Curriculum Vitæ

Alexander Ness

Education

• Graduate
  • Currently a doctoral candidate in music composition and theory in New York University’s music department. ABD as of January 2010; Ph.D. expected in spring 2011.
    Dissertation: Uncommon Practice: Musical Reason in Radical Baroque Music Theory. Proposal defended on October 12, 2009.
  • Certificate from the American Institute of Indian Studies Advanced Hindi Language Program in Jaipur, summer 2008.
  • M.A. in music from New York University, 2007.
  • Participant in University of Wisconsin-Madison’s study-abroad program in Varanasi, India, 2004–05.
    Final project: transcriptions of ten dhrupad voice lessons, pedagogical materials in three ragas, and roughly thirty pages of tabla compositions.
• Undergraduate: A.B. magna cum laude in music from Harvard College, 2004.
  Senior thesis: The Lure of the Deep, a twenty-minute composition for fifteen players.

Teaching experience

• New York University
  • Teaching fellow of the Graduate Student Educational Development Program, summer 2009. I organized the following:
    • A workshop on the history of educational discipline.
    • A workshop on running a humanities recitation (with Meg Hammond, doctoral candidate in English).
    • A roundtable on classroom power dynamics.
  • Supervisor and administrator of the music department’s undergraduate theory program, 2008–09.
    • Developed curricular standards for the first-year course with Prof. Jairo Moreno.
    • Held teacher-training workshops for graduate students.
    • Set up an online resource to archive and discuss exams, syllabi, and teaching materials:
      http://nyumusic.pbwiki.com
  • Class instructor for a first-year harmony and counterpoint course, 2007–08; syllabi available on the site above.
  • Teaching assistant for a first-year harmony and counterpoint course, 2006–07.
  • Walden School for young musicians: three summers on faculty (2005–07). My courses have included musicianship, composition, North Indian music, and symmetric harmony.
• Harvard Extension School: teaching assistant for a semester-long introductory music theory course.

Expertise

• Computer languages
  • Proficient in SuperCollider, Max/MSP, CSound, and other programs for sound synthesis, editing, and mastering.
  • Working experience in Python and Perl for automated data processing, algorithmic composition, and media programming.
• Natural languages
  • General professional proficiency of Spanish and Hindi (speaking, reading, and writing).
  • Limited working proficiency of Urdu (reading).
• Instruments
  • Piano: proficient in figured bass realization, sight reading, and accompaniment.
  • Tabla: detailed knowledge of bols and rhythmic development formulas.
  • Laptop: extensive performance experience with improvised multimedia using SuperCollider.

Awards and honors

• Fellowships and teaching awards
  • Dean’s Dissertation Fellowship from New York University: 2010–11.
  • Dean’s Outstanding Graduate Student Teaching Award in the Humanities from New York University: 2009.
  • American Institute of Indian Studies graduate fellowship for summer language study: 2008.
  • MacCracken graduate fellowship from New York University: 2005–10.
  • Beebe Fund fellowship for study in India: 2004.
  • John Knowles Paine Traveling Fellowship from Harvard University: 2004.
• Composition awards
  • “Nocturne” won the MacColl prize from the Harvard music department: 2003.
  • A string quartet won Harvard’s Blodgett competition: 2002.

Papers

• “The Meaning of Musical Noise: Radical Dissonance in Eighteenth-Century Music Theory,” presented at the Noise and Sound in the Eighteenth Century conference at the Sorbonne nouvelle: 2009.
• “Uniform Diversity: The Common Myth of Tonal Progress,” published in the American Music Center newmusicbox (http://www.newmusicbox.org/article.nmbx?id=5801)

Recent compositions

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