{"id":15629,"date":"2026-09-15T13:47:23","date_gmt":"2026-09-15T20:47:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/?p=15629"},"modified":"2026-09-15T13:47:23","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T20:47:23","slug":"faculty-profile-bill-alves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/2026\/09\/15\/faculty-profile-bill-alves\/","title":{"rendered":"Faculty Profile: Bill Alves"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Professor of Music and Miller Professor of Humanities Bill Alves has been at Harvey Mudd College since 1995. In addition to teaching a variety of music courses, he organizes the HMC Concert Series, which features performances by student and professional musicians. Alves is a composer and video artist with myriad musical interests, including in Indonesian gamelan, computer music, abstract animation and visual music and alternate tuning systems. He is a recipient of the 2026 Henry T. Mudd Prize. Find out more about his musical interests, what he\u2019s reading and more in this Q-and-A.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading h5\">What is your favorite part about your job and why?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I most enjoy the enthusiasm and creativity students bring to music and also the support and friendship of my colleagues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading h5\">What is something people don\u2019t understand about your job that you wish they did?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">My professional work, which in many departments is called \u201cresearch,\u201d consists mostly of composing and performing new music. Don\u2019t tell anyone, but I would do it even if it wasn\u2019t part of my job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading h5\">If you could swap jobs with any other HMC employee for a day, who would it be?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The person who determines benefits for upcoming retirees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading h5\">What\u2019s your favorite food\/dish in the Hoch-Shanahan Dining Hall?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I\u2019m vegetarian and appreciate the many veggie options at Hoch-Shanahan. Not so much the brussels sprouts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading h5\">What is your favorite hobby, activity or creative outlet?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Because my professional work is also my creative outlet, I don\u2019t need to describe my favorite. However, I also like playing Baroque harpsichord music, hiking in the mountains, and having a beer with my wife and friends after a long week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading h5\">What is your most effective strategy for dealing with stress?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Whacking pieces of bronze over and over with a wooden hammer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading h5\">Are you studying or learning something new?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I\u2019m working on my skills editing video and programming VR with the musically named C#.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading h5\">What book or podcast are you enjoying right now?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Besides music, I enjoy reading fiction\u2014recently, it\u2019s James Morrow, Angela Carter, and Jonathan Lethem. I also like reading Scientific American (I came to the right place!). <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What\u2019s a fun fact about you?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When I was in college, I wrote musicals and majored in computer science.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Professor of Music and Miller Professor of Humanities Bill Alves has been at Harvey Mudd College since 1995. In addition [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":145,"featured_media":4373,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,217],"class_list":["post-15629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty","category-unlisted"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/145"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15629"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15632,"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15629\/revisions\/15632"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hmc.edu\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}