Thomas Patteson is a scholar and musician who studies experimental and electronic music and their connections to intellectual history, technology, and society. Thomas is Professor of Music History at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where he has been a member of the faculty since 2013. He has studied at New College of Florida, the University of Cologne, and at the University of Pennsylvania.
He is the author of Instruments for New Music (University of California Press, 2016), a study of the musical, social, and political ramifications of experimental sound technologies developed in Germany during the Weimar Republic. His book received the 2017 Lewis Lockwood Award from the American Musicological Society, which recognizes "a musicological book of exceptional merit produced by a scholar in the early stages of their career."
Thomas' current research project explores the idea of self-generating music--from centuries-old phenomena such as change ringing and Aeolian harps to modern approaches to improvisation, indeterminacy, and algorithmic music--and seeks to illuminate these practices with the aid of discourses in cybernetics, systems theory, and post-humanism.
An avid supporter of the digital humanities, Thomas was the author of the music blog Acousmata (2009-2013) and is co-curator of the Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments, an online archive of speculative organology.
Beyond his scholarly work, Thomas is actively involved in the Philadelphia music scene. He is an associate curator at Bowerbird, where he helped launch the Arcana New Music Ensemble in 2016, and has also collaborated extensively with the experimental art platform <fidget>. As a musician, Thomas' primary instrument is the modular synthesizer, and he performs in the duo act Argyle Torah with vocalist Aaron Pond.
He is the author of Instruments for New Music (University of California Press, 2016), a study of the musical, social, and political ramifications of experimental sound technologies developed in Germany during the Weimar Republic. His book received the 2017 Lewis Lockwood Award from the American Musicological Society, which recognizes "a musicological book of exceptional merit produced by a scholar in the early stages of their career."
Thomas' current research project explores the idea of self-generating music--from centuries-old phenomena such as change ringing and Aeolian harps to modern approaches to improvisation, indeterminacy, and algorithmic music--and seeks to illuminate these practices with the aid of discourses in cybernetics, systems theory, and post-humanism.
An avid supporter of the digital humanities, Thomas was the author of the music blog Acousmata (2009-2013) and is co-curator of the Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments, an online archive of speculative organology.
Beyond his scholarly work, Thomas is actively involved in the Philadelphia music scene. He is an associate curator at Bowerbird, where he helped launch the Arcana New Music Ensemble in 2016, and has also collaborated extensively with the experimental art platform <fidget>. As a musician, Thomas' primary instrument is the modular synthesizer, and he performs in the duo act Argyle Torah with vocalist Aaron Pond.
