More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Thanks to Paul Harrington for the Latin assistance.

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.

John James Audubon image associated with this project adapted (cropped, colors changed, text added, cut’n’paste) from a public domain Audubon illustration, courtesy of Wikipedia.

Disquiet Junto Project 0385: Audubonus Instrumentum

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/22502/4?u=eptc

WOBBLING LOCK PICK: The Convict Shoves Into the Empty Home (Disquiet0385)

The sciù is a double reed aerophone, consisting of a cylindrical tube inside which are placed thin membranes that produce resonant delays. The sciù was built by Amos Soma, the name derives from a Sicilian dessert, a ricotta cheese. As such sweet induces the player and those who listen to States of ecstasy.      
release date :17_ 05_2019   
More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Thanks to Paul Harrington for the Latin assistance.

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.

John James Audubon image associated with this project adapted (cropped, colors changed, text added, cut’n’paste) from a public domain Audubon illustration, courtesy of Wikipedia.

Etude Du Sciù (disquiet0385)

Found floating amongst the stars, initially though to be an alien satellite, a yalpian blackstone organ was found in 1972 by Major Tom & Eva. 

After several years of experiments, Professor Spleet Von Gingle finally succeeded in taping a few minutes of it's song, after which (she claims) it broke completely. 

Rumour has it, though, that pieces and parts as well as some of the oscillating blackstones has been seen on stage or in the studios of some of the biggest bands throughout the '70'ies and '80'ies.

More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

disquiet0385 - etude for yalpian fields

For this weeks contribution I utilized a 358 pattern on the Roland DJ 808. I then recorded a tambourine with Zen magnets attached to it, a bowl of water with magnets in it while using a squeezee pig blowing into the bowl, filling up with water, snout up with water. In addition I added some tongue clicks, lip bubbles. Building an instrument rack in Abelton with Wavetable and Operator to include an in the box instrument combination.
Ta=Tamborine
Mag=Magnet
WA=wavetable
O=Operator

More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Thanks to Paul Harrington for the Latin assistance.

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion

CyMag WAudubonus OInstrumentum Disquiet0385

TaMag WAudubonus OInstrumentum Disquiet0385 Download ME

Prepared guitar run backward with little processing.

Ryan Scott Mattingly

Backmasked Etude (disquiet0385)

This is the only known recording of Mrs Ethel Cartwright performing on what the unknown recordist dubbed the “Ethelphone” in their notes. Said notes describe the Ethelphone as being “an unholy collection of fragments of household cleaning implements played by Mrs Cartwright with far more enthusiasm than skill through an ancient reel to reel tape recorder powered by a car battery” 

Cartwright and her husband Sidney lived almost all of their lives on an isolated farm that only had the most basic amenities. Mrs Cartwright however had a passion for music that apparently remained a source of friction between the couple for a lot of their married lives. She had a collection of very poor quality tapes recorded with a microphone from a battery powered radio. When visited by the recordist who made this tape she expressed an enthusiasm for a show presented by “Mister John Peel”. Her husband seemed irritated by this and had to be persuaded to go and do some work on the farm by the recordist so that his muttering and grumbling didn’t spoil the recording. 

A couple of years after this recording life on the farm came to a tragic end. Mrs Cartwright turned up at a neighbouring farm disheveled and distressed. She said only “call police. Tell ‘em to go to the farm”. She accepted a cup of tea from her Neighbour but wouldn’t say anything more. Something she continued through the subsequent trial and her imprisonment. Life in prison didn’t suit Mrs Cartwright and she passed away in her sleep a few short months into sentence.

Disquiet Junto Project 0385: Audubonus Instrumentum

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

"The Ethelphone" disquiet0385

This piece is produced with an imaginary instrument, a whip which both tames the creature and is the creature itself. To make the sounds, I used a metallic rod hooked up to a contact microphone in combination with an amplified acrylic panel. The two together form a feedback loop. Upon contact, a creature is brought to life. The creature changes pitch, moans (resonates) or is extinguished each time the whip "cracks".

Feedback Whip - disquiet0385

The Hinterland Who’s Who Theme - arranged for the Bremmenmusikkasten (a so far imaginary instrument made up of live birds and a cat in a box of sorts)

Hinterland (disquiet0385)

https://disquiet.com/2019/05/16/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

Photo by Patryk Grądys: https://unsplash.com/photos/4pPzKfd6BEg

Music for EQ

Music for EQ (disquiet0385)

The corvus sonic bowl is a type of musical instrument that uses a wide copper or crystallophone rim to produce musical tones by means of friction and velocity. The first models were produced in Finland, where one is most likely to hear and see the instrument in action.

The actual word has no lexical meaning in Finnish, and in Finno-Ugric language the instrument is often called a korppi meaning “raven.” It is unknown what ornithological significance this holds, but we know that the name comes from the Latin corvus vis Swedish korpen, both derived from the Indo-European root ker, “to cry out.” Mysteries abound.

