Austin Richey
Adjunct Faculty
Section Lead, Material Culture
PhD, Eastman School of Music
MA, Eastman School of Music
BM, Western Washington University
Austin T. Richey is a musician, multimedia artist, and Storyteller for Detroit Opera. He recently defended his PhD in Musicology at Eastman School of Music; his dissertation, 鈥淪ynergistic Mythologies: Improvising the Afrofuture in Detroit’s North End鈥 explores the resonances between diasporic African musical, dance, and visual arts and Detroit-specific genres such as Motown and techno.
Richey鈥檚 current sonic practice reclaims public spaces through community-oriented DIY synthesizer-making workshops and site-specific, historically and environmentally informed sound installation. Through these workshops, Richey connects young sound makers to their environment via deep listening practices while teaching skills like electrical engineering, encouraging them to experiment with self-designed sonic expressions.
Professional Experience
Richey was recently in residence as Wave Farm’s Radio Art Archive Research Fellow, where he expanded Wave Farm鈥檚 collection to incorporate artists and sound art from Africa and its diasporas.聽 His research and photography have been featured in publications including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, as well as co-production support for The Metropolitan Opera, Cincinnati Opera, and Scottish National Opera among others. Musical collaborations include work with Bora Yoon, Tatsuya Nakatani, Nate Young (Wolf Eyes), S艒 Percussion, and more.
Richey has published original research in African Music, Sonic Signatures, Opioid Aesthetics: Expressive Culture in an Age of Addiction, has contributed research to the award-winning Public Broadcasting Service digital series Sound Field and has a forthcoming essay in the Routledge Handbook of Music in the New African Diaspora. His work is supported by the Frederick Douglass Institute, the Society for American Music, Humanities New York, the Knight Foundation, and the Presser Foundation.
Significant Publications, Presentations and Exhibitions
Peer Reviewed
2024聽 聽 鈥淒umisani鈥檚 Diasporic Mbira: Tracing the Zimbabwean Diaspora through the Nyunga Nyunga Mbira,鈥 Routledge Handbook on the Music of the New African Diaspora, Routledge Press, (Forthcoming).
2016聽 聽 鈥淐himurenga Renaissance: Double Doubleness in the Diasporic Music of Tendai Maraire鈥 African Music, Vol. 10, No. 2, 2016, 167 鈥 185.
Edited Collections
2024聽 聽 鈥淟ow Pass: Day 51,鈥 A Year of Deep Listening: A Celebration of Pauline Oliveros, The Center for Deep Listening, (Forthcoming).
2022聽 聽 鈥淜aringido: Vigilante Tricksters and Feedback-Loop Approaches to a Liberation Struggle,鈥 Sonic Signatures: How Migrant Music Constitutes the City at Night, Intellect Books, (Forthcoming).
2020聽 聽 鈥溾楬ey, Let鈥檚 Have a Very Good Time:鈥 The Opioid Aesthetics of Young Thug鈥檚 Post-Verbal Hip Hop,鈥 The Opioid Epidemic and U.S. Culture: Expression, Art, and Politics in an Age of Addiction, West Virginia University Press, December 2020. Digital
2018聽 聽 鈥淒oubled Double Consciousness and the Sound of New Afrikan Expression鈥 Sounding Out!, Amplifying W.E.B. Du Bois at 150, September 3, 2018.
2015聽 聽 鈥淭he Diasporic Nyunga Nyunga Mbira鈥 SEM Student News: Music and Diaspora, Vol. 10 Spring/Summer 2015, 13.
Script Writing
2019聽 聽 鈥淎re Three 6 Mafia the Godfathers of Modern Rap?鈥 Sound Field, PBS Digital Studios, August 15, 2019.
2019聽 聽 鈥淭he 鈥極ne鈥: What Makes James Brown鈥檚 Funk So Funky?鈥 Sound Field, PBS Digital Studios, January 31, 2019.
2019聽 聽 鈥溾楾riggaman:鈥 The Most Famous Breakbeat You鈥檝e Never Heard Of鈥 Sound Field, PBS Digital Studios.
2019聽 聽 鈥淧opular Sounds and Punjabi Sources: Hearing Bhangra in Early 2000s American Hip Hop鈥 Sound Field, PBS Digital Studios.