Using technology to make interactive music between cultures and to give refugees a musical voice

Roger Mills is an international musician, sound artist, and composer and who also writes about his music as an academic based at the University of Technology, Sydney. He specialises in using technology to enable musicians in different locations nationally and internationally and often from different cultures to play improvises music collaboratively together in real time. Mick Paddon talked with Roger on Thursday Drive about his approach to telematic music making and an exciting, innovative project he is developing to enable refugees who are from the same cultural background but who are in different places around Australia, to play music together, interactively.

Roger is also a key figure in the Ethernet Orchestra, a cross-cultural musical ensemble based in different parts of the world who improvise live electroacoustic music on the Internet and at collocated events. The Ethernet Orchestra is performing live at the Parramatta Lanes festival at 7.30 on Wednesday 7th and 6.30 and 8.00 on Friday 9th at the UNE Lecture Theatre 232 Church Street. Full details of the week long festival held each evening around the old lanes of Parramatta are on the website

During the interview, Mick plays two minutes of a track called Kunstmuhle Sessions 1.0 taken from Diaspora , the debut album from the Ethernet Orchestra featuring musicians performing simultaneously between Iran and Australia via North America, Canada, Brazil and Europe. The album is available free for download at

The full discussion between Roger and Mick is available here