Matt Sargent

Matt Sargent (b. 1984) is a composer, guitarist, recording engineer, and music technologist based in upstate New York, where he is an assistant professor of music at Bard College. His music grows from interests in resonance, the making/breaking of patterns, and computer models of musical thought. Over the last decade, his work has focused extensively on musical algorithms and real-time notation systems, which can be heard in his compositions and technical collaborations with other artists.

His albums include Illuminations (Sawyer Editions, 2024), Bend (Waveform Alphabet, 2023), Between Time and After (Chen Li Music, 2023), Tide (A Wave Press, 2020), Separation Songs (Cold Blue Music, 2019), Tide (for ten basses) (Marginal Frequency, 2019), and Ghost Music (Weighter Recordings, 2018).

His compositions have been described as “bringing a sharpened sense of the transcendental into the 21st century.” (Paul Muller, Sequenza21) On Ghost Music, Bill Meyer writes, “this music isn’t about following in anyone’s footsteps; it uses bare resources to establish a bounded and essential place.” (The Wire Magazine) His guitar work on Bend, a duo album with synthesist Dani Dobkin, was described as “a guitar record retrieved from far in the future.” (Antonio Poscic, Research Music)

Matt is currently engaged with expanding available repertoire for the pedal steel and electric guitar. In 2022, he commissioned new music for solo pedal steel from Michael Pisaro-Liu, Carl Stone, and Nomi Epstein. His solo pedal steel performance of Kevin Good’s Trails (2019-2022) was released by Sawyer Editions in 2023. His recording of James Romig’s hour-length piece for electric guitar, The Fragility of Time, commissioned by Sargent in 2022, will be released by A Wave Press in 2024.

In demand as an audio engineer for contemporary music, Matt’s recent production credits include Alvin Lucier’s One Arm Bandits (Important Records), Ricochet Lady (Black Truffle), and Works for the Ever Present Orchestra II (Black Truffle), Richard Teitelbaum’s Asparagus (Black Truffle), Musica Elettronica Viva’s Symphony No. 107 - The Bard (Black Truffle), Michael Ranta’s Transits: Volume I (Important Records), Sarah Hennies’s Spectral Malsconcities (New World Records), Kyle Gann’s Whispers, and Ensemble Signal / David Felder’s Les Quatre Temps Cardinaux (Coviello Contemporary), among many others.

As a technical producer and software designer, Matt developed a networked music notation program for the Swiss-based Ever Present Orchestra, which facilitated performance of numerous large ensemble works composed by Alvin Lucier. In 2021, he co-composed A Murmur in the Trees, for twenty-four basses, with Eve Beglarian and bassist Robert Black. Along with Chris Cerrone, he is currently reconstructing the electronics of the late composer Ingram Marshall. Praising his work on Robert Carl’s album, Splectra (Cold Blue Music), Fanfare Magazine writes, “he could find no better collaborator than composer and sound designer Matt Sargent.”