Barry Vercoe, who made coding sound accessible to all, has died

Barry Vercoe, composer and music scientist, founded MIT’s electronic music efforts and helped shape the Lab’s efforts in digital synthesis and machine listening and learning. But his biggest impact came outside the academy: as the inventor of Csound, he took the original innovations of Max Mathews and made them accessible to everyone. The live coding scene that followed has transformed the practice of coding sound into a new form of musical performance.

Live round-up: 12.2 is out, vids, a free Grain Slicer Rack, tuner, and more

Ableton Live 12.2 went from beta to public yesterday. And there’s more for all Live users – Iftah has an accessible tuner device called Pitch Pipe and Side Brain has an awesome free instrument rack for performing granular tricks, among other new add-ons. You don’t have time to wade through hours of videos; let’s put everything in one place and get bouncing tracks/spectral resonating/granulating.

Peter Kirn - June 12, 2025

Apple at WWDC on accessibility, inclusion – music devs, tune in

Inclusion and accessibility are the answer. They’re why we’re here—and they’re a way for developers to support themselves by reaching new audiences. Let’s tune in to Apple’s latest WWDC sessions on the topic, as there are notes here both within Apple’s ecosystem and for reflection across platforms.

Peter Kirn - June 10, 2025

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