New things, as promised!

Last month, I wrote about letting things go to make space for new things to arise. Although that process is still underway—my last day at Catalyst is this Friday, for example—I can now write publicly about some of said new things!

Personal news item #1: I've accepted an offer from the Wellesley College Music Department to serve as a Visiting Lecturer, where I'll teach four courses next year: A History of Jazz, American Popular Music, Introduction to Electronic and Computer Music, and Interactive Sound Art with Electronics. I'm excited for the new challenge and for the opportunity to rejoin the ranks of academia. This is a one-year, non-renewable position, which means that I'll also be spending much of the year ahead "on the job market" looking for other academic opportunities moving forward. I'm especially interested in finding work in the Spanish-speaking world—pues si conoces a alguien, o cualquiera opordunidad, ¡por favor avísame!

The other exciting new thing is that Mirlo has continued to grow—and we've just launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise money to keep the lights on and sustain the project through the rest of the year. Please spread the word and chip in if you can! You'll notice that one of the rewards is a one-hour Deep Listening session with yours truly. That will be an opportunity to learn from some of my most recent experiments and learnings over the past few years about how we can tune in and develop a deeper understanding of our relationship to sound, space, and one another—and in this case, the peculiarities of algorithmic mediation over the internet. You'll come away from the session having new insights into how your ears, mind, and heart work together to make incredible meaning out of tiny vibrations of particulate matter! OK, that's the end of my sales pitch 😛

Thank you, as always, for reading and listening along as these adventures unfold. I'm grateful to be back in a musical blogging rhythm again and look forward to keeping you all in the loop with whatever happens next. Friendly reminder that you can also follow updates on the album project, Somewhere Else!!!!, on Mirlo. You'll notice that I've created a new supporters-only album for project updates that will continue on a monthly basis:

Now to wrap up with some music: this month, I'm listening to Kamasi Washington's latest release, Fearless Movement. I've been an admirer of his since encountering his as part of the West Coast Get Down when I was living in LA and writing about the local jazz scene. It doesn't seem like that was ten years ago, but here we are ... anyway, enjoy their latest—maybe we can get them onto Mirlo soon!