Research Catalogue

This artistic research exposition serves as a virtual presentation of the sound art installation, 'Welcome Children (Stay Small)', on view at 'The WaveCave: An Experimental Sound Space' at California Institute of the Arts within the Herb Alpert School of Music from September 14 - 20, 2025. Works: Welcome Children Color video with sound 14 minutes 19 seconds (loop) 2025 Stay Small Color video with sound 3 minutes (loop) 2025 Artist Statement: Welcome Children (Stay Small) is a multimedia installation exploring a series of manipulated Google Search images of diverse children, which are juxtaposed with moving images of a children’s night lamp. The images are concurrent with drones and reverberated audio samples, which sonically collide. Through the symbolism that sound and image provide, this installation highlights the inevitable reality of children losing their innocence in an imperfect world and the longing of so many of us to protect them from the harm of life and adulthood. Welcome Children (Stay Small) was inspired by the song “Stay Small” by former North American post-rock band, The Receiving End of Sirens, and the New Testament theological essay, “Jesus Loves the Little Children: A Theological Reading of Mark 9:14-29 for Children with Serious Illnesses or Disabilities and Their Caregivers”, written by Dr. Melanie Howard. It is important to note that from 2004 - 2018, I worked with children as a music teacher and Christian educator. I dedicate Welcome Children (Stay Small) to those who also work with children and seek to help them become resilient in the face of life’s pain and ambiguities.

Raschx is a series of mutational performances based upon two fundamental materials: Robert Schumann’s Kreisleriana op. 16 (1838), and Roland Barthes essays on the music of Schumann, particularly focusing on ‘Rasch’ (1979), a text exclusively dedicated to Schumann’s Kreisleriana. To these materials other components may be added for every single particular version: visual elements (pictures, videos), other texts, or further aural elements (recordings or live-electronics). The main goal is to generate an intricate network of aesthetic-epistemic cross-references, through which the listener has the freedom to focus on different layers of perception: be it on the music, on the texts being projected or read, on the images, or on the voices. Situated beyond ‘interpretation’, ‘hermeneutics’, and ‘aesthetics’ the series Raschx is part of a wider research on what might be labelled as experimental performance practices—practices that productively deviate from conventional (repetitive) performative strategies and that lend the audience to think during the performative moment, transforming familiar artistic objects into objects for thought.

Circus - posters, programs and other ephemera. Digital material donated by Cirkusakademien.

Andy Birtwistle’s introduction to this special issue addresses the question "what is sonic materiality?" by examining how both "new" and "old" materialisms offer productive frameworks for conceptualizing sound's material dimensions. Drawing on work by Cox, Voegelin, and Cobussen, alongside critiques from Goh, Thompson, and Campbell, the article proposes understanding sound's materiality through texture, temporal flow, and spatiality. By engaging with Structural/Materialist film theory and creative sonic practices, Birtwistle discusses how materiality intersects with aesthetics, agency, and ethics in sound. The introduction argues that exploring sonic materiality opens new avenues for understanding sound across environmental soundscapes, artistic practices, and cultural contexts.

Is the reality perceived by someone with dementia less real than our own? Can photography give authority to this alternate reality? This research, sparked by my newfound relationship with my dementia-affected grandfather Raymond, investigates the family album - often perceived as an unquestionable document - in order to uncover its ambiguities and to question photography in itself as the most trustful record of reality. The inaccuracy of a medium that aims for objectiveness and is perceived as the bearer of truth, leads me to focus on three different ways of approaching the family archive (collection, editing and manipulation) and the relationship between mortality and memory. By using a mix of photography and photogrammetry, Ray's distorted memories - as he recounted them during his illness - became new images in order to materialise his present parallel truth. Alongside this dreamlike everyday, what has survived of Ray's past is contained in a briefcase: 254 photographs that have been transformed into postcards, travelling keepsakes, ready to be sent. If photography is in itself unreliable, why should the reality of a person who has lost his memory be any less real than our own?

This project aims to explore the ability of playing by ear in order to design a creative and stimulating teaching approach for the development of the skill in piano lessons. The goal is to devise effective strategies for piano instructors, offering guidance on how to effectively advance the abilities of their students. Consistent with Woody’s ideas, playing by ear has been described by educators as a relevant developmental prerequisite to becoming a truly fluent music reader. Nevertheless, making sounds by ear is often just the initial and playful approach to music, and its significance diminishes considerably in education as the skill level increases. In fact, one must not forget the crucial role of the skill, that is the direct connection between music and player (without any interference like the score).