The corvus (as it’s typically called) can be played two ways: by rubbing the edge of the rim with a moistened rubber ball, or by flicking various parts of the body framework with your finger. The emitted sound may be highly percussive, like hitting a clay pot, or it can resemble the angelic tunes produced by a glass harmonica. 

Since the corvus was (and is) an expensive instrument to produce, recorded artifacts are exceedingly rare. Suss Müsik is fortunate to own several albums in which the corvus makes an appearance. 

The Scottish progressive rock band Aloysius Colourboxx featured the instrument on their 1972 triple-album opus Trade Language, and US flower-pop outfit The Third Fifth Forth was known to break out a corvus throughout their two-week existence in the autumn of 1967.

Suss Müsik’s personal favorite corvus tunes are “Sifting the Soft” by funk-jazz great Bootsie Sidewinder, and an obscure 1977 B-side from punk band Screaming at the Mirror titled “The Apple Doesn’t Fall Far From the Tree (Unless I Throw It At You).”   

Highly skilled corvus players can emit a wide variety of sounds in a single session. Suss Müsik isn’t that skilled at anything, really, so we cheated by multi-tracking the recording for this week’s Junto. Unfortunately the rim cracked during our session before completely shattering to pieces, so that’s it for Suss Müsik’s corvus phase. Sorry.

The piece is titled Corvus. The image is a primitive sketch of the instrument drawn purely from memory.

More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Thanks to Paul Harrington for the Latin assistance.

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.

Corvus [Disquiet0385]

This week's prompt: create a fictional musical instrument.

I bought my son a xylophone but he really wanted that Gary Burton vibraphone sound, so he hooked up a bunch of servomotors to the metal bars, gently twisting each one in time to a bank of oscillators. Of course he got the idea from YouTube! I never should have signed him up for that Arduino class. And of course now the xylophone is out of warranty. Kids!!


More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Thanks to Paul Harrington for the Latin assistance.

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-... 2

There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.

Disquiet0385 Audobonus Instrumentum

for Disquiet Junto Project 0385: Audubonus Instrumentum
The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it.

This Instrument is a so-called Doohingophone. Its sound generating part is a tube with a rotating rod inside. The rod can be rotated by hand using handles on ropes which are laid around the rod. Attached to the tube is a large resonant body. 
The special thing about this instrument is the element of surprise, because the pitch is not entirely determined by the rotating speed but also by many other factors that concern the friction surfaces of the inner tube with the rod, as well as the materials used and the weather. 
There are not many artists who are able to make it sound pleasant, which is perhaps the reason it is not commonly known. Sadly even, some critics compare the sound to a squeaking door hinge and it will take decades for its reputation to be resetted to its original glory. In the time when it was invented, around 1896-1897, it was popular as house music with rich mansion owners who had nothing better to do than invite guests and keep their army of servants busy.
Here, we hear a rare live performance of one of the last artists owning a Doohingophone.
In recent times, usage of this instrument is slowly generating interest again, and I gladly link to a recent piece: 
https://soundcloud.com/moiofficiel/dont-open-the-kitchen-door



-----------------------------------------------------
More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Thanks to Paul Harrington for the Latin assistance.

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.

Doohingophone [disquiet0385]

While the UC Berkeley campus abounds in charming sights and sounds, perhaps none are more evocative to alumni of decades past than the sounds pealing forth from atop "The Campanile", or Sather Tower. These are from none other than the Glocken der Nagetiere, or Hamster Carillon, the result of an remarkable cross-departmental project (including Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Biology, Music, and Philosophy) in 1974.

Playing this instrument, the human performer(s) attempt to guide the set of pampered hamsters that are its core into moving, running in a wheel, eating, or burrowing into various parts of the sound-insulated enclosure atop the tower. These actions trigger actuators that ring the bells of the carillon. While the question of who, precisely, is performing  or composing the piece still generates papers in the philosophy journals, the rest of us can just enjoy the results at frequent midday concerts.

This piece, performed in 1986 by Rachel Salgado and two Winter White hamsters (Pippin and Dash), was recorded from nearby Strawberry Creek.

-----------------
Driving the MIDI signals for the bells in Ableton are two independent networks of LFO's interpreted with custom Reaktor macros implementing randomizable non-continuous functions that I've been working on. The creek and birdsong background are an early-morning field recording I made at Tassajara Zen Center.

Agitation/After Grape (for disquiet0385)

The Chord Can is an instrument for playing chords only. It is inspired by the Stradella Bass System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stradella_bass_system that can be found on Accordions.

The Chord Can has the size of a driking can https://i2-prod.mirror.co.uk/incoming/article1259812.ece/ALTERNATES/s1200/Hand%20Holding%20Beverage%20Can and provides buttons on the top for choosing the base note of a chord. On the outside there are buttons for setting the flavour of the chord.

More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Thanks to Paul Harrington for the Latin assistance.

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.

John James Audubon image associated with this project adapted (cropped, colors changed, text added, cut’n’paste) from a public domain Audubon illustration, courtesy of Wikipedia.

