Johnathan136 plays electronic bagpipes:

This was about a year and a half ago, I had my jaw wired shut because it was broken, so couldn’t play my actual pipes. These are Ross Electronic Bagpipes. I kinda go psycho in the end.

If you’re not familiar with the surprising range of electronic bagpipes, don’t miss The Complete Guide To MIDI Bagpipes; Covering Practice Pipes, Robotic Bagpipers & The Frankenpipe.

Sunday Synth Jams: This video captures the savage percussive noise assault of Cartier Santos Sweet Lady, live at Make:Tokyo Meeting 04.

Fluorescent Lamp controlled with

• /I/F GAINER
• /Finger move
• /Hand move
• /Voice volume

If you happened to be at this show – leave a comment and let us know what you thought of it!

via omnibotoom

Sunday Synth Jam: Sound designer Diego Stocco is always doing something amazing and this short promo piece is no exception.

If you’ve been dreaming about a new synth or new app, see what Stocco does with a bunch of old junk:

A short abstract piece created during one of the sessions I did for an upcoming project.
I used an old dismantled piano, antique zithers collected in the past few months and metallic wind chimes. Played with piano hammers and a dulcimer bow.

See more of Stocco’s videos at his Vimeo site.

This is a demo for Drawdio – a pencil that lets you “draw” instruments.

While creator Jay Silver compares it to a theremin, it’s closer to a Tannerin or Electro-Theremin.

via wakeupsilver:

Imagine you could draw musical instruments on normal paper with any pencil (cheap circuit thumb-tacked on) and then play them with your finger. The Drawdio circuit-craft lets you MacGuyver your everyday objects into musical instruments: paintbrushes, macaroni, trees, grandpa, even the kitchen sink…

One day I bought a “harmonium” kit at the street market in Bangalore. I hacksawed the keyboard off to make the first ever Drawdio circuit. We played with it at a local school in the slums using plants, water, our foreheads, etc. My friend told me graphite would work too. Meditating on it, I realized the Drawdio circuit should be literally attached to a pencil to “draw audio,” and that’s where the name came from: Draw + Audio.

DIY: Make it. Remix it. Play it.

See http://drawdio.com

This is a demo video for a video theremin, created with Max For Live in Ableton Live 8. 

via akihikotube:

Max For Live (ableton & cycling’74) Video Theremin Tutorial Patch

This video demonstrates using Max For Live with a Wacom Tablet to control the Analog synth instrument in Ableton Live 8.

The “Wacom Theremin” offers a lot of expressive musical potential, with 5 degrees of control over the sound.

Details below.

via rerunnermusic:

The live.remote~ object passes data at many times the resolution of MIDI (one of the great things about the Wacom tablet and sample accurate modulation from MSP to Ableton Live using the API objects in Max for Live).

The Wacom tablet has 5 degrees of hi-res expressive freedom (see below for mappings). Very promising, this is just a quick little study… Cheers.

x axis = pitch (tempered)
y axis = volume
pen pressure =vibrato amount
tilt axis y = vibrato rate
tilt axis x = detune +/- semitone.

rishabhrajan demonstrates his MacGyver multitouch surface, with some general applications and then with a Flash version of Brian Eno’s Bloom ambient app.

Below, a “paper piano”, created with Community Core Vision, Pure Data and Logic Pro.

Do you think 2010 will be the year somebody packages this concept and turns it into a general music app?

Sound Textile experimentations at Modefabriken – umlautbrikauski “freaking out on the Textile Harp”.

This is obviously early on in development – but the idea of fabric synth controllers is intriguing.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Earlier in the month, we brought you the news of the new Yamaha Tenori On Orange, aka the TRN-O.

The TRN-O is an entry-level version of the Tenori On, offering the same basic musical functionality, but using orange LEDs, stripping away the backlighting LEDs and using a basic white plastic case.

Yamaha has not officially announced the pricing for the new Tenori On Orange, but the pricing is reported to be £649 in the UK and $699 in the US.

Nobody seems to want to state the obvious on this, so I will. If these prices are correct, the Tenori On Orange looks like it’s $300 overpriced.

The Tenori On Orange doesn’t have the sex appeal of the original Tenori On.

It looks like Yamaha cheapened the materials and stripped away features to make the Tenori On Orange less expensive, rather than trying to design a new version that would meet the lower price point in an elegant way.

