Niamh Houston, also known as Chipzel gave an excellent TEDtalk on chip tunes this past November 5, 2016. If you’ve ever wanted an explanation on how she creates her music, she gives a full demonstration as part of the talk. She also talks about the overall idea that we are all hackers, and the importance of being authentic in any creative pursuit.
The ‘hacker ethic’ is central to Niamh’s musical creativity as she takes us on a journey into the Chiptune genre, a subculture creating music from augmented hardware and software, and why such expression resonates with Millennials and others who are seeking to create raw and unfiltered music for an online generation.
She is a BAFTA nominated and award winning independent composer from Northern Ireland. In 2015, Houston received the Best Music award in XBLA Fans’ Game of the Year awards, as well as being named VGMO’s best independent composer.
She has scored the original sound tracks for six video games, including the critically acclaimed Super Hexagon. Houston continues to compose music for forthcoming video game projects while working on her next studio album and touring the world. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community.
TEDx
The TEDtalk runs around 17 minutes, and it definitely worth your time. If you’ve had something on the creative back burner for a while, this might be the pep talk you need to hear. You can learn more about the TEDx event here, and check out chipzel’s music on her website.
What did you think of Chipzel’s TEDtalk?
