Joel Hunt is an Associate Teaching Professor of Music and Digital Media, Arts and Technology at Pennsylvania State University, Erie. He teaches courses in music theory, digital audio, electroacoustic music, computer-aided music composition, music and animation, film music, and jazz history. Joel’s research interests include computational analysis, music information retrieval, analysis of electroacoustic music, jazz/pop theory, theories of rhythm and meter, American modernism, and sketch studies. His current book project focuses on the evolution of compositional process in the music of Henry Brant, incorporating analyses of Brant’s original sketches, text manuscripts, and correspondence. He has presented at national and international conferences such as the Society for Music Theory (Milwaukee), EuroMAC (Leuven and Strasbourg), Tracking the Creative Process in Music (Montreal and Paris), Paul Sacher Foundation Colloquium (Basel), Society for American Music (Sacramento), International Musicological Society (Tokyo), International Music Theory and Analysis Conference (Rimini), Canadian University Music Society (Victoria and Saint Catharines), West Coast Conference of Music Theory and Analysis (Irvine), and Temporality: Issues of Change and Stasis in Music (Long Beach). Joel’s research has received generous support from the Paul Sacher Stiftung, the Albert and Elaine Borchard Foundation, the University of California (Santa Barbara) Music Department, Humanities and Social Sciences Department, Graduate Division, and Academic Senate, and the Pennsylvania State University Endowment Research Grant. For his work on Brant, Joel received the 2013 Roger Chapman Memorial Prize in Music Theory.

Joel is an active composer and performer of algorithmic computer music and interactive electroacoustic music.  His compositions have been performed at the International Computer Music Conference (Athens and Denton), New York City Electronic Music Festival, Society of Composers, Inc Region III Conference (Huntington, WV), Electroacoustic Barn Dance (Fredericksburg, VA),  Electronic Music Midwest (Kansas City, KS), Primavera Festival of Contemporary Arts and Digital Media (Santa Barbara), California Electronic Music Exchange Concert Series (Los Angeles), National Student Electronic Music Event (Bowling Green), and at the Ethos NewSound Festival of Contemporary Music (Fredonia). His acoustic music has been performed by the Now Hear Ensemble, the UCSB Contemporary Music Ensemble, and the Fredonia Jazz Ensemble. As a saxophone soloist and member of the Now Hear Ensemble, Joel has performed at the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater (Los Angeles), Santa Barbara Museum of Art, North American Saxophone Alliance, College Band Directors National Association, Sigurd M. Rascher Centennial Celebration, Rochester International Jazz Festival, and has toured throughout the Northeast, California, and China.  Joel’s current creative pursuits include recording a collection of new works for saxophone and electronics, and a set of original compositions for modular synthesizer.