Newsletter no. 46
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ACTOR OUTCOMES
TOR Spotlight
New writings available
Two new reports documenting ACTOR-funded research are now available on the TOR! Martin Daigle and Pauline Patie present their ACTOR student project uniting sonic and visual elements in composition and performance using real-time timbral analysis, while Annie Liu summarizes research led by ACTOR partners Lindsey Reymore, Jason Noble, Caroline Traube, Charalampos Saitis, and Zachary Wallmark on the influence of register and pitch height on semantic descriptors. Stay tuned for more TOR publications in the coming months!
Publications
New research involving ACTOR members has been published.
Zacharakis, A. (2024). Η σημασιολογία του μουσικού ηχοχρώματος [The semantics of musical timbre]. In C. Anagnostopoulou, A. Triantafyllaki, D. Koniari, K. Dracoulaki (Eds.), Έρευνα και Εφαρμογές στη Μουσική Ψυχολογία [Research and Applications in Music Psychology] (pp. 75–96). Hellenic Association for Music Education.
Dolan, E. I. (2025). Gluck's orchestra, or the future of timbre. Cambridge Opera Journal. Published online: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954586723000216
Thilakan, J., Balamurali, B. T., Gomes, O. C., Chen, J.-M. & Kob, M. (2025). Exploring the role of room acoustic environments in the perception of musical blending. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 157(2), 738–754. https://doi.org/10.1121/10.0035563
Zacharakis, A. (2025). The poetry of senses: exploring semantic mediation in timbre-aroma correspondences. Frontiers in Psychology,16:1520046. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1520046
AWARDS & HONOURS
Photo by Lou Scamble
Opus Prize - Article of the year
ACTOR member Jimmie LeBlanc has won the the Article of the Year category of the 28th edition of the Opus Prize for his article “Du son vers la forme, le sens... l'Autre... : pensée spectrale et art engagé dans les oeuvres mixtes de Serge Provost [From sound to form, meaning... the Other...: spectral thought and engaged art in the mixed works of Serge Provost], published in Circuit musiques contemporaines, vol. 34, no. 1 (2024): 45-67. Read more
Congratulations, Jimmie!
Lund University’s Stimulansmedel grant
ACTOR Collaborator Jack Adler-McKean received a Stimulansmedel incentive grant of Lund University to commission four new pieces for serpent. Adler-McKean is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the Lund University investigating the meeting point of timbre, performance practice and organology in the context of composition for historical instruments. The concert of the commissioned pieces took place February 7 as part of the Lund Contemporary Festival of Lund University in Sweden.
Follow the link to view the recording of the pieces: New music for old instruments
Photo by Katharina Geist
ACTOR Y7 Workshop - Student Presentations
Congratulations to the student members selected to present at the plenary session (July 7) of the ACTOR Y7 Workshop in Geneva:
Amit Gur (Antwerp University): Form and Material in Visual and Auditory Perception
Benjamin Lavastre (McGill University): Orchestration and Timbre Writing Challenges in Mixed Music with Digital Musical Instruments: Case study of Instrumental Interaction V for 3 Karlax and ensemble
Kelsey Lussier (McGill University): Identifying Orchestrational Norms and Trends in Funk Grooves
Jonas Régnier (McGill University): Everyday Sounds as Emotional Catalysts: A Research-Creation Study in Contemporary Music
Joshua Rosner (McGill University): To Be or Not to Bop: How Phonetics and Timbre Shape Rhythm and Phrase in Scat Singing
UPCOMING EVENTS
Doctoral Colloquium
26 March | 4:30pm
McGill University
ACTOR student member Ying-Ying Zhang will present her research entitled Virtual Acoustics for Recording Studios: Musician-Led Approaches (title to be confirmed) on March 26 as part of the Doctoral Colloquium, a lecture series organized by the Department of Music Research at McGill University's Schulich School of Music. The main objective is to provide a forum for graduate students in all fields to present their research.
Workgroups
Arts, Humanities, and Interdisciplinary Workgroup Meeting
The Arts, Humanities, and Interdisciplinary Methods Workgroup will hold its second meeting of the year in March. For those ACTOR members interested in attending, please fill out the following poll with your availability by Sunday, March 9th. The time slots are somewhat restricted to accommodate the multiple time zones where ACTOR members live and work.
https://www.when2meet.com/?29344995-k5iBN
In the meeting, participants will be able to present interdisciplinary projects at any research stage, workshop potential collaborative or multidisciplinary projects, and discuss topics relevant to the workgroup's mission.
A second announcement will follow with the meeting date and agenda.
Martha de Francisco
Martha de Francisco is an Associate Professor of Sound Recording at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, an internationally recognized record producer, a researcher, an educator, and a mentor of students. She has established a prominent international career as a leading record producer/engineer for classical music, and she has been invited to produce recordings with some of the world's most significant performers and recording stars, at renowned music institutions and venues around the world and for major record labels. As a producer, initially for Philips Classics in Europe, de Francisco developed longstanding working relationships with distinguished musicians, soloists, singers and symphony orchestras in Europe and the Americas. Her discography is extensive, and her recordings have received numerous major awards and distinctions in different continents.
Originally from Colombia and a graduate from the renowned Tonmeister program at the Musikhochschule Detmold, Germany, de Francisco was one of the pioneers of digital recording and editing in Europe during the 1980s. Deeply committed to education, she complements her appointment at McGill University with invited guest lectures and masterclasses at leading schools for higher education in audio in Europe, Asia, and North and South America.
De Francisco has won international awards, honours, and personal distinctions. She has been invited to impart multiple keynote and lecture presentations at international conferences, and to act as a jury member of international music competitions as well as of recording competitions. She has published several academic papers and book chapters, and she is featured in prominent press and media publications in print and online around the world.
As a researcher she has led innovative projects on music performance in virtual acoustics, critical listening and auditory analysis, and interdisciplinary studies in timbre and musical blending. In music recording, the focus of her research has been the faithful capture of the music performed in acoustic spaces. She has developed expertise and pedagogic methods for the recording of small and large ensembles including symphony orchestra and opera, guiding musicians through the process in all its facets, and leading postproduction to obtain high-quality recorded performances that are shared with audiences worldwide.
