Samuel Hertz

Samuel is in the first year of his Techne-funded PhD in the Department of Geography focusing on sound-based methodologies, research tools and fieldwork/documentary practices for assessing global change at multiple scales: mainly atmospherics, geologics, and bioacoustics as primary areas of focus. This research encompasses overviews of the physical technologies though which these measurements are possible, the systems and tools by which data are processed/analysed, as well as the scientists and developers who build and refine these technological systems in the first place. His project pays special attention to the ways in which these acoustic technologies (and analyses) incorporate unique understandings of time and volumetric space, illuminating the multiplicity of ways in which sound provides important, and new, perspectives on a changing planet.

Samuel works as an internationally exhibiting and performing composer and sound-artist. Having studied composition with experimental music pioneers Pauline Oliveros, Fred Frith, Maggi Payne, and Zeena Parkins at the Center for Contemporary Music at Mills College, Hertz works fluidly between the worlds of composed music for ensembles, electronic music and installation, performance, and film. Past performances of his include engagements with durational doom metal performance (DOOM, with Layton Lachman), Earth-Moon-Earth radio communications relays (Librations with Carmelo Pampillonio), multi-channel audio installations and IMAX sound systems.