Christopher Burns is a laptop improviser and a composer of instrumental chamber music. His works explore simultaneity and multiplicity: textures and materials are layered one on top of another, creating a dense and energetic polyphony. Both electronic and acoustic music are influenced by Christopher's work as a computer music researcher. The gritty, rough-hewn sonic materials of his laptop instruments are produced through custom software designs, and the idiosyncratic pitch and rhythmic structures of his chamber music are typically created and transformed through algorithmic procedures. His most recent projects emphasize multimedia and motion capture, integrating performance, sound, and animation into a unified experience.
In 2002, Christopher's piece The Location of Six Geometric Figures was awarded the First Prize and Audience Prize in the International Composition Competition for Chamber Music at the Hitzacker Sommerliche Musiktage in Germany. His work has been performed by groups including ensemble recherche, NOISE, the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Gageego!, the Contemporary Keyboard Society, and ensemble courage, and soloists including Mark Menzies, Griffin Campbell, Chris Froh, and Matthew Burtner.
Christopher is an avid archaeologist of electroacoustic music, creating and performing new digital realizations of classic music by composers including John Cage, György Ligeti, Alvin Lucier, Conlon Nancarrow, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. His other research interests include the application and control of feedback in sound synthesis, the design of complex signal-processing networks for emergent sonic behavior, and the study and preservation of sketch materials produced by electroacoustic composers.
A committed educator, Christopher teaches music composition and technology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Previously, he served as the Technical Director of the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA) at Stanford University, after completing a doctorate in composition there in 2003. He has studied composition with Brian Ferneyhough, Jonathan Harvey, Jonathan Berger, Michael Tenzer, and Jan Radzynski.
Christopher is also active as a concert producer. He co-founded and produced the strictly Ballroom contemporary music series at Stanford University from 2000 to 2004. He currently directs the Unruly Music concerts in Milwaukee, and is a co-producer of sfSoundGroup, a contemporary music ensemble in residence at ODC Theater in San Francisco.