This book introduces readers to concepts in computational thinking and coding alongside parallel concepts in music, creative sound, and interaction. In this practical, project-based book, music students, educators, and coders are assisted to engage with real-world experiences in computation and creativity using the programming language Scratch. The book’s projects vary in complexity and encourage readers to make music through playing and creating with code.
Book title: Scratch Music Projects
Authors: Andrew R. Brown (Griffith Uni) and S. Alex Ruthmann (NYU)
Publisher: Oxford University Press, New York, 2020.
We, the authors, are grateful to Mitch Resnick (MIT Media Lab and Scratch sherpa) for the foreword, and to Mark Guzdial (UMich), V.J. Manzo (WPI), and Jason Freeman (Georgia Tech) for the very kind advanced praise. Special thanks to Eric Rosenbaum, Nicole Carroll, Eve Klein, Rebecca Fiebrink, and Andrew Sorensen for the interviews around your creative practices at the intersection of music and coding. Thanks to Paul Young and David Harris for reviewing early drafts. And, thank you to designer extraordinaire Pana Li (Diana Castro) for the amazing cover design.
Alex and I have been working on this book across three different iterations of Scratch since 2012 and were relieved to see it finally released in 2020 to coincide with the public availability of the web-based Scratch 3.0.
The projects from the book can be engaged with ‘live’ from the Scratch Music Projects ‘studio’ on the Scratch Community site.