MIT Medla Lab Professor and Opera of the Future Research Group, Tod Machover, is also a noted composer and inventor. He will also host the CMK 2013 reception at the MIT Media Lab.

Machover’s research group invented things like Guitar Hero and Hyperscore software. This spring he will premiere a symphony for the entire city of Toronto, created by citizens and a symphony orchestra. Check out the videos here if you are more interested in this amazing project

Check out some of these interviews, talks and performances by our forthcoming guest speaker!

Tod Machover – The Constellation App for “A Toronto Symphony” (2012)
CONSTELLATION has been designed especially for A Toronto Symphony by Akito Van Troyer and my team at the MIT Media Lab. Like Media Scores, Constellation lets you take material I have composed for the piece and then reshape, modify, morph and personalize it to create the version that you like best. It has a truly fun — and, honestly, somewhat addictive — interface that lets you move the mouse over clouds of bubbles to create “constellations” of beautiful sounds. These constellations are recorded, can be played back, and become your musical “score” made from this material. Learn more at toronto.media.mit.edu/?p=508

The invention behind the popular video game began with guinea pigs Yo-Yo Ma and Penn and Teller.


Composer/collaborator Tod Machover describes the launch of the new web application “Media Scores,” designed by his team at the MIT Media Lab to generate sounds and collaboration with the city of Toronto. The material generated through Media Scores and the input of its users this coming month will become the finale of A Toronto Symphony, to be premiered in March 2013, at the Toronto Symphony Orchestra’s New Creations festival.


Machover’s 2008 TED Talk
Tod Machover of MIT’s Media Lab is devoted to extending musical expression for everyone — from virtuosi to amateurs, and in the most diverse forms — from opera to videogames (Guitar Hero grew out of his group). At TED2008 he talks about what’s coming next, from new tools for music creativity to the world’s first robotic opera. Machover then introduces Dan Ellsey, a young man with cerebral palsy who has found his voice through music created and performed using Media Lab technologies. Ellsey plays his “My Eagle Song” in a soaring rendition that underscores music’s power to heal, to communicate, and to inspire.


Mozart & Me – A Radical New Model of Interskill Collaboration (2011 TEDx New England Talk)
The new movie “Anonymous” shows that our culture is more obsessed than ever with celebrity and genius, and that we look for transcendent heroes capable of leading us through the darkness. On the other end, masses of people meet online as “friends” to share intimacies or to solve problems collectively. The truth is that the real power of invention lies in between these two extremes, where experts can collaborate as equals with everyone else, combining unique and broad perspectives for the benefit of all. Music provides an ideal test bed for this new mode of collaboration. Tod’s group at the MIT Media Lab has spent the last 25 years developing technologies to enhance the musical expression of virtuosi like Yo-Yo Ma, to open the expressive and creative musical potential for amateurs, children and the infirm, and to breakdown barriers between artist and audience. We are now entering a bold new phase of inter-skill collaboration, informed by the recent successes of Guitar Hero, Björk’s Biophilia, and RjDj’s mobile music apps. Through physical composing, sequenced sonic objects, morphing Mozart-to-merengue, and creating City Symphonies and Personal Operas, we believe that a more satisfying musical ecology can be forged which — in turn — will be a powerful inspiration for a more creative society.

Machover’s speech from WIRED 2012


Tod Machover – The Future of Music (2010)
Americas most wired composer Tod Machover visits the RSA to share his vision of how music-making can be made genuinely accessible and life-changing for all.


WBUR Visionaries: Tod Machover

A Conversation with MIT Lab Inventor & Composer Tod Machover