Christopher Lock (lock-music.com) is an electronic musician, creative programmer, violist, film composer, and educator currently based in Asheville, NC. He creates densely textural electronic music which slowly mutates and morphs over time and is often saturated with abstract imagery of the natural world and biological phantasmagoria. His unique musical practice is a synthesis of traditions ranging from Baltimore area noise and experimental music, where he first started working with sound, to his background as a modern classical Violist.
Throughout his education Christopher has been fortunate to study with such musical visionaries as Esperanza Spalding, Meredith Monk, Vijay Iyer, Claire Chase, Tod Machover, Thomas Dolby, Chaya Czernowin, Hans Tutschku.
Christopher has released his music on labels such as Reset Networks (India), Beautiful Machines (MA), Ex_Log Records (Bay Area), Protomaterial Records (Spain), Geryon (NYC), and Idolatrous Records (NYC). He has worked with world renowned ensembles such as Ensemble Recherche, Tak Ensemble, Ensemble WasteLAnd, Switch~ Ensemble, Elision Ensemble, Line Upon Line, and Wet Ink.
In the spring of 2022 Christopher was the appointed Teaching Fellow for Esperanza Spalding’s Songwright's Apothecary Lab at Harvard University where he worked with Prof. Spalding and the students intimately during the semester to develop a concert program of new original works.
Christopher is an active composer of film music and has worked with artists such as Ezekiel Goodman (I Know What You Did Last Summer) and Robert Eng (Mulholland Drive, Twin Peaks, Corroline). In January of 2022 Christopher composed original music for Giovanna Molina's Deer Girl which was an official selection for the Sundance Institute's Ignite x Adobe Fellowship.
In the summer of 2019 his audio/visual work, in collaboration with his grandmother (also called Chris Lock), was screened at the Venice Biennale from May 8th to June 4th. The video was projected in the Palazzo Pesaro Papafava as part of the UK's Alive In The Universe project.
In April of 2022 Christopher produced and performed original electronic music for LuChen's debut runway show in Manhattan, which was later reviewed positively by Vogue Magazine, Fashion Week, and other major publications.
In Fall 2022/January 2023, Christopher was the Research Assistant to Claire Chase (flutist). During this appointment he implemented the mobile (IOS), interactive music technology AUMI (Adaptive Use Musical Instrument) for Chase’s Day Of Listening at Carnegie Hall. This technology allowed members of the audience, with no prior musical training, to participate in electronic music on stage at Carnegie Hall simply by moving their bodies in front of iPads.
Christopher's recent creative activities range from solo concerts to large scale collaborations across multiple disciplines. In Fall of 2023 he was a collaborator on the Organology project with Jessica Shand and Manuel Cherep (both graduate students under Tod Machover, MIT Opera Of The Future), which premiered at the MIT Media Lab. This project used bio-data from sensors attached to the performers in order to control synthesizers in Max/MSP. The team used incoming streams of data from multiple healthcare devices including a breathing band, heart monitor, body temperature thermometer, etc to control audio parameters within our software and to inform the overall contour of the piece.
Christopher received his Ph.D in Music Composition (with supporting courses in Computer Science at the Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences) at Harvard University. His dissertation, “Resonant Simulacra: Building Artificially Intelligent Instruments, A Portfolio of Musical Compositions, and a Self-Analysis of a Cybernetic Workstream,” documents the development and implementation processes of his recent techno-musical endeavors. The dissertation focuses partially on building artificially intelligent musical instruments using Small Data. He holds a Master’s Degree in Music from Harvard, a Bachelor's Degree in Computer Music from Johns Hopkins University (Peabody Conservatory), and a second Bachelor's degree in Viola Performance (also from Hopkins).
Research Interests:
- Music software development, machine learning, data sonification, creative programming
- AI music theory, ethics of AI art, Small Data
- GNU/Linux and Free Software for music making
- Accessiblity and democratization of electronic music/composition pedagogy
- Computer-aided composition, modern recording and studio production techniques
- Electroacoustic composition, improvisation with viola, contemporary classical music, electronic musicianship
- Digital humanities, new media practices, media theory
- Film and new media composition, cross-discipline collaboration practices and techniques
Quotes:
"Slow, poetic energy, drenched in beauty" - Chaya Czernowin
"Moody glamour" - Fashion Week Magazine
"A masterclass in electronic music production, showcasing Christopher Lock’s ability to blend organic and electronic elements into a cohesive and compelling whole." - Parkett Magazine
"With all the strength necessary to provide a soundtrack to the entrance to hell." - Miusyk.com
"Music theory terms of pitch and harmony are dropped from the vocabulary and priority is given to colour and pulse." - Hör Bar Neue Musikzeitung
"Gorgeous string arrangements and computer music sophistication intertwine with cohesive inventiveness." - Obscure Sound
Awards:
2024 - George Arthur Knight Prize for Original Composition (Harvard University)
2023 - Barbera Natterson and Zachary Horowitz Graduate Student Dissertation Fellowship Fund
2023 - The Bohemians Award (New York Musicians Club, Harvard University)
2021 - Derek Bok Center Excellence in Teaching Award (Harvard University)
2020 - Helen L. and Benjamin J. Buttenweiser Scholarship Fund (Harvard University, GSAS)
2020 - The French Fellowship (Harvard University)
2020 - The Wesley Weyman Fund (Harvard University)
2013 - Marge and Chuck Levin Endowed Scholarship Fund -(Johns Hopkins University)
2012 - National Symphony Orchestra Young Associate (NSO, Kennedy Center)
Links:
Email: chris.lock.music@gmail.com
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