Richard BEAUDOIN

Richard BEAUDOIN
Assistant Professor of Music, Dartmouth College

SCHOLARSHIP
Richard Beaudoin analyzes audio recordings, investigating the expressive rhythm of sounds made by the performer's body, their instrument, and the recording medium itself. Scholarly articles in music theory, analytic aesthetics, musical borrowing, and sound studies have appeared in The Journal of Music Theory, The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Music Theory Online, Journal for the Society of American Music, Perspectives of New Music, Organized Sound, Divergence Press, and The Journal of the CeReNeM.

A monograph—Sounds as They Are published in 2024 by Oxford University Press—includes chapters on Sounds of Breath, Sounds of Touch, Sounds of Effort, Surface Noise, and Inclusive Track Analysis (ITA).

Invited lectures at the Paris Conservatoire [CNSMDP], the Centre for Music and Science at Cambridge University, Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst, Vienna (mdw), The United States Consulate Shanghai Division, The Royal Academy of Music in London, The Shanghai Conservatory of Music, East China Normal University, Harvard University, The Steinhardt School at New York University, The New England Conservatory, Dartmouth College, Yale University, Tufts University, Boston University, Berklee College of Music, The University of York, and the Schweizerische Musikforschende Gesellschaft at the Hochschule, Luzern, Switzerland.

COMPOSITION
Architect of the microtiming technique: iconic recordings are slowed down and transcribed in minute detail, then treated as a palimpsest, forming a parchment over which the composer manipulates, reorganises and interweaves original material to create innovative compositions of startling beauty and originality. 

Performers of his music include Claire Chase, Roomful of Teeth, Boston Lyric Opera, the Kreutzer and Chiara String Quartets, Sound Icon, members of the Philharmonia Orchestra, Transient Canvas, Mark Knoop, Colin Davin, Sally Pinkas, Marilyn Nonken, Constantine Finehouse, Wolfram Rieger, Ulrich Naudé, and Philip Howard, Serge Vuille, Christopher Graham, Clive Driskill-Smith, Christian Wilson, Carl Rosman, Clio Gould, Peter Sheppard Skaerved, Neil Heyde, and Rohan de Saram. Vocal music sung widely by artists including Annette Dasch, Dashon Burton, Estelí Gomez, Joseph Kaiser, Annika Sophie Ritlewski, Frank Kelley, Kevin Burdette and Roomful of Teeth. Settings of texts by Christa Wolf, Christian Bök, Celan, Éluard, Empson, William Henry Fox Talbot, Heaney, Heine, Hölderlin, MacDiarmid, Melville, Morgenstern, Muresan, Pushkin, Rilke, Rückert, John Updike, and William Carlos Williams. Recordings include Digital Memory and the Archive (New Focus 2023) and Microtimings (New Focus 2012), recordings by Constantine Finehouse and Daniel Kurganov, and Another Woman of Another Kind by Claire Chase and Roomful of Teeth, setting text by Paul Griffiths.

Compositions performed at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Wiener Konzerthaus, the Laeiszhalle in Hamburg, the Brucknerhaus in Linz, the Schwetzinger SWR Festspiele, The Kitchen, Weill Recital Hall, Boston's The Institute for Contemporary Art, Calderwood Pavilion, Sanders Theatre and Jordan Hall, and in London at the Royal Festival Hall, Duke’s Hall, The Forge, The Arcola Theatre, Wilton’s Music Hall, Pushkin House, and King’s Place. Commissions from Konzerthaus Dortmund, Staatstheater Kassel, the President of Harvard University, Sound Icon, and Boston Lyric Opera.

TIMELINE
Born 10 October 1975 in North Attleborough, Massachusetts. Early studies at Amherst College, performed and coached chamber music at Greenwood Music Camp. Withdrew from college and moved to London to study music privately. At 23, became a fellow at the MacDowell Colony. Returned to Amherst College and graduated summa cum laude in 1998.

In 2000, moved to London to attend the Royal Academy of Music [MMus in Composition 2002]. Returned to the US and worked in a violin-maker's shop. In 2005, while studying at Brandeis University [Ph.D. Composition and Theory 2008], was invited by Amherst College to be the Joseph E. and Grace W. Visiting Professor of Music (2005-06) and Visiting Assistant Professor of Music (Spring 2007).

Taught at Harvard University for the next eight years (2008-16), first as as Lecturer, then as Preceptor. In 2016–2017, held simultaneous posts as Lecturer at Brandeis University and Visiting Research Fellow in Composition at the Royal Academy of Music, London. In 2017, became visiting lecturer at Dartmouth College. In Fall 2019, began a tenure-track position as Assistant Professor of Music at Dartmouth College.

[Beaudoin is pronounced bōd-win.]