Stanford Laptop Orchestra (SLOrk): Musical Macs

When composer/researcher/programmer Ge Wang looks at a MacBook, he sees more than a computer. He sees a versatile platform for creating custom electronic instruments—the perfect tool for transforming lines of code, user input, and even gestures into music.

Wang is the man behind the Stanford Laptop Orchestra (SLOrk), an ensemble of student computer scientists and musicians that uses 20 MacBooks to compose and perform new music. It’s an experimental fusion of portable computing and live performance that harnesses the notebook’s plug-and-play compatibility, state-of-the-art sensors, and raw processing power.