Dr Scott Mclaughlin

Profile

I was born in Ireland (Co. Clare) in 1975. I played in an indie-rock bands until my mid-twenties, I then studied music at the University of Ulster at Jordanstown where I gained a BMus degree in 2001. I completed a PhD (Strange Attractors: A Commentary on Applications of Indeterminacy in my Recent) at the University of Huddersfield with Pierre Alexandre Tremblay and Bryn Harrison in 2009.

I attended the Ostrava New Music Days summer school (2005, 2007), and the Irish Composers Summer School (1999–2001). I have previously lectured at the University of Huddersfield, and Brunel University.

In 2019–21 I was awarded an AHRC Leadership Fellowship for a compositional project on the indeterminacy of the clarinet.

Current Research Students

• Ed Cooper (2020–) ‘From the in-between: portfolio of original compositions and commentary’ (practice research)
• Jenni Hogan (2019–) ‘music and performer movement (practice research)
• Murray Royston-Ward (2019–) ‘vital materials in contemporary improvised music’ (practice research) 
• Hannah Firmin (2018–) ‘translation as composition’ (practice research)
• Jacob Randell (2017–) ‘composition strategies for decoupled organ pipes’  (practice research)
• Martin Loridan (2017–) ‘Souffle: air and breath as a composition material’ (practice research)
• Stuart Mellor (2016–) ‘Site-specific composition using acoustic feature segmentation: An exploration into the timbre of space‘ (practice research)
• Caitlin Mockridge-Rice (2015–) ‘Creative practice and its modes of dissemination in the soundings of Hugh Davies’

Completed Research Students

• Manuel Farolfi (2017–) ‘John Cage in Italy: 1949–59’
• Michele Abondano (2018–21) ‘composition: timbre, light and darkness’ (practice research)
• Federico Pozzer (2018–21) ‘breath as musical regulator in composition and performance’ (practice research)
• Samuel Ridout (2017–21) ‘Musique concrète and the Language of Things 1948–1958’
• Max Erwin (2017–20) ‘Ghosts in the machine: A secret history of total serialism’.
• Symeon Yovev (2014–19) ‘Soundcastles: Playing with soundscapes, social spaces and composition’ (practice research)
• Timo Tukhanen (2016–20) ‘Mixed Signals: composition and touch’ (practice research)
• Alex De Little (2014–2019) [composition] ‘Spatial Listening’ (practice research)
• Arne Sanders (2014–2018) ‘composition and heterophony’ (practice research)

Responsibilities

• Deputy Director of Centre for Practice Research in the Arts, & Centre for Audio Visual Experimental
• Director of Impact and Innovation

Research interests

I am a practice researcher in composition, focussing on materiality and indeterminacy. My current research uses different methods to excite resonance in sounding bodies to exploit physical non-linearities and generate musical patterns/structures.

• SPARKLE: Sustaining Practice Assets for Research, Knowledge, Learning and Engagement
• The Garden of Forking Paths: material-indeterminacy driving open-form composition for clarinets

Qualifications

• PhD (practice-based), University of Huddersfield 2009
• MA Composition, University of Huddersfield 2005
• BMus University of Ulster (Jordanstown) 2001

Professional memberships

• Association of Irish Composers
• RMA (Royal Musical Association)

Student education

Most of my teaching is on composition modules, and some music technology. I have a particular interest in helping composers develop into new areas and question the musical ideas they have inherited; while understanding that the ideas they've grown up with will always be the basis of their understanding.

I also have a special interest in interdisciplinarity (I made a MOOC), and different ways that disciplinary boundaries affect collaborative research.

Research groups and institutes

• Making Music

Current postgraduate researchers

• Manuel Farolfi
• Sam Ridout
• Michele Abondano
• Ed Cooper