My Background
Jonathan N. Middleton
I am a modern day composer, published author of a composition textbook with Waveland Press, and sonification researcher with four published journal articles about data-to-music algorithms. I designed and launched the “musicalgorithms” software in 2004-05 with a Northwest Academic Computing Consortium grant. Since then I held research residencies at Stanford University (CCRMA 2007-08) and Tampere University (TAUCHI 2015-17). My work has both creative and analytical objectives with data-to-music sonification. I compose music and work with scientists and companies to hear their data. My collaborative research has been featured in Newsweek, the New York Times, Popular Science, Forbes, Oregon Broadcasting, and many other media outlets in the US and abroad. A description of my work was recently featured at a TEDx Spokane presentation made on September 28th, 2024.
I hold a DMA in music composition from Columbia University. I've been teaching music composition, theory, counterpoint, and orchestration at Eastern Washington University since 1999. My background in music theory and composition comes from studies at Hampshire College, UCSB, the Royal Conservatory of Liege, Belgium, and Columbia University with my mentors and sponsors Frederic Rzewski, Jonathan Kramer, and Fred Lerdahl. I've also studied with Ann Kerns, Dan Warner, Emma Lou Diemer, William Kraft, Lew Spratlan, and Tristan Murail. They taught me to think about music composition and theory from diverse perspectives. I've composed many works like Redwoods Symphony based on data to music transformations, which allows me to connect my musical expressions to the things I care deeply about. I also guided the cello metal band Apocalyptica in preparation for their work “Symphony of Extremes,," commissioned for Finland's centennial. They created a work from Finnish DNA sequences.
I hold a DMA in music composition from Columbia University. I've been teaching music composition, theory, counterpoint, and orchestration at Eastern Washington University since 1999. My background in music theory and composition comes from studies at Hampshire College, UCSB, the Royal Conservatory of Liege, Belgium, and Columbia University with my mentors and sponsors Frederic Rzewski, Jonathan Kramer, and Fred Lerdahl. I've also studied with Ann Kerns, Dan Warner, Emma Lou Diemer, William Kraft, Lew Spratlan, and Tristan Murail. They taught me to think about music composition and theory from diverse perspectives. I've composed many works like Redwoods Symphony based on data to music transformations, which allows me to connect my musical expressions to the things I care deeply about. I also guided the cello metal band Apocalyptica in preparation for their work “Symphony of Extremes,," commissioned for Finland's centennial. They created a work from Finnish DNA sequences.