Welcome

Richard James “Rico” Felciano, composer, pioneer in electronic music, Professor Emeritus of Music at the University of California, Berkeley, and founder of the Center for New Music and Audio Technologies, died peacefully in San Francisco on February 21, 2026, at the age of 95.

Born on December 7, 1930, in Santa Rosa, he grew up in Sebastopol and fell asleep looking out at the stars in the dark Sonoma sky from his top bunk. That sense of wonder — of possibility on an expansive scale — never left him.

Join us on Friday, March 6, for a unique day to explore memory and human rights in Peru through sound and sight at CNMAT. 

Event Name: Counter-Pedagogies of Forgetting

Date: Fri March 6, 2026

Location: 1750 Arch St. (CNMAT), UC Berkeley

10am – 4pm: Photo Exhibition & Sound Installation Experience Percy Rojas’s "Ausencias Presentes" paired with an immersive sound installation by Brian Cruz (PhD candidate Mathematics/CNMAT). A dialogue between the captured image and the resonance of the past.

CNMAT is pleased to invite you to our upcoming OpenLab, an afternoon of talks and discussions at the intersection of music, technology, and research, bringing together leading figures from academia and industry.

Thursday, January 29
2:00 – 6:30pm
CNMAT, 1750 Arch St.

RSVP required.

Schedule

• 2:00 – 2:15pm
  Welcome – Carmine Cella

CNMAT welcomes musicians from the National Gugak Center in Seoul, along with the Del Sol String Quartet, for a festival that blends traditional Korean instrumentalists with emerging technologies. Don’t miss these concerts of new works shaped by deep intercultural dialogue and inspired by the enduring legacy of traditional Korean music.

The College of Letters & Science at UC Berkeley recently reported on CNMAT. Read the article here.

https://ls.berkeley.edu/news/music-professors-campion-and-cella-steer-cnmat-through-ai-era

LIVE STREAM HERE

CNMAT OpenLab, focused on generative AI in audio. Space is limited to 30 attendees. Fill out this quick form to register.

What: A full-day event with talks on the latest research in audio generation, sound design, and AI-assisted composition.

The Voices of Silicon Valley in collaboration with the Center for New Music and Audio Technologies (CNMAT) has released performances of the American premiere of Gerard Grisey's "Les Chants de l'amour" ("Songs of Love"). The recording of the first of two US performances of this work was on March 9, 2025, at Wu Hall at the UC Berkeley Department of Music.

CNMAT welcomes composer Olivier Pasquet for a special visit and presentation in the main room at CNMAT for Thursday, June 19, from 11:30-12:30. Free and open to the pubic.

The 2025 International Computer Music Conference (ICMC) has concluded in Boston, MA hosted by Northeastern University, New England Conservatory, Berklee College of Music, Boston Conservatory at Berklee, Emerson College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This year's conference was dedicated to the memory of David Wessel, ICMC's founder and CNMAT's director from 1987-2014. The conference was hosted and chaired by CNMAT alum Anthony DeRitis (Prof. Music, Northeastern University).

CNMAT is thrilled to have been part of the design and implementation of the newly inaugurated Wu Performance Hall in the Department of Music at Morrison Hall.  With the support of Meyer Sound, Wu Hall is an ideal space for CNMAT's future concerts in the Department of Music. This project was made possible with several donors including the generous support of Laurie Wu McClain and Chuck McClain (pictured, lower right, with CNMAT Co-Director Edmund Campion.)

Composer and CNMAT alum, John MacCallum, remembers his last gig with David Wessel: 

On the occasion of the tenth anniversary of David Wessel's passing, CNMAT's ex-officio Associate Director, Richard Andrews, shares his reflections:

I had the distinct privilege of working with David Wessel from September 9, 1996 until his untimely passing on October 13, 2014. I started as an administrator and eventually became CNMAT’s Associate Director as well as Executive Director of the Eco Ensemble. I retired from CNMAT in June of 2021.