ABOUT

For booking and enquiries please email: shelly@datamusician.net

For sounds: soundcloud.com/shelly-knotts

For video documentation: vimeo.com/shellyknotts

// Very Short Bio (21 words) //

Mashing SuperCollider synths since 2006, Shelly Knotts wrangles beats and bloops out of unpredictable and semi-random noise generators and auto-drum machines.

// Short Bio (112 words) //

Shelly Knotts is an improviser who performs with computers and other humans. Interests in code, data and networks have lead her down strange and diverse musical paths from electroacoustic composition, through jazz and noise music to algorave. She experiments with generative and AI techniques and opinionated algorithms to make music. She has performed at numerous Algoraves and other live coding events worldwide, solo and with collaborative projects including algo-pop duo ALGOBABEZ. In 2017 she was a winner of BBC Radiophonic Workshop and PRSF ‘The Oram Awards’ for innovation in sound and music. By day she is a researcher at Durham University working on the research project ‘Musically Intelligent Machines Interacting Creatively’.

// Alt-Short Bio (136 words) //

Shelly Knotts produces live-coded and network music performances and projects which explore aspects of code, data and collaboration in improvisation. Based in Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK, she performs internationally, collaborating with computers and other humans. She is currently a Post-doctoral Researcher at Durham University working on AHRC project: Musically Intelligent Machines Interacting Creatively. She completed a PhD in Live Computer Music at Durham University with a focus on collaboration in Network Music. She was Leverhulme artist in residence at Newcastle University in 2017.

She has performed at numerous Algoraves and Live Coding events worldwide, both solo and with collaborative projects including algo-pop duo ALGOBABEZ (with Joanne Armitage), OFFAL (Orchestra For Females And Laptops), and live coding performance [Sisesta Pealkiri] with Alo Allik.

In 2017 she was a winner of PRSF The Oram Awards for innovation in sound and music.

// Long Bio (874 words) //

Shelly Knotts produces live-coded and network music performances and projects which explore aspects of code, data and collaboration. Her experimental and collaborative tendencies have seen her engage with diverse musical practices and styles ranging from electroacoustic tape music to live-coded dance music. She performs internationally, collaborating with computers and other humans.

She is currently Post-doctoral Researcher at Durham University working on AHRC funded project: Musically Intelligent Machines Interacting Creatively. Previously she worked at SensiLab, Monash University (AU) on ARC funded project Improvisational Interfaces. In 2017 she was Leverhulme Artist in Residence at Newcastle University School of Chemistry working on Molecular Soundscapes. She is also collaborator on the SSHRC Insight grant Platforms and Practices for Networked, Language-neutral Live Coding led by David Ogborn.

She completed a PhD in Live Computer Music at Durham University with Nick Collins and Peter Manning, with a focus on collaboration in network music, and completed a masters degree in composition at the University of Birmingham in 2012, where she studied with Scott Wilson and Vic Hoyland and was a member of BEAST (Birmingham Electroacoustic Sound Theatre).

In 2017 she was a winner of PRSF and BBC New Radiophonic Workhops’s The Oram Awards for innovation in sound and music.

She has been a member of several network music bands including SuperContinent, BiLE (Birmingham Laptop Ensemble) and OFFAL (Orchestra For Females And Laptops). SuperContinent are an international live coding band who use the web-based platform Estuary to collaborate using various live coding languages. They have performed at Algoraves and Live Coding events worldwide. OFFAL formed in 2015 and are a collective of women who make electronic music who are developing projects which explore technology, structures and approaches for long-distance collaboration. They have performed at several international festivals. BiLE performed together in various line-ups 2011-2016 and were interested in collaborative electronic music performance and composition and structures for improvisation. They performed across the UK and Europe including at: NIME 2011 (Oslo, NO), Laptops Meet Musicians Festival 2011 (Venice, IT) and TEDxBrum (Birmingham, UK).

Notable live coding collaborations include ALGOBABEZ and [Sisesta Pelakiri]. ALGOBABEZ was an algo-pop duo with Joanne Armitage who performed at high profile electronic music events including intenational Algoraves, Mutek Montreal 2018, SXSW 2019 (Austin TX, USA) and Algorithmic Art Assembly 2019 (San Francisco, USA). As well as performing Algorithmic dance music they collaborated on projects that interrogate gender and the body in highly technologised performance practices. [Sisesta Pelakiri] with Alo Allik is a generative audio-visual performance based on an audio-visual feedback loop created by writing code live on stage and exchanging musical information over the network. [Sisesta Pelakiri] has been performed at live.code.festival 2013 (Karlsruhe, DE), Zeppellin 2013 (Barcelona, ESP) and Musik Festival 2015 (Bern, CH). Knotts and Allik also collaborated with author Tom McCarthy on work combining audio, visuals and spoken word. Shelly regularly collaborates with live visual artists including Antonio Roberts, Coral Manton and Olivia Jack.

As solo laptop improvisor and composer, Shelly’s work – including live and fixed electronic works, generative sound installations and live electronic improvisations – has been presented at various festivals and events in the UK and Worldwide including at Microwave 2017 (Hong Kong); /* Vivo */ 2014 (Mexico City, Mexico); International Symposium of Electronic Arts 2015 (Vancouver, CA); Earzoom 2013 (Ljubljana, Slovenia); Grande Exposition d’Art (Nantes, FR); Ton:art 2011 (Karlsruhe, DE); Inventionen 2010 (Berlin, DE); Supersonic Festival 2011 & 2012 (Birmingham, UK); Noisefloor Festival (Leicester, UK); Network Music Festival 2012 (Birmingham, UK). As a live-coder she has also performed at numerous Algoraves in cities around the world since 2013. In 2018 an exhibition of her work titled Performing Code was presented at UCSD (San Diego, USA).

She has taken part in several online festivals and broadcast performances both as a solo performer and as part of G.I.A.S.O (Great international Audio Streaming Orchestra), including Piksel 2013 (Bergen, NO) and Audioblast 2014 (Nantes and Anger, FR).

Past affiliations have included BEAST (Birmingham ElectroAcoustic Sound Theatre) 2007-2011 and sound art collective SOUNDkitchen 2010-2012. She is also a co-founder and project manager of Network Music Festival, Birmingham which took place in 2012, 2013 and 2014.

Publications of her work include: collaborative tracks Rift and Raft with Jan St. Werner on CRXSSINGS (a fundraiser Compilation album, in 2019; ALGOBABEZ album Burning Circuits on Fractal Meat in 2017; Etude #16, 257, on Chordpunch record label’s RissEP, 2012; and I.E.M (Impromptu Entropy Machine), on Absence of Wax netlabell; 2013, live electronic piece XYZ in CNCPTN webzine in 2012; and mixed live electronic and instrumental piece Chordophonia in Leonardo Music Journal, 2008. She received commissions from the PRSF ‘women make music’ fund in 2011 and 2016. In 2014-15 she was part of Sound and Music’s ‘New Voices’ cohort.

She has taken part in a number of residencies including Digital Media Labs 2015, Nantes Electronic Arts Recontre in 2015, Sound and Music ‘Improvisors’ Residency in 2014 and Composer’s Lab at METAL, Liverpool in 2013.

Shelly has presented and published her work at international conferences, festival and in international journals. She has also been involved in the organisation of a number of projects including Rewriting the Hack, several Algoraves and the 1st International Conference of Live Coding. She regularly facilitates workshops on creative coding including live coding sound and visuals, and data sonification.

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