Tristan Perich

In 2004 he began work on 1-Bit Music to experiment with the foundations of electronic sound, culminating in a physical "album," a music-generating circuit packaged inside a standard CD jewel case, released by Cantaloupe Music in 2006. Surface Magazine called the 1-Bit Music boxes "profound throwbacks to the traditional album, a response to the intangibility of iTunes and mp3s in the form of a hand-held artwork." Working with 1-bit audio conceptually influenced his music for acoustic ensembles, resulting in dual compositions for musicians with 1-bit music accompaniment, pairing the performers with on-stage speakers. His latest circuit album, 1-Bit Symphony (Cantaloupe Music, 2010), is a long-form electronic composition in five movements. Its music explores the intricate, polyphonic potential of 1-bit audio, uniting simple with complex and celebrating the virtuosity of electricity. New York Press called it "sublime," and the Wall Street Journal said "[its] oscillations have an intense, hypnotic force and a surprising emotional depth."

In 2009, Austria's Prix Ars Electronica awarded him the Award of Distinction for his composition Active Field (for ten violins and ten-channel 1-bit music). Rhizome awarded him a 2010 commission for an audio installation with 1,500 speakers. Perich attended the first Bang on a Can Summer Institute in 2002. He was artist in residence at Issue Project Room in 2008, at Mikrogalleriet in Copenhagen in 2010, and at the Addison Gallery in Andover, MA and Harvestworks in Fall 2010. His work has received support from New York State Council on the Arts, the American Music Center, Meet the Composer and others. He has spoken about his work and taught workshops around the world.

Perich studied math, music and computer science at Columbia University after attending Philips Academy, Andover. More recently, he received a masters in art, music and electronics in the Interactive Telecommunications Program at Tisch School of the Arts, NYU.