معرفی
Teresa Nakra is a Professor and Director of Music & Technology at Stevens Institute of Technology’s School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences. Previously, she held roles as Professor of Music and Design at The College of New Jersey (TCNJ) and Adjunct Assistant Professor at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Her research focuses on musical expression, gesture analysis, and interactive systems, with notable contributions like the Conductor’s Jacket and the Digital Baton. She has collaborated with institutions like the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital on music & health initiatives.
Education: PhD (2000) and MS (1996) in Media Arts & Sciences from MIT, BA (1992) in Music (magna cum laude) from Harvard University. Her 2024 book Constructing Music: Musical Explorations in Creative Coding (Oxford University Press) is a seminal work in the field.
Research Interests: Quantifying conducting gestures for interactive systems, music technology education, health applications of music, and interdisciplinary collaboration between arts and sciences. Her work bridges music performance, computer science, and robotics, as seen in projects like conducting robots and museum installations.
Articles highlight her focus on synchronous audience-conductor dynamics, immersive pedagogy, and robotics in music education. Awards include the Excellence in Technology Education Award (2008) and induction into Phi Kappa Phi (2018).
Grants and Projects: Over $400K in funding for initiatives like TCNJ’s Center for Creative Technology, health communication projects with Colgate-Palmolive, and NSF grants for conducting robotics research. She advises on curriculum design at K-12 and university levels, including a 6th-grade music program in NJ.
Labs/Teams: Founder of Immersion Music, Inc. (1999–2021), a nonprofit developing music technologies for artists and institutions. Current collaborations include a music & health design project with Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital.
