Music lecturer challenges global arts community

School of Music lecturer John Coulter is challenging the global arts community on what it means to be a 21st century musician.

Ground-breaking work by John Coulter, and prospective PhD candidates, Jasmine Chen, Alex Bennett, and David Rylands show how new technologies are extending capabilities of musical instruments and changing the face of composition and performance.

John says: “The paradigm incorporates note and sound-based methods of composition, advanced sound recording, digital/hyper-instrument design, live performance, sound with moving images, electro-acoustic music studies, and research. The approach facilitates the needs of the ‘21st century musician’, supporting men and women who perform, compos, make use of technology, and who use their individual and collective heritage as a source of musical inspiration. The concept embodies the total musical experience, offering an alternative to the 19th century conservatorium model that is still in popular use inmany Schools of Musicthroughout the world.

“Hyper-instruments and integration of real-time performance technologies is enabling composers to tangibly achieve creative ideals that until now have been just out of reach,” he says.

Composers are now able to create and perform their own works while maintaining live control of sound and 3-dimensional space. Using gestural control systems, the modern composer-performer can access a range of sounds and images in real time, blurring the boundaries between visual arts, musical composition, and performance.

John’s own Speaking Stick, a hollowed manuka branch combined with wireless digital technologies, emits rich and deep bassoon-like tones, as well as the sounds of the New Zealand forest, as it is played and moved about the stage.

Head of School Professor Robert Constable is a strong advocate of the new technologies and their application to serious music composition. “This type of work is at the cutting edge of international best practice in the field,” he says.

Research in the field of gestural control/haptics is also being carried out within the Dance Studies Programme and Elam School of Fine Arts, at the National Institute of Creative Arts and Industries, which is providing exciting interdisciplinary opportunities for staff and students.

“The 21st century is an exciting time to be a musician” says John. “We have only just begun to explore the creative possibilities.”

The University of Auckland’s National Institute of Creative Arts and Industries comprises the School of Architecture and Planning, Elam School of Fine Arts, the Centre for New Zealand Art Research and Discovery (CNZARD), the School of Music and the Dance Studies Programme.
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