COURSE OUTLINE

Introduction to COMPUTER MUSIC

(timings are tentative)

Fall 2025

August 26

Introduction; format and goals of the course
Ways in which computers are used in music:

• sound analysis/synthesis
• composition
• notation
• recording
• music retrieving, etc.
Computer Music centers, organizations, venues.
• C`omputer Music Center vs DAW
• Computer Music at Illinois
• "James W. Beauchamp" Computer Music Project

August 28 - September 9

Brief history of Electro-acoustic Music and Computer Music in particular:
Analog electro-acoustic music.

Assignment: chart "Chemins de fer" due 9/2
An overview of selected digital synthesis methods.

• Vocoder
• LPC
• FM
• subtractive
• granular
• physical modeling, etc.
Reading assignment: Jeffrey Haas, chapter 6, due 9/9

September 11 - 18

Elements of acoustics and psychoacoustics

• Sound waves, sound parameters; sampling rate, the Nyquist criterion
  
• Overtones and partials; wave shapes; Fourier analysis, additive synthesis.
  
• Tuning and scales
  
  Reading assignment: Jeffrey Haas, from chapter 1, due 9/16
• Beats, critical band, consonance and dissonance; difference tones
  
• Rameau's harmony
  
• Helmholtz and the perception of timbre.
  
• Power and loudness; Fletcher-Munson curves; dB, phons, and sones
  
  Reading assignment: Jeffrey Haas, from Appendix X, due 9/18
  Assignment: acoustics - due 9/23

About computers
• representation of numbers; integers and floats
• Operating Systems languages; compilers:
• representation of sound waves; sampling rate, formats
• Object-oriented programming and C++
  
UNIX/Linux
• logins, passwords;
• directories and files;
• basic UNIX commands (ls, cat, more, cd, mkdir, rm, rmdir, etc.), sftp, ssh, putty, winscp
• available editors (atom, emacs, gedit, vi/vim, nano)
• Audacity

September 30 - October 2

Introduction to DISSCO
• Computer-assisted Composition and Additive Sound Synthesis
• three modules: CMOD, LASS and LASSIE
• tutorial synthesis

The view from CMOD
• DAG (tree) structure; Events
• parent-children-sibling relationships (Matrioshka)
• functions
Determinism and Probability
• Select and Random functions
• Manifold compositions
Controls
• Spectrum; envelopes; EnvLib
Assignment 5: spectra - due 10/14
• frequency, loudness, spatialization and reverberation
Assignment 6: spatialization and reverb - due 10/21
• Modifiers
  • FM - vibrato
  • AM - tremolo
  • glissando
  • AM and FM transients
• Continuum and Sweep

Aesthetics and C-aC
• C-aC historical examples
• other compositional methods
• Random Walks, Brownian mothion, 1/f noise, fractals
• Game heory
• Cellular automata, etc.
Reading assignment 4: Brun article - due 11/04
• Constructing a piece
• Herbert Brun article

Utilities
• Markov Model Library
Assignment 8: Markov chains - due 11/11
• Stochos
Assignment 9: plan for your Final project - due 11/13
• ValueCheck
• sieves
Assignment 10: sieves - due 11/20
• DETUNE

THANKSGIVING BREAK

December 2 - 9

Final projects: lab
Assignment 11: first draft - due 12/2
• patterns
• Lab: work on final projects
  Assignment 12: Final draft - due 12/9
• Lab: refine final projects

Presentations of the final project: December 16, 8-11 am

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