The market has also been flooded with matrix controllers in the last year. While most of them don’t have the minimal chic appeal of the Tenori On, they do have larger buttons and a more functional design. And, while the Tenori On is a matrix synth rather than just a matrix controller, many would consider the built-in synth capabilities limiting.

If Yamaha would introduce this at US $400, they’d have a device that could compete with things like the Novation LaunchPad or the Livid Ohm64 or the APC40.

The original Tenori On has never seemed to find its mojo, despite fawning coverage in both the music press and the general press. The Tenori On Orange at $699 isn’t going to fix that.

I’d like to see the original Tenori On priced at $699 and the Tenori On Orange priced at $399. At those prices, Yamaha could sell these en masse.

If the reported Tenori On Orange prices are correct, though, expect to see Yamaha announcing price cuts in a year.

What do you think? Does the Tenori On’s unique design justify its price? Or does Yamaha need to sharpen its pencil if they want to start selling these things?

via CDM, MusicRadar

The BT Visit London Awards 2009 opened this year at The Westfield Centre, London to the sound of a 10 piece Tenori-On Orchestra.

The event, to celebrate and award the best of the tourism industry in London, was opened in style. A  string quartet began playing Beethoven’s 5th against a back drop of images of London. As the piece built up, a 10 strong Tenori-On orchestra took over, turning Beethoven’s 5th into a disco tune a la Walter Murphy.

You can hear the Tenori-On Orchestra’s version of Beethoven’s 5th at the Yamaha site.

The Tenori-Ons were programmed by Sound Designer and Yamaha artist Marc01.

“Taking on such a monumental piece of music (Beethovan’s 5th), and adapting it for the Tenori-On was definitely an exciting and challenging project,” said Marco1. “The Tenori-On is a very inspirational tool – having the ability to program it in a very melodic way, and to suddenly switch to the more experimental layers such as Bounce and Random opened up a world of possibilities.”

“Having the luxury to use 10 Tenori-Ons meant that I could really experiment with multiple layers, effects and processing to take the Tenori-On way beyond peoples expectations of what it can do.”

If any readers made it to this performance, leave a comment!

Eigenlabs has posted a couple of videos that offer an introduction and tutorial for the new Eigenharp Pico.

With 18 playing keys and 4 mode keys, a strip controller and breath pipe, the Pico has the majority of the playing features of the Eigenharp Alpha. It plays an unlimited range of sounds and is available in two finishes.

The Eigenharp Pico is shipping starting November 23, 2009 and retails for £349.00 (inc vat).

Click here to view the embedded video.

Specifications:

Dr Bleep is trickling out more info on the new Thingamagoop 2 synth robot.

The video above demonstrates using a Thingamagoop 2 to control a Moog Prodigy.

Dr Bleep says:

The Thingamagoop has a stereo 1/8? jack on the side to facilitate control voltage in and out. You can make your own cable very simply or order a nice, shielded one from us. It’s simply a stereo 1/8? to two, mono female 1/4? jacks. Here’s Dr. Bleep and his band, The Hearts and the Minds, using the Thingamagoop 2 to control a Moog Prodigy.

Note that the CV input is not 1volt/Octave but you can use it to make some ridiculous sound!

Arduino Support

The Thingamagoop 2 uses Arduino to control the analog VCO as well as the LEDacle. You don’t need an Arduino board to use the Thingamagoop 2; you only need on if you want to reprogram it.

The Thingamagoop 2 circuit incorporates an AVR chip that has been programed without the Arduino bootloader. This allows the device to start up immediately but you’ll have to switch out the chip for one with the bootloader if you want to reprogram it.

The programmer cable is a stereo 1/8? cable with a ferrite noise suppressor and 3 pins on the other end that go into the Arduino headers. Not only can you directly program the Thingamgoop 2, you can communicate with it.

“Who will be the first to get processing to use the photocell as a variable!? Or build a MIDI i/o!?” asks Dr Bleep.

If you’ve been worrying about how you can incorporate more onanistic pantomime into your act, you may want to check out Eric Singer’s Sonic Banana.

The Sonic Banana may not quite as cool looking as a keytar, but the instrument is completely original, offers unique performance opportunities and could be the perfect excuse for the occasional single-entendre pickup line.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Sonic Banana consists of four bend sensors in a row, running the length of a rubber tube, with a pushbutton switch at the end. Software in Max converts this data into musical functions, turning the Sonic Banana into a versatile performance instrument.

