Jon Phipps

Background

About Jon Phipps

After earning a Master of Arts degree in Music, Jon established himself as a virtual symphonic orchestrator and creative consultant, collaborating with top producers and international artists to release chart-topping albums in various countries over the last ten years. His passion for this niche career path grew from teaching guitar, performing in bands, composing modern classical works, and using professional software tools to enhance his creative outputs – skills he later transferred in his post as Information Literacy Coordinator at the University of Essex in the provision of innovative workshops and asynchronous resources which strengthened students’ academic and digital skills. Jon's combined creative, educational, and digital literacy expertise underpin his role as Audio-Visual Support Advisor here at the University of Suffolk, where he troubleshoots audio-visual technology for faculty, provides training, and supports the delivery of university events, in addition to designing software automation solutions for staff. Jon leverages his aptitude for AI prompt-engineering to design software in Python, ranging from machine learning-powered text analytics tools to the batch processing of administrative tasks, modernising and optimising institutional workflows. He also uses AI to build virtual guitar amps and synthesisers to create unique instruments and sounds which distinctively colour his own music. Jon has over two decades of experience teaching guitar and music theory to learners of all levels, including those preparing for accredited grade exams. For several years, he also led music workshops across Essex for children through Supastars Academy, a charity-funded programme fostering skill development in an engaging rock school format. As a virtual symphonic orchestrator, Jon delivered a two-day seminar at the ETIC arts college in Lisbon, deconstructing highlights from his extensive portfolio of global collaborations to demonstrate the industry-standard audio production of software-generated instrumental performances. Later, as Information Literacy Coordinator at the University of Essex, he curated and collaboratively presented a rolling open workshop series on literature searching, referencing, fact-checking, digital literacy, and ethical AI usage in academia.