Five Questions with Music Producer Ken Wheeler
Meet featured speaker, musical producer, software engineer, and open-source developer Ken Wheeler.
Hey all,
Sear Hear Now just surfed through Asbury Park this past weekend, and we’re stoked for local summer here at the Jersey Shore. It also means the return of local, community tech and design are just around the corner now that Jersey Shore Tech & Design's - Talk Series events are back!
Today we’re featuring a 5 question interview with Ken Wheeler, one of the speakers at the Jersey Shore Tech & Design - Creative Talk Series (#200) event. The title of Ken’s presentation is Robot Rock: How to use AI to make beats. Enjoy!
Ken summarizes himself as “made a bunch of open source, now I make a bunch of stuff I can’t speak on. When I’m not coding I’m making beats and being a dad.”
Ken is a passionate music producer, web developer, podcast host, worldwide speaker, and well know in the web dev community as the author of several popular open-source libraries, such as Slick Carousel, Spectacle, react-music, react-game-kit, among others. He’s also a board member for the Vets Who Code organization.
As a contributor to local tech events, Ken has led a React Development workshop at Cowerks, and was also was a featured speaker at local tech conference, Asbury Agile based in Asbury Park, NJ. Ken presented at the Asbury Agile 2015 event discussing the topic of Developer Experience with React. A few years later Ken presented a unique pre-Asbury Agile talk on the Asbury Park boardwalk discussing how to use Javascript to control hardware. In this presentation he used it to control a crossbow 🏹.
Check out Kent C. Dodd’s interview with Ken “…about saying yes to challenging opportunities and using them as a chance to rapidly grow” for a more in-depth conversation with Ken from earlier this year.
Here’s a description for what to expect from his upcoming Robot Rock: How to use AI to make beats talk at the Jersey Shore Tech & Design event:
This talk will focus on using React, LLMs and the WebAudio API to make music. we’ll look at Prior Art, prerequisites, and ML techniques that we can use to let the machines do the work.
Maybe you’re an audiophile or just curious about audio and code? Checkout Ken’s presentation Processing Audio using DSP in Reason at Reason Conf a few years back.
🙏 Thank you Ken for taking the time to answer our questions. For those counting, it’s actually 6 questions but 5 just sounds better.
What excites you most about the current trends in tech/design, and how do you incorporate them into your work?
I'm not particularly excited about anything right now. For me, the ecosystem has largely stabilized, and the most exciting thing is how easy it is to get something built. There used to be a lot of greenfield around our current tools, but now you can just build. And with LLMs you can skip a lot of the drudgery and also learn new things really quickly.
Can you share a project you're particularly proud of and what made it a success?
The project I'm most proud of by far hilariously isn't Slick Carousel, despite its success. I'm most proud of a drum machine I wrote from scratch in native OCaml/ReasonML for ReasonConf. It was extremely out of my league but I persisted and learned so many things to make it happen. A trust testament to sheer will. Everything was basically building up buffers of floats to synthesize noises and I had researched how the 808 drum machine synthesized hihat noises and implemented it. I had to learn how to implement filters and fx, and it was an extremely rewarding project. And the UI wasn't in Javascript for once :)
What's one piece of advice you would give to aspiring designers/technologists in our local community?
If you think something is cool, build it. There were a ton of times where I pitched something and team members were like yeah, uh, I dunno. I built it anyway and everyone was like oh what this is so dope. Nobody can really see the culmination of your efforts until you've gotten there (or at least a mvp).
I'm most proud of a drum machine I wrote from scratch in native OCaml/ReasonML for ReasonConf. It was extremely out of my league but I persisted and learned so many things to make it happen. A trust testament to sheer will.
How has being part of the local community influenced your work or perspective in tech/design?
I think being from the area actually gives you a bit of an edge. Culturally, being forward and passionate and assertive largely sets you apart from most people in tech. Nobody is pulling up with the kind of rizz that Jersey brings to the table.
As a hyper-local community event, we're always interested in sharing and supporting local spots we should be visiting. What’s your favorite place to grab a coffee or a meal in the area, and why?
Federicos in Belmar is obviously king. Turnstile Roasters, also in Belmar, is absolutely unreal. Hoagitos is goated. So is 10th Ave Burrito.
What is your ideal work setup? Can be the environment but also hardware and software.
Work environment: I hate open office plans. I work best without interruption. I want one of those cube type outdoor office things in my yard, with a built in desk
Hardware & Accessories: one ultrawide or 2 24's, my kinesis 360, a sharkfin ergo mouse like the logitech or the anker
Seating: Aeron all day long and adirondack chairs out front, and maybe an eames lounger inside.
Lighting: plenty of LED lights. I want it to look like Blade Runner or Alien.
Software: I'd go vscode or cursor, with warp terminal, chrome or arc, and Spotify playing the Westworld soundtrack.
Thank you for reading. We’re stoked for Ken’s featured presentation at the Jersey Shore Tech & Design - Creative Talk Series (#200) event. Thanks again Ken!
Jersey Shore Tech & Design events are hosted in collaboration with The Center for Entrepreneurship at Monmouth University. Founded in 2010, JST&D community events cover various innovative technology and design topics, engage local professionals and students, and help foster the creative energy and community in our own backyard. Let's build together 🚀