Robert Scott Thompson stands out as a versatile and highly productive figure in composition and performance. He holds the position of associate professor of music at Georgia State University, located in Atlanta, Georgia. That same city serves as the base for both his personal studio and Aucourant Records, the imprint through which he issues recordings spanning no fewer than six distinct styles. These include electronic and experimental pop, modern classical, new age, avant-garde works, and his primary focuses on experimental computerized music and ambient soundscapes. Across more than two decades in the field, he has issued in excess of 25 compact discs and CD-Rs. Thompson received his Ph.D. in music composition with an emphasis on computer applications to music synthesis, digital recording, and sound processing from the University of California at San Diego in 1990. The following year he received appointment as a Fulbright Research Scholar to Denmark, where he pursued further composition and study at the Danish Institute of Electroacoustic Music. Such scholarly depth and training have supplied him with the means to shape deeply emotional and spiritual works through a rigorously intellectual process. Comparable to much contemporary ambient minimalism, his output carries substantial depth of significance. Yet in contrast to typical examples of that approach, Thompson’s layers of meaning reach audiences across numerous planes and perspectives simultaneously. His experimental methods have earned widespread recognition, while substantial portions of his catalog anticipated developments in the genre by five to ten years. That degree of anticipation and forward vision frequently unsettles both promoters and audiences.
