VENUE
School of MUSIC, University of LEEDS,
12 Cavendish Road, off Woodhouse Lane,
Leeds, LS2 9JT, UK
https://www.leeds.ac.uk/campusmap
https://what3words.com/motor.tubes.supper
ABOUT
SYNTHposium is a hybrid (in-person and online) event. Please register to be notified of the online link and for in-person attendance. Refreshments and catering will be provided during the day for ticket holders.
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Programme Schedule
09:30 Session 1 (UK time)
James Gardner – Portabella Markets: the design, productionisation, and pitching of the EMS Synthi A synthesiser
Mathew Dalgleish – Bending the Clock: Modular Synthesizers and Disabled Temporalities
Nikos Ordoulidis Bridging Tradition with Innovation: Eastward Modern Folk and the Electronic Keyboards
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[short break]
11:10 Session 2
Sean Williams – Early live synthesis – deriving archetypes from a case study
Andreas Kitzmann (& Kurt Thumlert) – Designing Sound Futures: building community through synthesis and music
Christopher King – Someone Else’s Patch, Notes on Xenorganology and Early Video Synthesizers
Gergely Loch – A Sample-and-Hold Armageddon: Ákos Rózmann’s Rhythms and Melodies
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[lunch break]
13:30 Session 3
Gianni Bencich-Grigore – Synthesising the unimagined: an addendum to the Birmingham Companion to East-West Politics
Simon Emmerson – The Fairlight CMI – between sampling, synthesis and composition
Paul Harkins – ‘Keeping the Machines Alive’: Repairing and Maintaining Digital Synthesizers
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[short break]
15:30 Session 4
Jess Blaise Ward – Making synthwave: using virtual synths to reimagine sounds of the 1980s
Will Frampton – Medieval Modular: This paper will explore how compositional techniques developed in European Medieval and Renaissance music can be (and are) applied to modular synthesizers with particular reference to the
keyboard-less Eurorack format
Mikko Ojanen – Digital daze in the analog era: tinkering with synthesizer technology as a form of counterculture in Finland in the 1960s and the 1970s
Will Bennett – Acid is an “Accident”: Starving Capacitors, Awful Interfaces, and the Roland TB-303
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[break for dinner]
18:00 Session 5
Pablo Galaz & Colin Frank – Hybrid Systems
Trudi Veremu – A 20-minute performance lecture by Trudi Veremu (Thelma Rose) using the rare EMS VCS4 to explore analogue synthesis as resistance and confirmation. Rooted in African Futurism, this work reclaims sound, machine, and voice as sites of survival, identity, and speculative becoming
Sippapas Thienwiwat – Two Feedback Studies
Brian Bridges & Stephen Roddy – Machine Times – Cybernetic Creativity in Modular Synthesis
James Dooley – formuls, an experimental synthesis-based touchscreen electronic musical instrument (EMI) for live performance and composition
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21:00 [Close]
ACCOMMODATION
Hotels near the venue:
Accor Business Hotels (inc discount code; search for “Leeds”)
Premier Inn – Leeds City Centre (Arena)
Roomz Aparthotel Leeds Headingley
TRANSPORT
Public car parking is available on campus (£7 for 12 hours; use the paystation on Cavendish Road, or on Level 1 of the multi-storey car park):
https://estates.leeds.ac.uk/our-services/car-parking/visitor-parking/
EV charging is free on Cavendish Road or Level 1 of the Multi-storey car park
Use the MONTA app to access EV chargers: https://monta.com/en/products/charge-app/
TRAIN
The nearest train station is: LEEDS (distance: approx 1 mile)
https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/
BUS
Several bus services run from Leeds city centre to the University
The cheapest bus is the Citybus Service 5 (£1) which runs from the Trinity N stop on Albion Street to LGI / Clarendon Way (get off at the LGI A&E stop)
Live bus times from Leeds Trinity N (Albion Street)
The easiest route is 24 from City Square E (Infirmary Street) bus stop to Holt Park which runs up Woodhouse Lane, directly past the university entrance.
Bus 24 timetable
Live bus times from Leeds City Square E (Infirmary Street)
RATIONALE AND THEMES
The synthesizer is an instrument with a long history that has played an important role in popular and experimental music from the late 1960s onwards. The Synthesizer Research Network (SyReN) will initiate dialogue and collaborations between musicians, academic researchers, non-academic scholars, software and hardware engineers, composers, and other expert groups. These different communities share a common interest in the history, design, or musical practice of synthesizers. SyReN aims to provide an organised route for exchange of knowledge between these groups to explore how we can expand our understanding of how synthesizers are used by musicians (both past and present) and potentially use that knowledge to inform the design of future instruments.
Suggested themes or questions for critical discussion fall into three key areas:
Synthesizer practice: performance, composition, sound design
- How has synthesizer performance practice evolved over time, within specific genres?
- To what extent is the full potential of specific instruments exploited by musicians?
- Do specific categories of synthesizer have archetypal sounds and styles of performance practice that can be defined?
- What gaps currently exist in our knowledge of synthesizer practice?
Industrial design and musical practice
- Do variations in synthesizer design have an impact upon musical practice?
- Why are certain parameters or functions used more than others by musicians?
- What are the musical impacts of changes to synthesizer specifications?
- What gaps exist in our knowledge of synthesizer design?
Exploring the history and music of the synthesizer
- Has the perception of the synthesizer changed over time within different academic, professional, industrial, and enthusiast communities?
- How may our view of the synthesizer be augmented by broader cultural studies, including (but not limited to): race, disability, gender, sexuality and social class?
- What gaps currently exist in synthesizer scholarship and musicology?
Additionally, the over-arching question for all SyReN activities will be:
How can the network enhance synthesizer research and facilitate new discoveries that will be valuable to musicians, academics, engineers, and non-academic experts?
Mailing List for future events and updates (click the ‘subscribe’ option):
https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/wa-jisc.exe?A0=SYREN
Synthesizer Research Network 