The field of audio and music engineering extends far beyond the traditional music recording industry. Career paths for program graduates span hundreds of companies representing industries such as: computer hardware and software manufacturing, audio software development, music and audio recording and production, core audio and signal processing technologies and component manufacturing, musical instruments and audio equipment manufacturing, augmented and virtual reality, architectural acoustics, industrial noise monitoring and control, consumer product design, and research and development in acoustics. The projects completed in the two-semester senior design class highlight the diverse skills and experiences of our students in the areas of electronics, signal processing and acoustics.
Michael Heilemann – Assistant Professor
mheilema@ur.rochester.edu
611 Computer Studies Building
University of Rochester
Rochester, NY 14620
Sarah Smith – Assistant Professor
sarahsmith@rochester.edu
617 Computer Studies Building
University of Rochester
Rochester, NY 14620
Team Members Oliver Annon, Audio and Music Engineering ’26Raffael Venterea, Audio and Music Engineering ’26Emma Wang, Audio and Music Engineering ’26 Project Description Unscheduled downtime due to mechanical issues is…
The design of a controlled mechanical testbench for the detection of faults using acoustics and AI.
Team Members: Jared Lipkin, William Seastrand, Ajay Sujaritha Ganesh Advisors: Michael Heilemann, Dan Phinney What is it and why is it important? Preamplifiers are the foundational link in any audio…
Team Members: Michael George, Makayla Press, Elek Yuhas Strong Auditorium is the main performance space at the University of Rochester for music ensembles, dance groups, guest speakers, and similar events.…
Team Members Yunji Kim – B.S. Audio and Music Engineering ‘25Zian (Alan) Wang – B.S. Audio and Music Engineering ‘25Haochen (Glenn) Xiong – B.S. Audio and Music Engineering ‘25Samuel Yang…
Team Members: Abagail (Abby) Che, Terrence Wong, Theodore Kaufman, Yongzhao WuMentors: Prof. Phinney and Dr. Heilemann Project Description The Plug-in Playground is an interactive audio station that offers a hands-on…
WheelTalk is a compact and inexpensive system that offers voice control of regular electric wheelchairs with a joystick controller, offering convenience to individuals with compromised motor skills.
The Beat Buddy 3000 is a robotic drum machine capable of actuating a live drum set. Users can compose patterns in real-time using the sequencer-style interface as well as by selecting from a list of predefined drum patterns. This instrument is equipped with pause, play, reset, and mute commands, and features global tempo and local MIDI velocity controls. The Beat Buddy is designed to stand in for a human drummer in live settings, to be user-friendly, intuitive, easy to set up and tear down, and to be more affordable than similar products on the market.
A solution for tracking acoustic metrics about community spaces in real time over the internet. A small unit is installed in a communal space such as a lobby, office, or library, which transmits audio data to an on-site computer for processing. Metrics about the space and its occupants are uploaded to a web server for convenient access.
A solution for tracking acoustic metrics about community spaces in real time over the internet. A small unit is installed in a communal space such as a lobby, office, or library, which transmits audio data to an on-site computer for processing. Metrics about the space and its occupants are uploaded to a web server for convenient access.Background When we play music to and record speech from a flat panel speaker at the same time, the recorded speech will have music interference. The music interference will hurt…
We aimed to create a device that allows acoustic guitarists to produce real-time audio effects, such as reverb and delay, by resonating the body of their guitar with a transducer. Our device would improve upon existing market products by offering higher-qaulity audio processing, more effects and more user-friendly hardware components.
This project combines two instrument and vocal effects, Talkbox and Vocoder, in one guitar pedal unit, making it easy to use and switch between either effect.
Team Mentors Professor Michael Heilemann, Professor Daniel Phinney, Professor Sarah Smith, Tre DiPassio TL;DR We designed a system that includes both hardware and software components to extract speech audio from…
Team Mentor Michael Heilemann, Dan Phinney, Sarah Smith, Tre DiPassio Abstract An Electronic Wind Instrument, or EWI, is a type of wind controller that takes in breath input and outputs…
The Gavett Hall Recording Studio’s signature reverb is well known amongst AME students. Although this reverb is embraced by many, some wish for more control in post production. The aim of this project was to create a modular solution capable of treating the sound with the option of leaving it intact.
Team Benjamin Kevelson Jun Qiu Julia Weinstock Zilin Zeng Mentors Mike Heilemann, Sarah Smith, and Dan Phinney Abstract Flat panel technology has been an emerging field of research at…
Using flat-panel speaker technology, our group seeks to address these problems by designing a low cost and lightweight alternative, that provides the same dynamic tone loved by all, with scalable power to fit all needs.
The project’s development is around making pitch detuning, velocity variations, and time-shifting to create dequantization in real-time and non-real-time algorithms, both with and without the help of Machine Learning.
We have built an audio interface entirely from scratch. We designed the interface to be efficient, easy-to-use, and beneficial specifically for the user’s creative workflow.
We are not okay with the compromised sound in online conference apps, and we investigated ways to improve.
This product is intended to be used by music producers/recording engineers as a simple instrument within a digital audio workstation. It entails programming a virtual instrument (synthesizer) in the C++ based programming environment, JUCE by utilizing wavetable synthesis. The synthesizer is meant to provide the user a basic virtual instrument with the ability to upload custom wavetables, and which includes integrated effects which can be modulated & controlled dynamically in real time.
Our group designed an audio headset with user-adjustable 360 beamforming, EQ, and gain control. The signal processing runs on Analog Devices’ EVAL-ADAU1452REVBZ using the Sigma Studio software. The headset uses ADMP401 MEMS microphones which are mounted on SparkFun’s MEMS Microphone Breakout boards – INMP401.
We created a digital audio effects pedal using a Raspberry Pi; the pedal can accept XLR and 1/4 inch input so it is ideal for horn players and guitarists alike. The effects can be controlled by the knobs and buttons on the pedal as well as by the knobs and buttons on a separate Bluetooth controller, which was coded on an Arduino.
Digital wavetable synthesizer; allows for 2-second user recordings to be used as custom oscillator sources. All DSP run on a SHARC chip, external controls via an Arduino.
Pianosaic is an augmented reality experience in which players get to create musical environments with a larger than life piano. Players are immersed in accurately spatialized audio. Players are able to use the keys of the piano around to create an individualize experience. Players are able to create a full production utilizing accompanying instruments in the game.