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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INTNSE
Dana Fakhoury
2019The project entitled “INTNSE” deriving from the word intensity. The grammar writing was changed for personal and esthetical reasons. “INTNSE” was Dana Fakhoury’s music production portfolio as Earlybird during her year spent at Berklee College of Music. It included a full branded show-reel portfolio that samples some of the producer’s best work in a creative and easily accessible manner through a website. The purpose was to feature her on the music market as an up and coming producer, artist, mix engineer, and a live programmer for Ableton. In the future the author would like to perform her own set as well as collaborative sets live and help artist reach their ultimate goal in production.
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Astral Voyage: The Big Electric Orchestra
Jason Faust
2019Astral Voyage: The Big Electric Orchestra is a thirty-nine piece ensemble that performs a fourteen movement original suite of music called Our Heart. This music blends the jazz of the past with the technology of the present, creating a unique sound of the future. The concept of the suite is based on the seven chakras of the human spirit and takes one on a journey through the cosmos and the essence of the human condition.
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EXLO: Play Your Surroundings
Meghan Gaudet
2019EXLO is a hardware/software-based system that can turn any surface into a musical instrument or controller. EXLO technology gives life to inanimate objects by enabling them to be used to create music. Producers and performers will no longer be confined by the layouts of traditional controllers; they will instead be able to incorporate their ideal workflow into their existing workspace. The EXLO system is driven by a piezo sensor, or contact microphone, which translates physical vibrations into an electrical current. EXLO’s custom software runs in the visual programming environment Max. The software analyzes vibration data from the EXLO sensor and uses the data to manipulate an organic sound as well as trigger synthesized sounds when familiar gestures are detected. The synthesized sound source can be any Digital Audio Workspace (DAW) that accepts messages of the Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) protocol.
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R. Glade Music: A Digital Portfolio of Professional Studio Services
Robert Glade
2019A digital portfolio website will be launched and continuously updated, featuring content produced by R. Glade Music, either in part or exclusively, including video, audio, and images, centered around professional studio services. The intended audience of this digital portfolio is primarily future employers, including: music performance solutions teams, recording studio managers, festival bookers, and university faculty. Peripheral audiences for the digital portfolio include artistic collaborators, like-minded researchers, and fans of R. Glade Music’s productions.
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Hugh Harsher - off the beaten track: The Creative Process of an Eight Track Album
Hugo Herber
2019This CE project consists of Hugh Herber’s second album off the beaten track, that contains eight tracks of original music. The album merges organic instruments with electronic music production and it glues together genres like trip hop, chillout, ambient, fusion, rock, world, and EDM to form what Hugh calls “progressive trip hop.” His latest work will be released on all streaming platforms as well as a limited tape cassette edition in late 2019.
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Iter Musicis
Varnavas Koromias
2019This CE consists of an EP titled “Iter Musicis”, Latin for “Music trek”, which signifies a musical journey. As such, the scope of this project is to engage the listener in a melodious venture. This is done by combining the composer’s influences into a blend of progressive rock/metal, electronic, and classical music. In turn, the music is accompanied by oscilloscope visuals which are programmed using 3D modeling and sound design. The visuals accompanying the tracks revolve around the composer’s reflections on his own compositions and what imagery they bring forth when listened to by the artist. The tracks featured in this EP will be part of a full-length album. By completing this project, the composer has gained experience in composition, sound design, mixing, as well as 3D and 2D modeling.
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EMERGING: Discovering My Style as a Multimedia Artist and Collaborator
Joyce Lindsey
2019Emerging is a multimedia performance that involves the improvisation and communication between the movement of dancers and visual synthesis, ambient, electronic West-African and Afro-Cuban music and live percussion triggered and manipulated by a live musician. Emerging is the result of Joyce Lindsey’s exploration in finding her style as a multimedia artist and collaborator. She aims to provide experiences where she can combine her skills as a sound designer, composer, percussionist and visual artist, in service to collaborating with choreographers and filmmakers to actualize the vision and/or theme they seek to express in their work.
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Filtering Chaos: an Audio/Visual Performance
Vasileios Malamas
2019Filtering Chaos is an Audio/Visual (A/V) Performance. The idea of the project is to reveal the need of filtering different kinds of urban life noises in order to achieve a point of balance and harmony. The composition consists of a real-time A/V Setup, centralized around a computer that handles all the audio and video content. Most of the sounds and visuals are pre-recorded and pre-rendered, which means that the performance is focuses on the manipulation and control of the content. There were a lot of technical challenges during the creation of the piece, but the main challenge was to find the way of delivering the message in the most interesting and compelling way. Fortunately, the project was successfully implemented with a lot of promising comments for the future.
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Paradise Divide: The Evolution & Exploration of an Artistic Identity
Celestine Manno
2019Paradise Divide is a 5 track EP that tells emotive stories of transition and growth, accompanied by complete artist branding. The goal is to combine authentic lyrical storytelling with original sound design and production to develop a fusion of genres and a sonic journey that ultimately leads to the artistic presence of Celestine. This “identity” is complete with branding, two separate EP releases, a performance portfolio, and a documented live debut of the new EP. Between the business elements of release, the struggle of songwriting, and the difficulty of learning a new DAW, there were a lot of challenges along the way. However, now the project can be used as a portfolio to pursue music after Berklee.
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Virtual Reality Meets Spatial Audio: A VR experience created with 360° video and spatial audio
Claudia Marcela Rada
2019The goals of this CE are to create a portfolio piece that illustrates proficient knowledge of spatial audio recording and mixing techniques, and to demonstrate the relevance of the use of spatial audio in today’s entertainment forms. The project consists of making a virtual reality (VR) experience through the use of 360° video and audio recordings of live musical performances. The user is taken to a space where they are able to rotate and see the room in a full circle; their movement is tracked so the effects of spatial audio can be heard through headphones. The challenges encountered included the time-consuming process of stitching and rendering 360° videos and finding platforms that support high order ambisonics. This CE showcases the effectiveness of spatial audio as a medium to create realistic experiences and in the future this research will be used to develop a course to teach ambisonics.
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Electro Shock
Javier Martin Arcos
2019This paper will discuss Javier Martin’s contribution to “Electro Shock”, the final project for his Master’s degree in Music Production, Technology and Innovation. Electro Shock is a collaborative project between two peer students, Javier Martin and Leanne Moser, based on the idea of experimenting with mixing EDM and rock music. It will be presented as an EP containing 4 songs and also as an audiovisual set, with interactive live performance and original visuals. Javier’s official part in the project was to mix Leanne’s Rock demos and blend them with his own electronic parts. He found it difficult to remix them without diminishing their strong social messages and their old structure. But with an open mind and respect for the demos, Javier gained skills in the field of mixing several new instruments and musical styles and Electro Shock was completed successfully and showcased proudly during his final Master’s defense.
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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.