Student and visitor projects

Students thinking of enrolling in Music 254 often want to know what scope previous research projects have had. As the following list demonstrates, projects are highly varied but also highly rewarding. Many lead to continued development beyond the course itself through independent studies, theses, and (rarely) outside development.

• Bret Aarden (M.A., Ph.D. music cognition, Ohio State University). Musical data translation (MuseData Humdrum **kern format); set up global-positioning software to link musical features with appropriate locales on digital maps (1999). Teaching music at New College of Florida (Sarasota).

• Emiko Arai (M.S., Music, Science, and Technology). Representation and analysis of gagaku (Japanese classical ensemble music). Working in Japanese electronic games industry.

• Ryan Blitstein (B.A., symbolic systems program). Special interest in topics related to music cognition. Contributing editor to the online public-policy magazine Miller-McCune. Some free-lance writing on music technology interleaved with articles for Red Herring, the New York Times, and other publications.

• John Brenneise (audio and graphics design engineer, 2002-05 visitor) developed a score viewer (DMuse) for MuseData electronic scores encoded at CCARH. Develops hardware interfaces at Silicon Image.

• Arbee Chen (Computer Science, Tsing Hua University, Taiwan, 2003-05 visitor) developed song-database search architectures as part of an ongoing series of projects. Prolific author on methods of mining very large databases.

• Parag Chordia (Ph.D., computer-based music theory, 1999-2004) studied problems of representing North Indian classical music, particularly for sarod and tabla, in systems for computer analysis. Assistant professor, Georgia Institute of Technology. Creator of LaDiDa (reverse karaoke software for the iphone).

• Lonny Chu (Ph.D., computer-based music theory, 1997-2000) worked on stylistic analysis of Beatles songs using MIDI files. Furiant (user-experience) consultant.

• Luke Dahl (Ph.D., computer based music theory, in progress). Coordination of musical and human-movement data.

• Sachiko Deguchi (visiting scholar, 2001-02) worked on the analysis of koto melodic patterns, a database of koto scores in the Humdrum format, and the analysis of koto sounds. Now teaching at Kinki University, Tokyo, and active in SIGMUS, the Japanese special-interest group for music.

• Andrew Einaudi (B.A., symbolic systems program; independent research, 1998) studied pitch-tracking systems with a view towards developing vocal input for MIDI software. Now working at SlingGlide (DVR anywhere).

• Jon Frank (B.A., Symbolic Systems Program, 2004-05) worked on the analysis and resynthesis of melodies from compositions of J. S. Bach. Software developer at Spock.

• Takuya Fujishima (M.A.; visiting researcher, 1998) investigated vibrato effects in vocal music of diverse cultures with a view towards humanizing synthesized instrument sounds. Subsequent projects in pitch estimation, sound and timbral analysis at Yamaha Corp. Active in SIGMUS, the Japanese special-interest group for music.

• Dan Gang (visiting Ph.D. candidate in computer science, Jerusalem University, 1999). Frequent collaborator with Jonathan Berger (professor, CCRMA, and co-director of the Stanford Institute for Creativity and the Arts) on neural-net models of harmonic and rhythmic expectation. Now in the computer science department at Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

• Anthony Guazzo (M.Sc., electrical engineering, 2003) investigated methods for searching online music files in audio formats. Later worked at Apple Inc.

• Rob Hamilton (M.A. Composition, M.S., Music, Science, and Technology; Ph.D. computer-based music theory). Adaptation of hardware-specific cues for interactive electro-acoustic music to software specifications compatible with open-source systems. Built the online score generator for Smule's popular Ocarina iphone app (and much else).

• Baoqiang Han (Assistant Director, Chinese Academy of Art Music, Beijing; visitor, 2001) created an online museum of Chinese musical instruments.

• Walter B. Hewlett (DMA, M.Sc. Stanford University; consulting professor, 1994 to present). Chief architect of the MuseData electronic scores project and associated schemes for data encoding, display, and printing software. See http://www.musedata.org.

