Elena Jessop
PhD Student
Opera of the Future
Personal web site
"I especially love the Lab's cross-disciplinary approach, which recognizes that some of the most interesting problems lie at the junctions of traditionally separated “fields.” Here, I can be a computer scientist AND a performing artist, and can conduct work that draws on all my different interests. "

Elly was an undergraduate at Amherst College, where she double majored in computer science and theater/dance. She has experience in a wide range of the performing arts (including stage and costume design, choreography, and stage direction), as well as in programming and electronics.

Elly's research primarily focuses on new technologies for performance capture and expressive gestural interaction. She has worked on a range of projects, from technologies to transform an opera singer's performance into the behavior of a robotic set for her group's large-scale opera project, Death and the Powers, to a glove that allows a singer to capture and manipulate his or her own voice. She is particularly interested in the ways that technology and the performing arts can combine in essential and compelling ways to create new means of expression and new performance experiences.