UMass Lowell Music Department

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University of Massachusetts Lowell Department of Music

10/09/2026

🎶 Faculty Spotlight: Dr. Ramon Castillo 🎶

This week, we’re highlighting Dr. Ramon Castillo, Teaching Professor of Music. A composer, performer, music technologist, improviser, and educator, Dr. Castillo explores what happens when traditional musicianship collides with coding, electronics, video games, and unconventional instruments.

At UML, Dr. Castillo founded the Video Game Ensemble in 2022 and opened the Red Velvet performance and creative space in 2023, which he continues to manage. He also created *Minecraft: The Musical*, a collaboration between the Contemporary Electronic and Video Game Ensembles that transforms Minecraft into an interactive musical instrument through connections with Ableton Live. Dr. Castillo says that students always dream up the WILDEST ideas--and so far they've been able to make all of them happen! Dr. Castillo also helped develop UML's Video Game Studies minor, launched in 2024.

Dr. Castillo has performed alongside artists including Kronos Quartet, Terry Riley, Wu Man, and Sandeep Das, and has appeared at venues including Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center. He also occasionally releases original music under the name Autumn Ate Everything.

And just how broadly does Dr. Castillo define "musical instrument"? His performance résumé includes trumpet, guitar, cello, banjo, gamelan, synthesizer, robots, laptops, guitar pedals, Otamatone—and Minecraft.

✨ Join us in celebrating Dr. Castillo this week! ✨

10/01/2026

Here is what you missed on Tuesday, September 29th 8-10PM. The Blues Ensemble loved the stage! Thank you Warp and Weft for having us! 🎸🎷🎶

09/27/2026

Three Bands for the Blues Ensemble are hitting the stage at WARP & WEFT Tuesday, September 29th, 8-10PM! Come and Support while getting something to eat and drink!
🎟 Free and Open to the Public
📍197 Market Street, Lowell, MA, United States, 01852

09/22/2026

The Chamber Singers are looking forward to collaborating with and in this concert of Portuguese and Luso-Afro-Brazilian music!
Be sure to check it out!
🎶Friday, Sept 25th 7:30PM
📍Friday- Fisher Hall Moloney Performing Arts Center
🎟 Free and Open to the Public

09/21/2026

Surprise Symphony by Ramon Castillo
Movement 30: The Authorized Biography of Nick’s Viola: Casting Line. on Viola & , performance automation, video editing recorded UMass Lowell. Surprise Symphony is an improvisatory/indeterminate piece that writes itself every time it's performed. It requires performers with high sensitivity to musical changes, and Nick Revel is exactly the right musician for the job.
Watch it on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2IPmSC3gm4

09/18/2026

🎶 Faculty Spotlight: Matthew Azevedo 🎶

This week, we’re highlighting Assistant Professor of Sound Recording Technology Matthew Azevedo, whose work as a composer, mastering engineer, acoustician, and sound artist explores the liminal spaces between sound and vibration.

Last weekend, Azevedo’s new work 1000-Footer premiered at Chicago’s Sonic Pavilion Festival, presented by Experimental Sound Studio at Millennium Park’s iconic Jay Pritzker Pavilion. Created specifically for the pavilion’s 24-channel loudspeaker array, the immersive work celebrates the 13 thousand-foot freighters that carry iron ore across the Great Lakes. Azevedo developed musical themes for each vessel with electronics and field recordings captured aboard the 1,004-foot Mesabi Miner during a research trip this summer which move across the speaker array driven by the GPS data from the ships.

Azevedo is also known for their work as Retribution Body, using custom subwoofer systems and electronics to explore the interactions between ultra-low-frequency sound, physical vibration, and architectural space.

✨ Join us in celebrating Professor Azevedo this week! ✨

09/16/2026

Surprise Symphony by Ramon Castillo is an improvisatory/indeterminate piece that writes itself every time it's performed. It requires performers with high sensitivity to musical changes, and Nick Revel is exactly the right musician for the job.
Movement 31: The Unauthorized Biography of Nick's Viola: Tightly Wound
Recorded
Check it out on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7k_n5NOf_E

09/09/2026

Two Nights with Nick Revel.
Sept 22 at 5:30PM - Fisher Recital Hall
Speaker Seminar: Creativity First, Mastery NeverHow does one pursue creative personal or professional projects with confidence in the face of countless legends who have fully mastered their crafts?
Sept 24 at 1:00PM - Concert Hall
Here his songs like:
Swimming with Whales (2026) for solo viola
Submerge (2021) for viola and fixed media
Surprise Symphony for viola and Ableton Live, by Ramon Castillo
and more!

🎶Tuesday, Sept 22 - 5:30PM & Thursday, Sept 24 - 1:00PM
📍Tuesday- Fisher Hall Thursday- Concert Hall (Recital Hour)
🎟 Both Free and Open to the Public

05/07/2026

Come one and all - high school aged students are invited to attend The Common Voice Summer Chorus Camp here in the Moloney Performing Arts Center running July 6-10!

It's a week-long day camp, run in partnership with our friends at the Lowell Center for the Arts ! For students entering Grades 9 and up this fall, The Common Voice Summer Chorus Camp will give young singers of all skill levels a great opportunity to expand their musical skills and sing in a welcoming and supportive environment.

When: July 6-10, 2026
Where: Moloney Performing Arts Center at UMass Lowell (35 Wilder St., Lowell MA)
Scholarships are available, and registration is open now until June 1! Join the fun: TCVSCC.org

05/04/2026

Thank you for the beautiful singing (and amazing photos), UMass Lowell Vocal Ensembles!

Address

35 Wilder Street
Lowell, MA
01854

Telephone

+19789343850

Website

http://www.uml.edu/FAHSS/music/default.aspx

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