About me

I am a final year PhD student in the Acoustics and Audio Group (AAG) and Centre for Speech Technology Research (CSTR) at the University of Edinburgh. My main research interest is in modelling of analog audio effects, with a focus on the intersection between tradidional digital signal processing and neural networks for this task. My specific areas of focus so far have been antialiasing, sample rate independent neural networks and modulation effects modelling.

My research is fully funded by the Scottish Graduate School of Arts and Humantities (SGSAH).

Since 2020 I have also been a teaching member of staff in the AAG, including a one year full time post as Teaching Fellow in Acoustics prior to starting my PhD.

I am a keen guitar player and songwriter – currently involved in two musical ventures.

Selected publications

Below are some key publications, with a full list available here.

DAFx Anti-aliasing of neural distortion effects via model fine-tuning
Alistair Carson, Alec Wright, Stefan Bilbao
Proc. 28th Int. Conf. on Digital Audio Effects (DAFx25), Ancona, Italy, Sept. 2025.

TASLP Resampling filter design for multirate neural audio effect processing
Alistair Carson, Vesa Välimäki, Alec Wright, Stefan Bilbao
IEEE Transactions on Audio, Speech and Language Processing vol. 33, pp. 2163-2174, 2025

DAFx Sample rate independent recurrent neural networks for audio effects processing
Alistair Carson, Alec Wright, Jatin Chowdhury, Vesa Välimäki, Stefan Bilbao
Proc. 27th Int. Conf. Digital Audio Effects (DAFx24), Guildford, UK, Sept. 2024

DAFx Differentiable grey-box modelling of phaser effects using frame-based spectral processing
Alistair Carson, C. Valentini-Botinhao, Simon King, Stefan Bilbao
Proc. 26th Int. Conf. on Digital Audio Effects (DAFx23), Copenhagen, Denmark, Sept. 2023