The Three-Oscillator Problem: Chaos and Emergence

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Simple rules to sonic chaos: the “three-oscillator problem” & Rob Hordijk’s “Benjolin”

In this video, I talk about the “Three-Body Problem” and created an analogous Pure Data patch, where three oscillators frequency-modulate each other. Just as in the physics problem, this cross-modulation network creates unpredictable, chaotic patterns.

This emergent complexity from simple rules perhaps connects to ideas of motivic development in music, how great artistic works can grown from simple and small ideas.

Feedback Loops & Acid House (“Hum” live set)

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“Hum”: Acid house meets analog chaos, live feedback loops performance

This is my live performance set “Hum”, blending digitally controlled analog synthesizers, surrealist acid house grooves, and feedback textures. Recorded in my home studio, this video revisits the set I played live at Synth-tember / Mini-Blorp at New Alliance Gallery in Somerville, MA.

Featuring chaotic 303 basslines (from Herbs & Stones Liquid Foam), evolving feedback loops (from the Random*Source Serge Resonant EQ), and hybrid digital/analog sound design, this should satisfy fans of modular synth performance, experimental electronic music, and custom audio setups.

🎧 If you enjoy this, check out my previous live set from Bleep/Blorp 2024 on Bandcamp:

“Speculation and Imagination”

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New music! 🎛️ 🎵

Check out my latest release “Speculation and Imagination”, combining gentle melodic sequences with harsh, noisy feedback.

These tracks are an edit of my live analog synthesizer improvisation from a online “session” with painter Onozaki Takuya. Onozaki and I meet monthly for jam sessions over Zoom, him in Hanamaki and me in Connecticut, where he paints, and I play my synths, exchanging artistic ideas across our mediums.

If you happen to be around Toyko this week, Onozaki’s works, some of which were created in these sessions, are on display 2/7/25-2/16/25 at “Gallery Camellia”in Ginza.

Matrix Mixing with Computer and Outboard Gear

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Running audio out from the DAW and feeding back through outboard gear.

The main idea here is a feedback loop starting with output from my computer, running into a compressor, then to a reverb, then back to the compressor, then back to the reverb, etc.

0:00 Intro: The Plan
0:39 Digital Setup
1:18 Analog (Outboard) Setup
1:44 Demonstration
3:55 Next Steps and Considerations
4:31 Take 2

Check out more videos on audio cybernetics and feedback:

Artificial Neurons for Music and Sound Design (5-minute lecture video)

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Video presentation I made for the 2024 “Explainable AI for the Arts” (XAIxArts) Workshop, part of the ACM Creativity and Cognition Conference 2024.

A lot of these points I’ve discussed elsewhere (see playlist below), but this quickie presentation brings together these ideas, focusing on the aesthetic potential of this approach.

Check out the complete playlist for more hands-on creation of neurons and neural networks:

Reaktor 6 Matrix Mixer

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Building a matrix mixer in Reaktor 6 primary, and then exploring its possibilities for sound design.

I’ve been a little obsessed with matrix mixers lately, because they feed my desire for unique sound design applications (and feedback). A matrix mixer is a combiner module that can route multiple inputs to multiple outputs, often allowing you to adjust how much of each input signal goes to each output. While sophisticated, they’re pretty easy to build in Reaktor or other software, and can maybe be useful for some next-level synthesis applications.

0:00 Intro / Why Matrix Mixers?
1:18 Starting the Build, Simple Sine Oscillator
2:50 Matrix Mixer Macro
3:55 Visible Ports for Panel Patching
5:37 First Mixer of the Matrix
9:46 Duplicating It for the Matrix
10:48 Matrix Mixer Basics
12:05 Delay and Feedback
15:29 Adding a Second Delay
18:44 END OF LESSON. Unless…
19:59 Adding Ring Modulation
21:43 Building a Complex Patch
24:45 Other Examples of Implementation
25:58 Final Thoughts, Next Steps

Beginning Reaktor 6 Tutorials:

Compression-Controlled Feedback Loops in Your DAW

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Creating DAW-based feedback loops, then using side-chain compression to regulate them.


Here, working on a project with @SpectralEvolver , I show in Logic Pro X how we can use a compressor side-chained to a beat to control a feedback loop for some noisy, industrial sounding music that sounds evocative of the artist Emptyset. I found this was a great way to create a chaotic sound, but keep it under control (and out of the way of the drums).

0:00 Intro
0:29 The audio tracks
1:15 Side-chain compression
2:03 The feedback loop
3:13 Controlling the loop with compression
5:00 Emptset
5:13 Two aux tracks sending to each other
6:23 A note about time-based effects
6:50 Will it blow up?!
8:06 Closing, next steps

Check out Emptyset’s bandcamp here. Here’s Emptyset talking about their ionospheric propagation work, “Signal”:


More Logic Pro Tutorials from me here:

New Music! “Hanamaki Sessions 2023”

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I’ve collected and edited some recordings I made with my “DAWless” mobile rig in Japan this summer.

It’s been interesting try to set something up that has the flexibility that I want, while still being portable enough not to take up too much space (and weight) in my luggage. Of course, as it’s often said, limitations can often lead to greater creativity.

In this setup I have my 54HP Eurorack (which can be battery powered if I want to play on top of a lookout tower somewhere), and my Arturia DrumBrute Impact. I do mixing with a little Mackie mixer, and recording with a Zoom H4N (which lets me record sound from the microphones at the same time as the line inputs).

Last year, some might remember, I went around with just the Eurorack synth (with some different modules in it–a benjolin in particular) and recorded my three-track “Ihatov MU” album. This year’s sessions were a fun extension of those ideas.

Perhaps I should do some performing out in New England in the next few months.

Pd Comb Filter Patch from Scratch

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Building a comb filter in Pure Data Vanilla from scratch.

A comb filter is a filter created by adding a delayed signal to itself, creating constructive and destructive interference of frequencies based on the length of the delay. All we have to do is delay the signal a little bit, feed it back into itself (pre-delay), and we get that pleasing, high-tech robotic resonance effect.

There’s no talking on this one, just building the patch, and listening to it go.

0:00 Playing back a recorded file
0:35 Looping the file
1:00 Setting up the delay
2:08 Frequency controls for the filter
2:52 Setting the range
3:48 Automatic random frequency
4:25 Commenting the code
5:39 Playing with settings

More no-talking Pd patch from scratch: