Monster Tubulum: Time To Start

The Monster Tubulum is built, and now it goes live. LINK: Youtube

Taiwan Artist - Shara Lin

Incredible girl plays three instruments: violin, piano, and the guzheng. LINK: Youtube

Siemens Aquaris - Watertight and Dustproof Hearing aid

Siemens AquarisTM hearing aid is not only watertight and dustproof, but also robust and impact-resistant. These qualities are achieved by features such as a special casing with a sealed battery compartment, a watertight microphone membrane and a protective cover. A slip-on sports clip holds the hearing instrument securely behind the ear, even when the wearer is moving around. LINK: Youtube

Unique Wooden Instrument

"QUOTE" “[It's] an automatic violin… We in Spain used this until the end of the 18th century. This is a good instrument but really very limited.” — tinotrivino. LINK, Via: Youtube

Incredible Sonovox - Kay Kyser - 1940 film "You'll Find Out"

Amazing device that gives voice to musical instruments. The Sonovox consists of one or two louspeakers placed on the throat that play the source sound. The performer whispers the words while the speakers stand in for the voice box. Used for the talking train in Disney's Dumbo, uncountable radio promos, a tube-in-the-mouth version "Talk Box" was used by Frampton to make his guitar sing, and all-electronic "Vocoder" versions are still used in current pop music. LINK: Youtube

Steve Martin / Sarah Jarosz (Full Episode)

Watch the full episode. See more Austin City Limits.

Steve Martin playing Banjo. LINK

World’s First Real Gold Guitar

“Introducing ‘The GoldCaster‘, the world’s first and only real gold guitar. This one of a kind instrument presents fabulous tones and luxury not available from traditional guitars.” w/ photos. LINK: UniqueDaily

The samchillian - a musical instrument based on relativity

An electronic musical instrument which takes Leon Gruenbaum's samchillian concept and defines a possible product design for it. The challenge was to make an aesthetic, ergonomic, musical product which could be used on stage by a musician.

The samchillian is a new type of musical instrument which uses the concept of relative notes, rather then fix pitches (as in a piano). LINK: Youtube

The Hydraulophone: Invention of a new musical instrument

Shows invention of the hydraulophone, a musical instrument based on pressurized water jets, featuring "Nessie", a children's hydraulophone in the form of a cute green sea monster, as well as other hydraulophones, such as the single-jet hydraulophone in which all sound is made from one screeching water valve on a single jet. The video shows various changes in the sound, depending on how the water jets are blocked. LINK: Youtube

Light-Sensitive Musical Instrument is Played by Moving Your Fingertips

Artist Robert Mathy created “Light Sensitive Fingertips” — a musical instrument that has light sensitive phototransistors in the tips of the fingers. It’s played by moving the sensors over light sources of varying intensity:

Light, emitted by the displays of activated mobile phones, functions as the origin of the sounds. As each mobile phone’s display generates a different light frequency, each results in an audio signal with a different pitch. In addition, other electronic devices, such as flashing bicycle lights, can be used to generate rhythmic tones.

Link, Via: GearFuse | Video | Photo: Robert Mathy, Via: Neatorama

Banjo & Beatbox Improv

Cathy Fink & Christylez Bacon improvise on Banjo & Beatbox at the 2nd Annual Old Time Banjo Festival. LINK: Youtube

"Dizzi Jig" Folk Medieval hammered dulcimer music by dizzi

"Dizzi Jig" Folk Medieval hammered dulcimer music by dizzi. LINK: Youtube

Swizzle Stick thumb piano

[YouTube - Link]

Homemade musical instrument using plastic swizzle sticks for keys.
An example of repurposing ordinary household materials for musical experimentation.
- Via: instructables, Via: Neatorama

You think the Sampler is a new musical invention?

[YouTube - Link]

That is the original video demo for the first sampler from the 60's (it is so very British!).

Have you ever heard a fan of classic rock or earlier music bemoan that new music is just a bunch of old music sampled and looped back with different vocals, etc? That musicians these days don't play their own instruments or really sing their own songs? Well... sure there is some truth to that. And yet, that's not to say that musicians from earlier generations didn't sample music in their songs. Meet... the Mellotron.

Created in England in the 1960s- this was a keyboard in which each key is connected to a loop of tape featuring a pre-recorded sound. The pre-recorded sound could be anything: flutes, violins, voices, random noises coming from your basement. By hitting the key, you played the recording, thus recreating that sound on command. It was the first keyboard using sampled sounds, a kind of instrument you will find in every studio in the world these days. Who used the instrument? Well the Beatles for one. They used it heavily on "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart Club Band" and "Magical Mystery Tour." Not to mention The Zombies, Deep Purple, The Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, David Bowie, and The Kinks.

The instrument became unpopular during the Punk Era, but was used again in New Wave and, of course, Electronic Music in the 1980's.
And then was used by basically everyone in the 90's: U2, The Smashing Pumpkins, Radiohead, Pearl Jam, R.E.M, Dinosaur Jr, Sheryl Crow, Tom Petty, and many many others.
These days an original Mellotron is rare to find, but there is a steep demand for them because they produce such a unique sound and feel.
- Via: emyoku, Via: Neatorama

New Musical Instrument Prototype By Roger Linn

Roger Linn Design is a small, home-based business in Berkeley, California, USA, that is engaged in the design of products for the electronic musical instrument industry. Here he demonstrates a prototype for a new musical instrument that for the time being is called LinnStrument. LINK: The Presurfer, Via: Youtube

Ghost Town on the Eigenharp

Ghost Town on the Eigenharp. LINK: Youtube

Bond theme song on Eigenharp

The James Bond theme song (Moby) on their Eigenharp. LINK: Youtube

The GPS Beatmap

“In 2006, Face Removal Services created the Beatmap, a GPS-based music instrument that transforms the face of the planet into an enormous DJ booth. Looping musical phrases are represented on a map as overlapping circular territories. As the vehicle approaches the center of a circle, the volume increases. In areas of the map where territories overlap the vehicle generates dynamic mixes of the overlapping musical phrases. By exploring a very large map of many overlapping territories the Beatmap creates complex, dynamic mash-ups. The map can be explored on foot, by plane, boat, train, or automobile. In this footage the map is explored by car on the Bonneville Salt Flats, allowing the user to freely accelerate, swerve, and slam to a stop for optimum musical control of the instrument.” LINK

The world's Oldest Handmade Musical Instrument

In all, researchers report finding the fragments of four flutes at two excavations in an area of southwestern Germany known as Swabia. Three of the sets of fragments were carved from mammoth ivory, but the real prize is a nearly complete flute hollowed out from the bone of a griffon vulture. That specimen was found in the Hohle Fels cave, just 28 inches (70 centimeters) away from the spot where the prehistoric Venus... was found.

When assembled, the vulture-bone flute is about eight and a half inches long (21.8 centimeters long) and boasts five finger holes. There are fine lines cut into the bone around the holes, suggesting that the flute's maker was calibrating the holes' placement to produce the nicest tones. One end of the flute is cut into a V shape, and the musician probably blew into that side of the flute. The researchers assume that an inch or two of the flute's far end is missing. LINK

You can listen to an MP3 of a replica flute being played.

Optron: Brilliant instrument of noise

Improv musician Atsuhiro Ito wields a flickering noise contraption called the “Optron” (or “Optrum”), a miked-up fluorescent light tube he plugs into an array of effects pedals and plays sort of like an electric guitar. The Optron is featured in some Sony Walkman commercials. LINK

+ Optron - Walkman CM 1, LINK

+ Optron - Walkman CM 2 (with Yoichiro Shin on drums), LINK