Laurie Spiegel (born 1945 in Chicago) is an American composer. She has worked at Bell Laboratories, in computer graphics, and is known primarily for her electronic-music compositions and her algorithmic composition software Music Mouse. Spiegel was seen by some as a pioneer of the New York new-music scene. Her compositions from the ’70s and ’80s were coded instead of written, revealing new horizons for improvisation and experimentation. She withdrew from this scene in the early 1980s, believing that its focus had shifted from artistic process to product. While she continues to support herself through software development, Spiegel aims to use technology in music as a means of furthering her art. Spiegel’s Harmonices Mundi (or ‘Music of the Spheres’), that is an interpretation of astronomer Johannes Kepler’s book, was chosen by Carl Sagan for the opening track on the “Sounds of Earth” section of the Golden Record placed on board the Voyager spacecraft in 1977. Her sounds are still orbiting the solar system.

Kepler’s Harmony of the Worlds, 1980, 2019
The Expanding Universe – the 1980 debut album by composer and computer music pioneer Laurie Spiegel – brought new methods of live interaction with computer-based logic upon its release. The featured work within the ( ) – space, Kepler’s Harmony of the Worlds, was previously included on the Golden Record launched on board the Voyager 1 spacecraft in 1977.

Laurie Spiegel contributed with this audio work within the
( ) – space.

She also contributed to the High Tides programme for
Maths, matter & body with her video work, Voyages (1979).