Digital sound, but physical: Roger Linn’s LinnStrument in action, 10% off

No, we do not all want to be reduced to brains in a jar. Music has always been about gesture, whether embodied in the breath or touch. So now is the perfect time for the LinnStrument, the human-scaled expressive grid from Roger Linn. Roger writes to point us to some of the latest musical examples […]

Flexur and Chill, with this Trautonium-inspired DIY synthesizer

I missed this when it dropped earlier this month — Synthtopia was there! But now is a perfect time to chill out to the smoothly gliding sounds of this original Trautonium-inspired synthesizer design in progress. Flexur can cool down an overheated Europe.

Peter Kirn - June 24, 2026

Casio’s expressive guitar strap controller was inspired by a chopstick case

Surprise! Casio has something unexpected — Dimension Shifter, a spring-powered expressive wireless controller that attaches to your guitar strap. And it was the invention of one employee, inspired by his kid’s school-lunch retracting chopstick and cutlery case.

Peter Kirn - January 23, 2026

Marvel at the gorgeous Nopia harmony instrument, now at MK1

Peter Kirn - December 16, 2025

The making of Sequential’s all-analog, polyphonic, expressive Fourm

Peter Kirn - September 23, 2025

Roland’s Tadeo Kikumoto on 808, part by part: the ukiyo-e drum machine

Peter Kirn - August 8, 2025

Therminator, with a curvy abstract glyph of a box with cables and a dot in the center engraved into the 3D-printed case, USB-C and jack connections

Ther’minator by Eric Singer transforms LIDAR to modular, CV

Peter Kirn - April 4, 2025

Sequencing with light on an alien-looking instrument by Kacper Ziemianin

Peter Kirn - January 10, 2025

Alternative histories, realized: someone built a working 80s Apple prototype

Peter Kirn - December 9, 2024