The Tenori-On, the grid-based musical instrument with whimsical sequenced lights created by Toshio Iwai, has been gradually becoming more affordable. The original model, complete with its rounded metal case, has already been cut to US$999 here in North America. Now, Yamaha announces that it is making an “Orange” version which also slices costs. A plastic […]
Music
This Weekend is Crazy in Austin: Handmade Music, Live 8 Sessions Tour
In LA’s DubSpot Live 8 Sessions, I shared a panel with Daedalus, talking about design, live playing, the monome, and how limiting tools for performance can be powerful. Austin gets its own cast of presenters this weekend. Sadly, I can’t be in all places at once. If I could, I’d be in Austin – twice […]
Two Garbage Cans and a Microphone
From the suggestion box at CDM, we’re taking a look at DIY party-rocking sound system technology from the birth of Hip-Hop. Ed.: Resident DIY expert and editor-at-large Michael Una returns – and the man has been known to do strange things with speakers himself. Say you’re an up-and-coming crew with a turntable and some mics. […]
Community-Driven DVI Mixing Hardware: Toby Answers Questions
Finally, “mixing” doesn’t have to be synonymous with “S-Video/composite”: DVI-grade mixing at affordable-by-human prices is coming. We were already thrilled by Toby *Spark’s effort to lead a community-driven DVI hardware mixer effort. But tantalizing as the teaser was, it led to still more questions. Toby has followed up with an extensive Q&A on his site. […]
Novation Launchpad OSC Wrapper Makes MIDI More Readable
A new, free software release for Novation’s Launchpad could make your device a lot more usable – and it shows how useful OSC can be for hardware, even if that isn’t OSC hardware. (Now, imagine what OSC-native hardware can do.) There are plenty of misunderstandings about OSC and the monome out there. Among them, there’s […]
Live Music Makers Ask: How Can We Get in Sync?
Sync or swim, indeed. Synchronized swimming performance in Brighton, which itself had to sync with live music and cinema – check out the details, as they’re perfect metaphorically for this story. Photo: Greg Neate. Laptop musicians are feeling out of sync — literally. But we can work together to help the situation. Computer music making […]
VVVV AV with Blender, Fraps, MeshLab – Vadim Smakhtin's Internal Thinking
On the weekend we saw plenty of love expressed for windows-only patching tool (or “Multipurpose Toolkit”) VVVV [tag on CDMo]. Another recent VVVV piece which has impressed me is Internal Thinking, from Vadim Smakhtin. Sune spoke about how audio-linked visuals can be “jumpy”, which is often the case. But Internal Thinking shows that random, fast-moving, […]
VVVV AV with Blender, Fraps, MeshLab – Vadim Smakhtin’s Internal Thinking
On the weekend we saw plenty of love expressed for windows-only patching tool (or “Multipurpose Toolkit”) VVVV [tag on CDMo]. Another recent VVVV piece which has impressed me is Internal Thinking, from Vadim Smakhtin. Sune spoke about how audio-linked visuals can be “jumpy”, which is often the case. But Internal Thinking shows that random, fast-moving, […]
A Gramophone that Plays the Earth Instead of Vinyl, and a Sonic iPhone Epidemic
Images courtesy Olle Cornéer. Used by permission. If you think culture has become too disconnected from the Earth, “Harvest” and the Terrafon instrument surely count as a shock to the system. A traditional ensemble picks up an enormous tone arm and transducer and, through back-breaking labor, drag it across arable fields. It’s part sound art […]