hope is that Fly on The Wall will develop into a multi character series.
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Chemistry: An Audio Visual Performance
Alex Rapp
2019Chemistry is an audio-visual performance exploring your body’s physical, emotional, and chemical reactions to falling in love. The aim of this project was to create a live performance around a single concept while combining music and video all controlled by a single performer. The performance consists of six songs each linked with a hormone that affects your physical and emotional state when falling in love. The music consisted of pre-produced instrumentation to give space for singing and live effects processing. Most of the issues that came about were due to time and resources. A major challenge that was overcome was downsizing elements to fit practical implementations, without losing the effect on the overall performance. While this is only the first implementation of this project, there is great promise for iterations in the future utilizing the many audio-visual skills introduced throughout the year.
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The Disturbed Calm
Mohammadreza Rezaei
2019The utilization of visual elements in a live music show has been proven to be significantly effective in the delivery of the content over the past decades. The synchronized video clips on the display can help the musicians enhance the emotional communication with the audience. This culminating experience has tried to integrate real-time and audio responsive software with visualizers and live shows. The goal is to ease the complications and expenses of visual effects in a musical event for an independent artist. In order to further develop as an artist, four music tracks have also been recorded and produced to showcase the visualizer. The music is about the personal experiences of the artist and political circumstance covering his home country, Iran.
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ConnorSchon.com: An Online Mixing Portfolio
Connor Schon
2019ConnorSchon.com is a mixing and engineering website showcasing Connor Schon’s portfolio, services offered, biography, contact information, and recording journal. It was a challenge to design the website, but moreover to make sure the six new songs for the portfolio material were properly recorded and mixed with the scarce studio time and poorly designed recording spaces at Berklee Valencia. The website will continue to be revised and updated with Connor’s newest material and used as the launching point for his freelance career.
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White Leaf Music Co.
Xavery Scott
2019White Leaf Music is creating a website to demonstrate multiple aspects of professionalism and talent. Along with displaying a sonically unique professional that will compete in the music market. This website project will double as an incentive for potential investors and contractors.
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From the Ashes: The Beginning of Morsifire
John Andrew Seely
2019This project concerns the development of the Indie/Hip-Hop musical brand Morsifire through recorded material, live performance, and artistic branding. The project will see through the writing, recording, and mixing of an EP, live set creation using Ableton Live and full band, as well as visual branding. The goal is to fuse the genres of indie rock and hip-hop in with both recordings and live performance, as well as establish a strong digital footprint to propel Morsifire to the next stage of his career.
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Essence - EP
Atman Sheth
2019For his Cumulative Experience project as a part of the Music Production, Technology and Innovation Master’s program at Berklee College of Music, Atman Sheth produced an EP with 6 original songs incorporating different genres and music styles from around the world including influences of Indian Carnatic, Brazilian, West African, American Pop, Mediterranean, and Arabic styles fused with Electronic, Future bass, Trap and Ambient Chill music.
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Rosy Mercury - 5 Tracks EP About “Space Romance”
Zhang Siyuan
2019“Rosy Mercury” is a 5 track EP produced and vocal performed by Zhang Siyuan, featuring instrumentalists at Berklee Valencia. This EP is inspired by artists like Moses Sumney, Daniel Caesar and JMSN. During the process of production, Zhang Siyuan used his new skills such as analog synthesis, sound design and different recording techniques. He also conquered challenges of vocal recording and working in two DAWs for the same session. Finally, this EP is completed and he plans to release it in August 2019.
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Culminating Portfolio Website
Madly A. P. Stock
2019A personal professional website is essential for an audio engineer who wants to showcase their work and be accessible to potential clients. This is why Madly has chosen to build her own. Not only did she want to go through the process of designing her own website, she also wanted to work on the content that she was going to showcase onto it. Music that she has engineered, produced, mixed or mastered. In the timeline of this year, Madly had challenged herself to have at least 15 pieces of music that she would put on it, and ended up with more. This website will remain her official professional website as she enters the industry.
