Trust Me, I'm An Expert: How augmented reality may one day make music a visual, interactive experience

You probably heard your first strains of music when you were in utero. From then on it’s helped you learn, helped you relax, hyped you up, helped you work, helped you exercise, helped you celebrate and helped you grieve.

Music is ingrained in so many aspect of our lives, but it’s also the subject of a significant body of academic work.

Today’s episode of Trust Me, I’m An Expert is all about research on music. We’ll be hearing from Dr Ben Swift, a digital artist and computer science lecturer from the Australian National University on how technology is changing the way we interact with music. Could it one day be something we experience through augmented reality, responding to the way we move through the world? Sound supplemented with colours and shapes?

And Conversation intern Juliana Yu spoke with Dr Clint Bracknell, a researcher at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music about how he’s investigating the power of song to help address the national and global crisis of Indigenous language-loss. He’s working on this research with Wirlomin Noongar Language and Stories Inc.

And we’ll hear from researcher Dr Hollis Taylor, most recently at Macquarie University, who has been studying, recording, and transcribing pied butcherbird song for 12 years. Taylor produces what she calls “re(compositions)” – musical arrangements that mimic and complement pied butcherbird song.

Trust Me I’m An Expert is a podcast from The Conversation, where we bring you stories, ideas and insights from the world of academic research. Special thanks today to Shelley Hepworth and Juliana Yu, as well as academics Hollis Taylor, Ben Swift and Clint Bracknell.

You can download previous episodes of Trust Me here. And please do check out other podcasts from The Conversation – including The Conversation US’ Heat and Light, about 1968 in the US, and The Anthill from The Conversation UK, as well as Media Files, a brand new podcast all about the media. You can find all our podcasts over here.

Additional audio

Kindergarten by Unkle Ho, from Elefant Traks

Svefn-g-englar by Sigur Ros

Green Lake, Victoria for soprano recorder and field recording by Hollis Taylor, Genevieve Lacey, recorder

Owen Springs Reserve 2014 for vibraphone and field recording by Hollis Taylor/Jon Rose, Claire Edwardes, vibraphone

Field recordings by Hollis Taylor

2 Adagio (Fantasia in C minor K 475 by W. A. Mozart) by NoLogic, from Free Music Archive

Procession by The Marian Circle Drum Brigade, from Free Music Archive

Svela Tal by Blue Dot Sessions, from Free Music Archive

Critters creeping Lee Rosevere Shimmering Still Water – Free Sound Archive

Asmodeus Redux by Ben Swift

Elder Brother by Ben Swift

The Illiac Suite by Hiller and Isaacson

Wirlomin members practicing old Noongar songs with the guidance of Henry Dabb, Gaye Roberts and the Wirlomin Elders Reference Group