Shape Changing Instruments

We've moved. New domain is at www.shapechanginginstruments.com

Lots of great bits on music with instruments that are changing shape

Harpejji tone

More rocking string instruments!

Bassoforte

Diego Stocco - Bassoforte from Diego Stocco on Vimeo.

Robotic Guitar

Exertion Instruments

Noah Vawter has done it again.

Exertion Instruments are self-powered electronic instruments. Small cranks provide enough power to charge up a sound chip and and amplifier. Add custom instrument bodies, a few keys from control, and you've ended up with something beautiful.

Materials materials

Lots of construction options out there.

Snap together guitars?
http://hubpages.com/hub/Guitar-Kits

People who buy google adwords on 'violin kit'!

International Violin Company

Stewmac has parts for violins, mandolins, guitars and dulcimers

Building kits galore

And this post on Make Blog lists:

80/20 - The industrial erector set

Microrax another badass aluminum set

Makerbeam - aluminum framework still coming together

Contraptor open source hardware kit

T slot aluminum is the bomb

Controlling Pitch On a String Instrument

Eye candy

Clapper solenoids aka instrument a day: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ranjit/3317186605/

Tension Guitar: http://www.moonmilk.com/2008/02/23/thing-22-automatic-tension-guitar/

Guitar bot- sliding tuner: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxLTJmmyqn4

LEGO NXT tuning system: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6BUmIY5aR_M&feature=related

Hydraulics: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Elt1XriaQXU&feature=related

Make Your Own Ghetto Sound Blasters

For those of you with extra welders and trash cans around

http://createdigitalmusic.com/2009/11/12/two-garbage-cans-and-a-microphone/

Feedback Control of Musical Instruments

Most structural engineers seek to prevent structural vibrations, instrument builders seek to create sustained structural vibrations.

A nice quote from "Feedback control of Musical Instruments" by Edgar J. Berdahl, G¨unter Niemeyer, Julius O. Smith III.

116 pages. Filled with too many ordinary differential equations, transfer functions and root locus plots for light reading. But if you want some cutting edge ideas about feedback control, the CCRMA thinktank delivers again.


Highlights:

Graphtech makes some bad ass sensors that could be used for termination based control. The first time I've seen that concept. But its possible to put sensors and actuators at the end of the string.

Most types of sensor/actuator will be done digital. This will introduce some type of delay and will cause phase problems. The whole notion of simply adding a microphone and speaker to increase feedback, will probably not sound the way one expects.

Certain types of string activators will result in inharmonic series coming out of the strings.

Magnetic actuators (aka ebow) and more are a nice way to sustain the tone. Magnet activated strings are boring to look at, but magnets provide a nice way to sustain a tone.

Charles Besnainou was footnoted a few times in this paper.

Rebuilding Instruments from The Monochord

The inventors are coming are popping up around the world.

Cybernetic monochords are going to be the big lobster mobster for the next two years.

Here is a nice paper talking about different methods of control.

https://ccrma.stanford.edu/~eberdahl/Papers/STANM120.pdf

Some quick thoughts:
+ Big props to the research team. Julius Smith is everywhere.
+ Groovy monochord pictures toward the end
+ Bode graphs will become the new eye candy for Electronic musicians
+ Are Magnetic actuators better than mechanical pluckers?
+ Can PID control be stable with better error correction?
+ Where do I buy neodydmium futures?

A proper reading and write-up is do on this one.

Old School Music Just Got Older

First post! Researchers in Germany unearthed the oldest musical instrument. Dating back 35,000 years it showcases how long music has been a part of our culture.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8117915.stm

Wall Mounted Strings played from Radioactive Readings

Beautiful use of wall mounted strings. Not a fan of using radioactive decay. But the whole thing is visually stunning.


The Small Within the Great sound installation from Barrie James Sutcliffe on Vimeo.

Acoustic /modular Guitar Synth

The era of mutable acoustic instruments continues.

A research at MIT created a guitar with a replacable sound board. He sets up a few piezos
on the sound board. Those piezos are send to a dsp card. As you change the sound board, you get a new tone. Sone sound boards include 150 year old wood form a Vermont bridge, and a container based sound board. The container board can be filled with liquids.

http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2009/03/chameleon_guitar_takes_on_many_tone.html

Music Road

Wow. Amazing musical instrument.

Why Your Speakers Suck

Sound on Sound just published a retrospective on the Yamaha NS-10. A studio monitor that become a surprise industry standard for over 30 years and now out of production. Known for its brutally honest reproduction of sound, NS-10 sell for more than their original price. The article breaks down why this unassuming box became the industry giant, and indirectly introduced a new trend in how speakers will be rated.

What makes a good monitor? The early adopters for the NS-10 favored its mobility. When traveling from site to site, a consistent mixing sound is important for an engineer. Practicality made it catch-on, but why did it stick around? The article quells the rumors circulating the net, and cites an academic paper comparing 30 studio monitors.

Frequency response is the current standard for monitors. The NS-10 performs less desirably here. It outperforms in one area: Response time.

A bass delay of 10 milliseconds(ms) will the kick drum appear 4 meters behind the mids and highs of the guitar. The NS-10 delivers the lows, mids and highs within 2-3 ms of each. The ear hears everything at once. Tight and punchy. As other speakers would introduce delays between the frequency ranges, and the sound becomes muddled.

Marketing folks rejoice. A new standard for comparing speakers. But will this carry over into other areas? Plugins? I’ve heard accounts of how eqs can alter the time delay and phase between harmonics. And I wonder if certain mixing consoles start introducing delays as you send sound through its eqs and aux sends. Each of these little bits result in a loss of punchiness and tightness.

Does this really make a difference in the sound? Yes.

Does it tell if you something sounds better? No. Trust your ears, not marketing charts. Good sound remains subjective. Tools like this are useful. But not gospel. Accuracy of time-domain, does not equate to sounding good. The unpleasant sound of the NS-10 is proof of that. If you think your speakers sound good then use it. If you think your eq sounds good, then continue using it.

But be prepared for a new wave of marketing literature explaining why your speakers suck.