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Stroobz Electronic LoFi Hip-Hop: An EP and Producer Career Preparation Project
Matthew Struble
2019Matthew Struble’s Career Preparation CE project, is a hip-hop and bass music infused EP, in addition to the branding of Struble’s digital footprint under the producer name Stroobz. The EP consists of five electronic lo-fi hip-hop tracks utilizing newly learned techniques in sound design and vocalists from Berklee Valencia, Germany, New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. This EP will be showcasing Struble’s production in electronic lo-fi hip-hop, and will be highlighted on Stroobz.com, a website created by Struble to present work and skills to potential artists and employers in the New York City market. The goal of this project is to showcase the new-wave of Struble’s hip-hop sound, and establish a digital footprint and identity to his unique production style. With the need for a stable career upcoming on the horizon, Struble’s CE project will aim to provide proof of concept and a foundation for professional connections upon his graduation in 2019.
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Cultivating the Caymanian Music Industry: Recording and Mixing Engineer Portfolio
Jared Tibbetts
2019The motivation for this culminating experience project was the desire to develop and further the music industry in the Cayman Islands in conjunction with the author’s personal aspirations to further expand on their personal knowledge as a musician, producer and audio engineer. This culminating experience project consists of a recording and mixing portfolio, and the launch of a website and personal professional brand. The project required recording and mixing with different producers, artists, musicians and bands from different backgrounds and in different recording and acoustic environments, building connections and relationships with those people and creating new ideas for future projects. This project ultimately lays down the foundation for the authors long term business plan of opening a destination studio in the Cayman Islands. The project acts as a tribute to Charles Gregory, an iconic Caymanian musician, producer and audio engineer, and the author’s personal mentor who sadly passed away in September 2018.
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Please Rewind: An Instrumental EP
Nicol Wheeler
2019This project is an instrumental EP, consisting of five tracks which the author wrote, produced and mixed. The goal for the project was to create a complete project that would serve to showcase the author’s abilities as a musician, sound designer and engineer, in order to assist in the search for career opportunities after graduation. The project combined modern Hip Hop influences, with the author’s love for 1980’s era film soundtracks and their synth heavy scores, into a blend that highlights the music the author is passionate about, and how he can contribute to its creation.
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Singularity: A Visual EP Combining Live Studio Performance, Electronic Music Production, and Visual Projection
Issaya Whitesides
2019The Singularity project is a three part visual EP that displays electronic music production, live performance using drums, keyboards, MIDI controllers and visual projection to showcase a one- person band experience. Each video is a multi camera video that shows the performer from different angles performing live in the studio. The second and third videos include the elements of animation and visual projection, respectively.
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Iberoamérica Media Records Presents: Dios Perro, a Statement of Cultural Preservation
Marcelo Wilson
2019The present project consists of a full twelve songs album, with a specific common concept and aesthetic goal: to respond to unanswered questions regarding how Chilean popular music would have developed if the 1973 coup d’état, which resulted in seventeen years of military dictatorship and an ensuing cultural disaster, had never occurred. Because of this political intervention, the previously vibrant music scene in Chile was suddenly and deliberately persecuted. However, since the turn of the century, after decades of cultural obscurity, a new movement has come along and Chilean music is finally recovering its identity. The recorded songs attempt to not only imagine what the current cultural energy would be had its development not been cut off, but also to channel this into a new and exciting movement.
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Veo Valencia: An Experimental Approach to Capturing Sights and Sounds for Music Videos
Juan G. Zamora
2019This culminating experience project is an experimental approach to producing two music videos, each of a different style, that contain elements of field recordings, sound design, and original music with scenes from the city of Valencia, Spain that create interesting and compelling results. Both are titled Veo Valencia, and have Part I or Part II added to their title, respectively. Part I is a colorful and abstract look of Valencia that contains an original musical track produced in Ableton Live, titled, Mister Synther. With a visible difference in color, effects, and music, Part II is a more natural and clear way of viewing the city. It contains an original piano and strings music piece titled Endless Journey. The music videos do not contain professional actors or dancers, dialogue, or narration. Upon viewing them, the viewer will be brought into an artistic and creative world of hearing and seeing Valencia in an exciting and innovative way.