More info is available at Singer’s site.

Last week, Bleep Labs introduced the Thingamagoop 2 with a teaser at their site.

Now they’ve put together this video showing the Thingamagoop 2 in squelchy action.

The Thingamagoop 2 is a DIY kit that sells for $100.

Here’s what’s new in the Thingamagoop 2:

• Analog VCO controlled by analog or digital signal from Arduino. (A separate Arduino board is not required)
• Sample and hold, Arpeggios, noise, and bit crush effects with open source code so you can program your own sounds!
• All the analog sounds of the original Thingamagoop.
• Controllable LEDacle – Ramp and random waveforms with rate control.
• New modulators – Square wave amplitude modulator and triangle wave pulse width modulator.
• Tough, stomp box type body with silk screened graphics in 3 different styles.
• Easy to access battery – No more screws!
• Much fuller and louder speaker.
• CV in and out.
• Arduino Programmer jack. Easily hook an Ardunio board up to the Thingamagoop 2.
• Kit now comes with a pre-drilled enclosure.
• Still assembled in Austin, Texas by Dr. Bleep and friends.

via drbleep:

Analog + Arduino noise madness. More info at bleeplabs.com

If there was a musical instrument in The Matrix, it would probably look something like the Octopulse.

The Octopulse was created for the Yamaha Musical Instruments Research Lab.

Here’s what they have to say about it:

It shows that noise is music and is the principal musician of »The Alien Noise Orchestra« (work in progress), being the first of 4 different looking toy instrument characters that all produce different sounds.

With this cuddly »alien bagpipe« you can control analogue sound synthesis through unconventional means, transferring movements into information for an analogue synthesizer to convert into cacophonous noises. This unconventional soundscape alters perceptions of what music could be and allows the electronic sounds of a synthesizer to be accessed by anyone.

Throbbing Gristle’s Chris Carter posed this short demo of a black Gristleism.

The Gristleism is described as a “Throbbing Gristle palm-sized loop playback machine.”

Yamaha today announced a new, budget version of it’s innovative Tenori On music synthesizer – the Tenori On Orange, TRN-O.

The TRN-O is an entry-level version of the Tenori On, offering the same basic musical functionality, but using orange LEDs, stripping away the backlighting LEDs and using a basic white plastic case.

Surprisingly for a budget item, Yamaha did not announce the pricing for the new Tenori On Orange. The TRN-O is expected to be available in December.

Yamaha also confirmed a free forthcoming firmware update for Tenori-On customers, expected to be available in January. The update will address the syncing of Tenori-On to external DAW applications and offer an improved MIDI sync implementation.

According to Yamaha, the new Tenori-On ‘Orange’ offers the same levels of creative power as the original but has been made significantly more affordable. Yamaha has replaced the magnesium casing of the original with a heavy duty and durable plastic casing.

“We know everyone loves the concept and fresh approach of Tenori-On, however, as you’d expect we have received thousands of requests for a more affordable version,” Yamaha’s Peter Peck explains. “We therefore looked at many ways of reducing the price without compromising the all-important product concept or creative operating system. By removing the battery option and the back panel LED’s and changing the chassis construction from the magnesium found on the original to a more affordable material we have achieved our goal of creating the more affordable Tenori-On ‘Orange’, bringing the full creative capability of Tenori-On to a much wider audience.”

Details at the Yamaha site.

Kyle Evans created this electronically modified digeridoo.

Details below.

via yakthekyle:

I created this instrument to experiment in the combination of the organic sound qualities of a didgeridoo with the advanced signal processing capabilities of modern computer programming and sound synthesis.

This custom built didgeridoo features externally mounted modules that allow the performer to process and manipulate the sound of the instrument in real time. All control data is transmitted wirelessly via blue tooth and is controlling several audio processes created in a custom-built software environment.

New with the Thingamagoop 2:

• Arduino + Analog
• CV i/o
• Much more….

No pricing or release date have been announced.

Percussa has announced that their AudioCubes are now available in packages of 6 and 8. Details are available at the Percussa shop.

You can preview the AudioCubes’ capabilities above.

Here are their recommendations for various types of applications: