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Tod Machover

Tod Machover Quotes

Composer

Tod Machover is a renowned composer known for his innovative work in electronic music and multimedia art. Born on November 24, 1953, he is a co-founder of the Boston Symphony Orchestra's Electronic Music Lab and a professor at the MIT Media Lab. Machover's compositions blend classical music, electronic music, and popular music, exploring the intersection of human emotion and technology through his creative work and performances.

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All Thinking Ifs Kind Way People Important Instruments Knows Music Is Composer Ideas Mind Opera Piano Play School Sound Technology Want Years

Famous Tod Machover Quotes

“When I was done with high school, I knew that music was really important to me and I knew I didn't want to be a cellist, but I wasn't really sure if I wanted to be a composer, or think about - I was just interested in the ideas behind music, I was interested in mathematics.”

Ifs Thinking Want Important Ideas Done Wanted School Behinds High School Mathematics Composer Cellists

Author:Tod Machover

“I think part of the bad thing is that skill is emphasized so much that a lot of people, by the time they get to Juilliard, well I think they kind of forget why they got into music in the first place and if they're performers - this is a simplification, but a lot of them are trying to win a competition and play more accurately, or better, or more beautifully, whatever can be measured, than somebody else.”

People Ifs Thinking Trying Firsts Wells Kind Play Winning Forget Skills Competition Bad Things Performers Simplification Juilliard

Author:Tod Machover

“I did take composition lessons when I was in high school, so I wrote piano pieces. I wrote some chamber music. I don't think any of that was particularly interesting.”

Thinking School Interesting Pieces Lessons High School Piano Composition Chamber Chamber Music

Author:Tod Machover

“I love silence. And one of the paradoxes about the way I live and also about my work is that definitely one of the reasons I went into music, and especially into composing is that I love setting up an environment where I can be by myself for long periods of time and have everything as quiet as possible, either to think about sound, or to think about ideas, or just to focus on things that are important to me.”

Thinking Way Long I Can Important Ideas Reason Sound Silence Environment Focus Periods Quiet Setting Settings Paradox Composing Long Periods Of Time Silence Love

Author:Tod Machover

“One of the things I like most of all is being in my study, in my barn, with absolutely no sound anywhere thinking about something. It's extremely important to me.”

Thinking Important Sound Study Barns

Author:Tod Machover

“I think it's maybe because Sergeant Pepper's came out when I was about 13 or 14 and that was a pretty impressionable age, and it was such a kind of radical period. But that period of the Beatles really had a big influence on me and I think are directly related to hyperinstruments.”

Thinking Kind Bigs Age Influence Periods Radical Related Peppers Sergeants Impressionable

Author:Tod Machover

“I think a double bass for me would be too much effort. But the cello, you're really engaged and the sound is kind of right here. So, it feels like being merged, married to an instrument.”

Thinking Feels Kind Would Be Sound Effort Too Much Married Instruments Engaged Bass Being Me Double Bass

Author:Tod Machover

“I think that one of the things about music is it's supposed to be spontaneous, it's supposed to be real human beings bouncing off of each other whether its from the stage or to the audience, or jamming with friends.”

Thinking Humans Real Human Beings Audience Stage Music Is Supposed To Be Being Real Spontaneous Real Human Be Spontaneous

Author:Tod Machover

“I think from age 13, 14, 15, I thought, yes, this rich studio produced music is the future, but it can't be the future to go run away into the recording studio. How can we take that kind of complexity and richness and make it possible for people to touch it and play it live. That's what hyperinstruments are.”

People Thinking Kind Play Running Age Rich Music Is Studios Complexity Running Away Richness Recording Studio

Author:Tod Machover

“I think the seed was planted when I was a teenager, and it took me until I got out of Juilliard. At Juilliard I was just learning to be a composer, but I was also learning how to manipulate computers.”

Thinking Computer Seeds Teenager Composer Manipulate Juilliard

Author:Tod Machover

“I started thinking, my gosh, all this sophisticated software for measuring how Yo-Yo plays, and how he moves and this technique of the bow, I should be able to use similar techniques for measuring the way anybody moves, and so somebody who is not a professional or a trained musician, I should be able to make a musical environment for them.”

Thinking Way Should Play Use Able Moving Environment Musician Musical Technique Software Bows Sophisticated Measuring

Author:Tod Machover

“I think in many ways, the texture of technology actually diminishes human beings. It doesn't augment them.”

Thinking Way Humans Human Beings Technology Diminish Texture

Author:Tod Machover

About the Author

Born: November 24, 1953
Known for: Composer
Quotes: 55

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