Darren Copeland is a Canadian sound artist active in Toronto since 1985. He is also the founding and current Artistic Director of New Adventures in Sound Art (NAISA). Key interests of his work include multichannel spatialization for live performance, fixed media composition, soundscape studies, radio art and sound installations.

Copeland fixed media compositions have explored both abstract and referential sound materials. Many of these works are published on the empreintes DIGITALes label and have received mentions from Vancouver New Music, Phonurgia Nova, Luigi Russolo and other competitions. His radio art works engage in the associative qualities of environmental sounds in relation to spoken text and have been commissioned and presented by Deutschlandradio Kultur, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, WBEZ Chicago Public Radio, and Kunstradio (ORF). His sound installations include gallery and sited works which examine the relationship of sound and place. Activity in that area includes projects with Andreas Kahre as Copeland+Kahre, which includes a permanent installation in Edmonton, Canada.

Copeland’s work with multichannel spatialization took focus with residencies in Europe and Canada from 1999 to 2001 where he facilitated the exploration of automated octaphonic spatialization using the Richmond Sound Design Audiobox and ABControl diffusion software. In 2006 he developed a performance-oriented system using the Polhemus Patriot as a gestural controller along with customized software by Benjamin Thigpen. This system has formed the core of spatialization practice at New Adventures in Sound Art since that time. In 2011 he received a Canada Council for the Arts media arts production grant and an Ontario Arts Council Chalmers Family Research Fellowship to expand this performance system which lead to making spatialization an ensemble practice by adding two more spatialization performers who manually manipulate directional loudspeakers.

As Artistic Director of New Adventures in Sound Art (NAISA), Copeland has been curating a wide array of sound art events in Toronto, including the annual festivals Deep Wireless Festival of Radio and Transmission Art and the Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art as well as the series SOUNDplay and Art’s Birthday. NAISA’s programming is comprehensive and covers the entire spectrum of sound art from sound installations, to radio and concert presentations, and to new emerging media.

Darren Copeland is an Associate Composer Member of The Canadian Music Centre. He has served on the board of directors for the Canadian Association for Sound Ecology (CASE), the Canadian Electroacoustic Community (CEC), Vancouver Pro Musica, and Rumble Productions. He holds degrees from University of Birmingham and Simon Fraser University.