Display of the amplitude of a single frequency as it changes with time. The result is a place that attracts students and visiting scholars with backgrounds in music as well as in electrical engineering, computer science, mathematics, psychology, and other fields. The influence of these multiple disciplines on music creates a vibrant atmosphere for research that could fundamentally alter the musical landscape. Simply put, it will do for the guitar what the synthesizer did for the piano's keyboard, but through the use of a technologically superior system that will likely be applied to other stringed instruments in the future. As a percussionist with a longtime devotion to jazz, he strives to develop systems that allow musicians the full freedom of improvisation.
Most machines are ill-adapted to an improvisation situation.
It is a real challenge to make them mutable, something you can transform. But the computers here can do that, and they're not cloistered in a studio. They're out there on stage, we're performing with them, and improvisation is a big part of what we do. Under Wessel's direction, it undoubtedly will continue to do so as students and scholars promote and realize creative interactions among music, science, and technology.