• Douglas R. Hofstadter (visiting Professor of Cognitive Studies from Indiana University, 1998). Organized a symposium on (human) musical creativity and musical style featuring the music of David Cope, UC Santa Cruz. The proceedings are published with additions under the title Virtual Music (2001).

• David Huron (visiting professor, music cognition, Music Cognition Lab, Ohio State University, numerous visits since 1994). Initiator of the Humdrum Toolkit and such derivatives as Themefinder (both substantially expanded at CCARH; see http://humdrum.ccarh.org/) and http://www.musiccog.ohio-state.edu/CSM_lab.html.

• Shyh-Kang Jeng (Taiwan National University, visiting professor of electrical engineering, 1999). Studied systems of representing music in conjunction with studies of brass synthesis.

• Seung-Beom Kim (M.S., Electrical Engineering) studied harmonic properties of non-harmonic tones. Engaged in entertainment media analysis.

• Andreas Kornstaedt (Ph.D., computer science, Hamburg University, 2000; intermittent visits through 2009). Extended the Humdrum **kern representation to capture graphical information acquired from SCORE notation files. Frequent collaborator on musical data translation, Themefinder, JRing [=Java Ring] program for score search and annotation soon to be available.

• Arvindh Krishnaswamy (Ph.D., audio engineering). Pitch-tracking of South Indian classical (Carnatic) music. Audio scientist, Apple Inc.

• Pedro Kröger (Bahia University, Brazil, visiting professor of computer music in 2009-10). Involved in the development of Humdrum tools (in lisp) and documentation, especially for harmonic analysis.

• Randall Leistikow (Ph.D. candidate, CCRMA, 1999-2004). Developed procedures for converting graphics output from MuseData software to performing parts viewable on the web. Later worked on transcription software for Zimpf Labs.

• Wei-Ling George Liu (M.A. candidate, Management Science & Engineering, 2000) developed a visual keyboard input for Themefinder. Now working in venture capital firm.

• Yi-Wen Jacob Liu (Ph.D candidate, EE, 2002) employed information theory to differentiate the closely related musical styles of Haydn and Mozart and, with Craig Sapp, developed the Haydn-Mozart Quartet Quiz (qq.themefinder.org). Engaged in scientific research on hearing and its remediation at Boystown USA (Omaha, NB).

• Oscar Madrigal (Ph.D. candidate in CS, robotics, 1999). Explored methods of accessing MIDI data using a protopyical three-dimensional joystick.

• Jim McCarthy (music education, Western Michigan University; visiting scholar 1999) investigated systems of linking real-time input of sound and notation with pedagogical tools for distance learning of music theory.

• Eric Miller (B.A., , symbolic systems, 1999) designed algorithms for chordal analysis with a view towards implementing them in pedagogical applications.

• Lincoln Myers (B.Sc., computer science, UC Berkeley, 1995) implemented elements of the Essen Musical Analysis Package in Unix using perl scripts.

• Steve Myers (M.S., mechanical engineering, 1998) studied cues to mood change in recorded music and used his findings to drive prototypical laser-driven home-entertainment systems.

• Unjung Nam (Ph.D., Center for Research in Music and Acoustics, 1999). Explored problems of representing Korean court music for transcription and analysis. Now teaching in Korea.

• Erik Neuenschwander (B.A., Symbolic Systems; M.A., Philosophy, 2000) investigated the representation of musical notation with a view towards developing new visual representations of music.

• Jieun Oh (B.A., symbolic systems, 2007; Ph.D. in computer-based music theory in progress). Projects related to rhythmic perception.

• Rafael Ornes (D.M.A. candidate, music). Investigations of online distribution for performing repertory led him to establish and maintain until 2008 the Choral Public Domain Library, now succeeded by the ChoralWiki.

