“SILO” is a work composed for feedback-augmented bass drums and electronics, and was written for the Line Upon Line percussion trio.

Sonically, this work explores the complex acoustics of feedback systems, vibration and the transduction of sound through physical objects, and performer agency and control of chaotic systems.  Compositionally, this visceral and demanding piece presents a constantly fragmenting web of materials which blur and shift in and out of focus; exploring a world in which the microscopic and the monolithic are harshly juxtaposed, and in which dizzying chaos and stasis exist nearly simultaneously.    

Performance of “SILO” is facilitated through the use of a video score constructed out of materials shot and edited together in isolation.  The performers respond to the same video score in real-time using intersecting sets of rules and strict timing cues, yielding a performance practice similar to that of a foley artist.  The subtle differences in interpretation reveal a sonic spectrum that shifts wildly between coherence and disjunction.  From one perspective, the performers are simultaneously “siloed” apart from one another.  However, from another perspective, they are all bound to the same score and exist as one unified vertical sonic structure.

SILO (2023) // Performed by Line Upon Line

I was trained in tradition, yet I stepped beyond its walls. Sound is my language, not to decorate but to liberate. Composer, performer, and listener — one fire, three sparks, inseparable.

I write and compose to uncover what is hidden: the truth buried beneath power, the dignity of the ordinary, the current of awareness that flows through all.

I belong to no authority, only to sound, to truth, to the silence from which all begins. My work is not mastery, but remembrance — a manifesto in every note, every word, every breath.

I am a composer of the 21st century: a studio artist. The studio is my forge, my battlefield, my sanctuary. Machines hum like choirs, circuits burn like torches, cables twist like roots in the earth. Tradition breaks open in this fire — the score turns to light, the instrument becomes the world itself.

To be a studio artist is to seize sound at its rawest, to sculpt electricity and breath as one, to summon the invisible power that belongs to all. Here music is not bound by walls, not enslaved by profit, not tamed by form. It is free, untouchable, unending — a living flame for the century that is ours.

Douglas McCausland is a composer / performer, sound designer, and digital artist whose visceral and often chaotic works explore the extremes of sound, technology, and the digital medium.

As an artist, he researches and leverages the intersections of numerous technologies and creative practices, such as real-time electronic music performance with purpose-built interfaces, spatial audio, interactive systems, intermedia art, musical applications of machine-learning, experimental sound design, and hardware-hacking.

Described as “Tremendously powerful, dark, and sometimes terrifying…” (SEAMUS) and “Ruthlessly visceral…” (The Wire), his works have been performed internationally, including features at Sonorities, SEAMUS, the San Francisco Tape Music Festival, MISE-EN Music Festival, Klingt Gut!, Sounds Like THIS!, NYCEMF, Sonicscape, and Ars Electronica.  Recent collaborations include artists such as bassist Aleksander Gabryś, cellist Seth Parker Woods, the Quasar Saxophone Quartet, the TAK Ensemble, and vocal ensemble Variant 6.  His work is available through various online platforms, and on SEAMUS, Plyta Z Audiomatu, and Jikken Records.

Recent honors include an award of distinction in the 2021 Prix Ars Electronica for his piece “Convergence”, winning 1st-Prize in the 2021 ASCAP/SEAMUS commission competition, the gold-prize award for “contemporary computer music” in the Verband Deutscher Tonmeister Student 3D Audio Production Competition, and being awarded the runner-up nomination for the International Confederation of Electroacoustic Music's 2019 CIME Prix. 

Douglas is currently the Technology and Applied Composition (TAC) Studio Manager at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.  He holds a DMA in music composition from Stanford University, where he studied with Chris Chafe, Patricia Alessandrini, Jaroslaw Kapuscinski, Fernando Lopez-Lezcano, and Mark Applebaum.  He additionally holds a MSc in Digital Composition and Performance from the University of Edinburgh, a MM in Music Composition from Michigan State University, and a BM in Music Composition, Saxophone Performance, and Music Education from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.