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Curriculum Vitæ

Email asness@gmail.com
Web
http://nesssoftware.com/home/asn
http://vimeo.com/alexanderness
Phone 415-235-6744
Address
165 India Street
Apt. RA
Brooklyn, NY 11222

Education

Graduate

  • Currently a doctoral candidate in music composition and theory in New York University’s music department. ABD as of January 2010; Ph.D. expected in spring 2012.
    • Dissertation: Uncommon Practice: Musical Reason in Radical Baroque Music Theory. Proposal defended on October 12, 2009.
  • Certificate from the American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS) Advanced Hindi Language Program in Jaipur, summer 2008.
  • M.A. in music from New York University, 2007.
  • Participant in University of Wisconsin-Madison’s study-abroad program in Varanasi, India, 2004–05.
    • Final project: transcriptions of ten dhrupad voice lessons, pedagogical materials in three ragas, and roughly thirty pages of tabla compositions.

Undergraduate

  • A.B. magna cum laude in music from Harvard College, 2004.
    • Senior thesis: The Lure of the Deep, a twenty-minute composition for fifteen players.

Teaching experience

Eugene Lang College The New School for Liberal Arts

  • Class co-instructor (with Yoni Niv) for an undergraduate experimental music course, spring 2011.

New York University

  • Teaching fellow of the Graduate Student Educational Development Program, summer 2009. I organized the following:
    • A workshop on the history of educational discipline.
    • A workshop on running a humanities recitation (with Meg Hammond, doctoral candidate in English).
    • A roundtable on classroom power dynamics.
  • Supervisor and administrator of the music department’s undergraduate theory program, 2008–09.
    • I developed curricular standards for the first-year course with Prof. Jairo Moreno.
    • I held teacher-training workshops for graduate students.
    • I set up an online resource to archive and discuss exams, syllabi, and teaching materials: http://nyumusic.pbwiki.com
  • Class instructor for a first-year harmony and counterpoint course, 2007–08; syllabi available on the site above.
  • Teaching assistant for a first-year harmony and counterpoint course, 2006–07.

Walden School for Young Musicians

  • Three summers on faculty, 2005–07. My courses included musicianship, composition, North Indian music, and symmetric harmony.

Harvard Extension School

  • Teaching assistant for a semester-long introductory music theory course, spring 2004.

Work experience

ZAG (subsidiary of Bartle Bogle Hegarty)

  • Pedagogy and technology consultant for music education software (“Playground Sessions with David Sides”), summer 2010–present.
    • I designed the software’s music theory curriculum, which involved:
      • writing scripts for each lesson;
      • assisting in the video production of the lessons;
      • writing a textbook to supplement the videos.
    • I wrote Python scripts to automate the production of MusicXML files.

Expertise

Computer languages

  • Proficient in SuperCollider, Max/MSP, CSound, and other programs for sound synthesis, editing, and mastering.
  • Proficient in Python and command-line utilities for automated data processing, algorithmic composition, and media programming.
  • Detailed knowledge of the MusicXML file format.

Natural languages

  • General professional proficiency of Spanish and Hindi (speaking, reading, and writing).
  • Limited working proficiency of Urdu (reading).

Instruments

  • Piano: proficient in figured bass realization, sight reading, and accompaniment.
  • Tabla: detailed knowledge of bols and rhythmic development formulas.
  • Laptop: extensive performance experience with improvised multimedia using SuperCollider.

Awards and honors

Fellowships and teaching awards

Composition awards

  • “Nocturne” won the MacColl prize from the Harvard music department: 2003.
  • A string quartet won Harvard’s Blodgett competition: 2002.

Papers and presentations

  • “The Ethics of Approximation in Renaissance Tuning Theory,” presented at the American Musicological Society (AMS) conference as part of the “Sensible Number” panel: November 2011 (forthcoming)
  • “Style in the Light of Science,” presented at the 99th Annual Conference of the College Art Association (CAA): February 2011.
  • “The Meaning of Musical Noise: Radical Dissonance in Eighteenth-Century Music Theory,” presented at the Noise and Sound in the Eighteenth Century conference at the Sorbonne nouvelle: December 2009.
  • “Uniform Diversity: The Common Myth of Tonal Progress,” published in the American Music Center newmusicbox (http://www.newmusicbox.org/article.nmbx?id=5801)

Recent compositions

Date Title Instrumentation Musicians of première Length
2011 Interaction of Color video and four-channel synthesized sound   7 min.
Schismatics laptop orchestra PLOrk 10 min.
Thread Chorale (Third Version) viola, flute, piano four hands Talea Ensemble 12 min.
Thread Chorale (Second Version) violin, cello, double bass, trombone, piano Jane Chung, Jane Cords-O’Hara, Rebekah Griffin Greene, Terry Greene, Solon Gordon 12 min.
2010

Five audiovisual compositions (composed with Yoni Niv):

  1. Pressure
  2. Beating
  3. Subharmonics
  4. Feedback
  5. La Mer
 video scores, mixer, electric guitar, cymbal, steel plate, transducers, oscillators, contact mics, amps of varying price and quality, Alka-Selzer tablets, etc. Yoni Niv and Alex Ness 25 min.
Ideomania string quartet and video score Jack Quartet 10 min.
2009 Qāyadā video and six-channel synthesized sound   20 min.
Akousmetria sextet and video score Tom Blancarte, Nathan Davis, Peter Evans, Dan Peck, Meighan Stoops, and Kathering Young 12 min.
Thread Chorale (First Version) flute and violin Kylie Collins and Erica Ball 7 min.
2008 Xayāl flute and percussion Due East 6 min.
2007 Glass Drum solo cello Ha-Yang Kim 4 min.
Cycles soprano and small ensemble Emily Eagen and ICE  
Good Night alto flute, bass clarinet, violin and cello ICE