• Akiko Orita (visiting M.A. candidate, management studies, Keio University, 1998; subsequent Ph.D.). Explored the influence of sound tracks on visual and "story" perception in computer animations. Assistant professor, Keio University (research) and Chuo University (teaching).

• Benjamin Ory (Ph.D. candidate, Stanford). Studies in sixteenth-century music. Assistant Prof., Music, Williams College.

• Patrick Perry (Ph.D. student, Mathematics/Computer Science, 2004). Examined low-dimensional projections of high-dimensional descriptions of melodies. Current post-doc in the Statistics and Information Lab, Harvard University.

• Michael Peterson (B.A., M.A., mathematics/music, 2007). Tuning systems used in harpsichord music of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

• Laurent Pugin (Ph.D., Univ. of Geneva, 2013 et al.). Adapted Themefinder search engine to the needs of RISM (global music-manuscript indexing project. Now heads the Berne (CH) RISM Digital office.

• Hendrik Purwins (visiting Ph.D. candidate, mathematics and neural computing, Technical University, Berlin, 1999). Investigated geometrical models of tonal harmony and their relationship to auditory processing. Currently a researcher in the Music Technology Group, Pompeu Fabra Unvieresity, Barcelona.

• Mauricio Rodriguez (Ph.D., composition; M.S., Music, Science, and Technology, 2010). Notation systems for algorithmic composition. Associated software for interactive analysis.

• Christian Romming (M.S., computer science, 2007). Geometrical analysis of polyphonic music and related approaches to music information retrieval. Software engineer, Trovix Inc.

• Michael Ross (B.A., symbolic systems, 1998) studied flexible models of listening using multiple cognitive agents.

• Craig Stuart Sapp (Ph.D. candidate, CCRMA; TA for Music 253 and 254). Influential developer of such music software tools (the Humdrum Toolkit, revised and extended in C++) and repositories (KernScores, Themefinder, MuseData, the Essen Data Collection online). Originator of keyscapes (harmonic analysis of symbolic data) and time-scapes (analysis). See KernScores (http://kern.ccarh.org/), the tonal Landscape Gallery (http://ccrma.stanford.edu/~craig/keyscape/), Themefinder (http://www.themefinder.org/), the US-RISM music-search database (http://rism.themefinder.org), and the open-source code site MuseInfo (http://extras.humdrum.org/http://museinfo.sapp.org/).

• Rodrigo Segnini (Ph.D. candidate, CCRMA, 2003). Employed the International Phonetics Alphabet to facilitate spoken searches of stored music. Later post-doc at NTT Labs, Japan. Now in management at Siemens' Healthcare division.

• Naeim Semsarilar (M.S., Computer Science, 2007). A bar-code approach to music encoding. OpenXML.

• Jane Singer (Ph. D., music, Jerusalem University, 2000-04). Cognitive procedures for refining and generalizing melodic-search software with a test repertory of Yiddish songs.

• Lloyd Smith (computer science, visiting from Waikato University, NZ, 1997) worked on melodic-matching algorithms in conjunction with the development of the Web-based MELDEX search tool. Moved to New Mexico Highlands University.

• Leigh VanHandel (Ph.D. candidate, CCRMA, 1997) studied the setting of texts by Goethe in Schubert Lieder using Humdrum tools. Assistant professor, music theory and cognition, Michigan State University. Now Assoc. Prof., University of Victoria, BC.

• Paul von Hippel (Ph.D., computer-based music theory, 2002). Statistical approaches to the analysis of melody and voice leading. Ph.D., in Statistics, Ohio State University, 2010.

• Akiko Washino (Ph.D. candidate teaching at Fukuoka Prefectural University, 2018). Research in performance styles in piano-rolls).

Yukiko Yoden (Ph.D. candidate, Toyko University of the Arts, 2019). Symbolic representation of PhotoPlay scores (early film lead sheets).

• Woon Yeo (Ph.D. candidate, CCRMA, 2003) explored methods of interchanging data between MIDI and MusicXML.