The concert “a.bel – New Music Interactive” had its second edition in the David Friend Hall, one of the auditoriums of the Berklee College of Music in Boston, on March 3, with a presence of about 100 spectators.

“The concert was not exactly a replica since there was a new piece made by students from Berklee Interdisciplinary Arts Institute,” explains Rui Penha, investigator of Telecommunications and Multimedia Centre of INESC TEC and responsible for the project.

The idea of bringing the concert to Boston came from Neil Leonard, Professor at Berklee College of Music, which had been in Portugal to prepare a piece for the concert held at the House of Music in October 2015. “In his will (Neil Leonard) to do it again the concert in Boston, joined our willingness to test some solutions we have developed since October and so it happened, “says Rui Penha.

The strategy designed for the concert was different from what was used in the Casa da Música. According to Rui Penha was used “mainly the sound from smartphones and acoustic instruments. We placed the public into two halves, face to face, and made some experimental test before starting the concert.” The public was thus even more integral part of the concert once the interaction with the musicians was higher. “I saw some people voluntarily swap their smartphone with people who were next only to experience a particular form of interaction, which says a lot about the way the a.bel is able to make this device as a personal experience catalyst collective, ” said the researcher.

The INESC TEC team that was involved in debut concert at Casa da Música, also worked on this event in Boston, directly or indirectly. However, only three members had the opportunity to travel to the United States: Rui Penha, Gilberto Bernardes and Alexandre Clément, also researchers from the Telecommunications and Multimedia Centre of INESC TEC.