Barry Vercoe is a New Zealand-born computer scientist

Computer scientist

A computer scientist is a scientist who has acquired knowledge of computer science, the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and their application in computer systems....

 and composer

Composer

A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

. He completed his undergraduate degree in New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 in Music and Mathematics and went on to complete a Ph.D. at the University of Michigan

University of Michigan

The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...

, USA, in Music Composition. In 1968, Vercoe's research in Digital Audio Processing paved the way for the subsequent evolution of digital musical composition. In 1971, he joined the faculty at MIT and established the Experimental Music facility in 1973. Vercoe was a founding member of the MIT Media Lab

MIT Media Lab

The MIT Media Lab is a laboratory of MIT School of Architecture and Planning. Devoted to research projects at the convergence of design, multimedia and technology, the Media Lab has been widely popularized since the 1990s by business and technology publications such as Wired and Red Herring for a...

 in 1984. He continues to this day at the laboratory as a professor of Music and Media Arts and as an Associate Head of the Academic program in Media, Arts and Sciences.

He is best known as the inventor of Csound

Csound

Csound is a computer programming language for dealing with sound, also known as a sound compiler or an audio programming language, or more precisely, a C-based audio DSL. It is called Csound because it is written in C, as opposed to some of its predecessors...

, a music synthesis language with wide usage among computer music

Computer music

Computer music is a term that was originally used within academia to describe a field of study relating to the applications of computing technology in music composition; particularly that stemming from the Western art music tradition...

 composers. SAOL

Structured Audio Orchestra Language

Structured Audio Orchestra Language is an imperative, MUSIC-N programming language designed for describing virtual instruments, processing digital audio, and applying sound effects...

, the underlying language for the MPEG-4 Structured Audio

MPEG-4 Structured Audio

MPEG-4 Structured Audio is an ISO/IEC standard for describing sound. It was published as subpart 5 of MPEG-4 Part 3 in 1999....

standard, is also historically derived from Csound.

He is also an accomplished jazz musician.

External links

• Barry Vercoe homepage
• Vercoe demonstrating the Synthetic Performer at IRCAM in 1984
• Barry Vercoe Playlist Appearance on WMBR's Dinnertime Sampler radio show, November 10, 2004