While in second year at the Victorian College of the Arts, Charles MacInnes was appointed to the position of Principal Bass Trombone with the Opera Australia Orchestra in Sydney. He moved to Germany four years later, and inspired by working as a guest musician with the North German Radio (NDR) Big Band in Hamburg, he began taking private lessons in jazz and improvisation. After a decade in Europe, he returned to Australia in 2000 and completed a Masters followed by a PhD researching improvisation in contemporary classical art music. He now primarily devotes his energy to guiding young people to compose and improvise through the design of inclusive learning resources and interactive workshops. In October 2022, he returns to Hamburg to take up a position as a music education specialist at the Elbphilharmonie.
Charles has had a number of research-related articles published. A recent example is a chapter he contributed on composer Laura Karpman for Women’s Music for the Screen – Diverse Narratives in Sound, edited by Felicity Wilcox and published by Routledge. The chapter examines how the recording studio itself becomes a multi-facetted instrument, and reveals how Karpman’s multi-genre samples and sound design are themselves agents for social change. Charles is a regular contributor to The Music Trust, and articles he has written for them include an overview of the achievements and legacy of innovative educator and founder of acoustic ecology R. Murray Schafer, an in-depth discussion on the music and sound design featured in the ABC TV series Wakefield, and a review of the William Barton and Véronique Serret album Heartland.
