the real question: will it help a musician mate?
New instrument scales musical heights
31–40 of 49 posts
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#32I have a funny story surrounding the Eigenharp. A few nights ago I was having last minute doubts about the original name we had picked for our startup. At a certain point, while brainstorming new names with a Dutch/Vietnamese friend, I came up with Eigenlabs. A quick search on Google led me to a site where weird instruments were being sold. "Argh, it's already taken, oh well". Fast forward two days, and I find the ar…
what do you mean with baader meinhof count += 1 ?
Have you ever said "That's odd, I just learned about this obscure fact/company/place/concept the other day and now it popped up again". That's the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon. So I increased the counter of my Baader-Meinhof occurrences. By the way, you'll hear about this again in a few days. :)
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#33What this is and what's exciting about it is that it's a new human-computer-inteface designed solely for producing synthesized music. Think about what we had before: Midi keyboards, Midi guitars, keyboards and mice, a few more interesting control surfaces and not much else. Sure the keyboards and guitars would be good for producing keyboard and guitar sounds, but what we needed was a way to control the gamut of sound…
I think it's just an optimized combination of pre-existing control methods. Keys with aftertouch, breath control and some touch surfaces. Evolutionary, not revolutionary. what we needed was a way to control the gamut of sounds that can be produced by a computer in a unified way That's a bit like asking for a way to control the gamut of images that can be produced on a canvas in a unified way. There are 1445068800 pos…
Assuming a sampling rate of 44100 samples per second, and 16-bit PCM, there are actually (2^16)^44100 possible 1-second-long, CD-quality recordings (which is way, way more than 1445068800).
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#34I am very bothered by how he said "synthesizer."
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#35So it's a midi guitar with a breath controller and built in synth/drum machine?
Yeah, calling it an "instrument" is incorrect. It's a controller, plain and simple. It is a pretty cool one, granted.
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#36I'd be hugely embarrassed to be seen playing one of those things. It's like some kids' movie-tied toy gone huge and gone wrong. Especially with all those flashing lights wizzing up and down the fretboard. Ridiculous.
Those flashing lights are simply the way the device communicates with the user. (Presumably) in the absence of haptic feedback on the controls the device needs to feedback what it is doing to the user visually. Without screens the current method of doing that is through flashing lights. Controlling pretty much anything complex and electronic will involve some flashing lights.
It looks as if some serious thought has been given to the usability of the device for music production. If the device succeeds in allowing the musician to produce more complex, interesting and diverse sounds, everyone will be playing one, and you'll be eating your hat ;)
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#37http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJhiY3oQRIk Some more info. Their website is rather low on content so you will have to sit through such a video if you want to know more.
Definitely, a good video! We get to see features such as a 16-note sequencer.
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#38I wish they'd have played a different song. While the instrument looks impressive, playing a generic sounding piece of rock means I can't help but wonder if three people couldn't have played the same piece with older instruments.
If you want to compare, the song they are covering is Extreme Ways by Moby.
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#39I would stand in line for this.
Re: New instrument scales musical heights
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Agreed. I'd buy one for $400, maybe, but for ~$5500? That's a bit too much. Also, while others on this thread seem to think it's very Star-Wars-y and ugly, I personally think it looks rather cool. Nothing wrong with the looks. Wonder how hard it would be to learn though.
http://www.eigenlabs.com/pico/ is their smaller and less intimidating version for £349.
I'd feel like I was missing out on something. My take is that it's simply a hair over engineered for the level of expressiveness most musicians will be able to play with. Build the same thing at a lower fidelity, sell it at 1/4 the price and maybe it'll take off. Right now, it's the price of really high end traditional instruments. And the next step down is a 10 penny whistle.