Chord Can [disquiet0385]

the sub-alto flute (also known as the sub bass flute (but not to be confused with the smaller sub-contrabass)) covers the range C0 - C3.

this 30 ft instrument is rarely seen in flute ensembles due to the great skill (and great lung capacity) required to play it. 2 assistants are needed to stabilize the instrument.

Nicknamed the contracolonic due to it's intestinal structure and rumbling at low frequencies, the recording here hopefully goes some way to highlight this facet.
.
flute sample in iris 2, paulstretched.
.
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/
Disquiet Junto Project 0385: Audubonus Instrumentum
The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it.

Step 1: Imagine an instrument that doesn’t exist.

Step 2: Develop documentation (description, back story, perhaps even a sketch) of the instrument.

image https://ganbreeder.app/i?k=730d63a4eb1195a8f1864247

sub-alto flute (disquiet0385

This week's Junto involves creating music for an imagined instrument.

The “Taciturn Aviary” is a small enclosure, about 6 inches square and 8 inches tall, made of metal bars, that contains feathers, various assorted memories of birdsong, and a delicate and ornate clockwork mechanism. When not in use, the bars are covered by plush velvet drapery, that is attached by a cord to the winder of the clockwork mechanism. To play, one lifts the drapery, thus starting the silently running clockwork. After 4’ 33" the clockwork runs down, and the drapery closes. The listening experience is different every time, being unpredictable but also affected by the location and time of day of the performance. Its tone is considered by many to be “golden”, but some consider it to be deafening.
If you pay close attention you will likely hear some of the memories of birdsong.
You might even be able to hear someone playing their Taciturn Aviary nearby right now if you stop and listen a while…

The Taciturn Aviary (disquet0385)

[The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it.]

The Beyondophone is a musical space-time location which, due to its non-euclidean geometry, generates musical echoes of very high and very low frequencies, presumably coming from neighboring multiverses. His original architect, Henry Paul Lavercroft, unfortunately disappeared already during the first recordings of the strangly resonating room, and with him also all documentations of the project vanished.

Today, the Beyondophonic Room is no longer entered by musicians themselves (if at all), but by two drones: One brings loudspeakers into the room, the other picks up the sound. So far, hardly any meaningful recordings of the Beyondophone have been made in this way – with the exception of this one piece: A blues improvisation played on a monday morning (or: what the Beyondophonic Room has made of it). In this case, neither of the drones disappeared.

First speculations want to know that at the beginning of the week even horrorfying entities of blasphemous dimensions have the blues .

--

More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:

https://disquiet.com/0385/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

--

Imaged based on PD image:
https://pixabay.com/de/photos/lost-places-keller-fahrstuhl-1928727/

Beyondophonic Room Blues Improvisation [disquiet0385]

The spike organ or nail chello (sic) is thought to originate from an early middle Europe monastic sect, the Iscariotians. They may have used the instrument to accompany their lengthy rituals contemplating the pain of the crucifixion.  

The Iscariotians are said to have been wiped out by returning crusaders at the behest of emperor Leopold III. Other commentators have suggested that the whole story may have been a constructed  alibi for the defeated crusaders plunder and desecration of the brewery of ..Santa Quaffa...


A possible surviving 'chello' object, made from of lignum vitae and iron, resides in the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen. Its interpretation is not without controversy with some critics asserting the object is nothing more than a kind of agricultural implement, though this does not explain its cruciform shape and carved decoration.

In 1972 the scholar . Roland de Févin was granted permission to investigate the Rouen Chello, explore its sound making capabilities and make recordings. his theory was that the instrument was to be played by a rosined bow.  Unfortunately de Févin's playing and handling resulted in two of the nails fracturing and so the investigation was terminated after only one day. The single recording de Févin made was never released but it was played to audiences on an European lecture tour he conducted shortly before his death in 1974. 

It has been subsequently alleged that de Févin's  investigation  coincided with the great fire at  Nantes cathedral. This lead to several occultist conspiracy theories, most notably retold in the pulp fiction novel Blood Nail-(Brownie Dane,1975) much of the plot was lifted for the Italian soft core film Sistero Orgasma (1977) where the action was switched away from a monastery to a scantily clad convent.(citation needed) 

On the film soundtrack, the sounds of the Chello were replicated by experimental electronic synthesiser the achoirorium- itself the  subject of intrigue- as its extremely high operating voltages caused the death of its creator  Luigi soon after the recording session.


This recording was made in 1980 by UK avant geographer Forster Iberix who attended several of de Févin's lectures.  He set about building a replica device and making reconstructions of the Iscariotarian mass based on a column of scribbled numbers  which appear reverso  in one of Leonardo da Vinci's codex's (Coded notebooks). The recording was released on an untitled flexi disk issued by cult French label sordide sentimental -who now deny any knowledge of its existence. It does not appear on their official discography.  Improbably- Haringey local studies library, London, has a copy in their archive. The library does not provide any method of playback for the flexidisc and items from the archive cannot be withdrawn -so some subterfuge was involved in me getting this track taped. Whilst the disk was in my possession an inexplicable number of minor disasters befell me -so I can assure you I hurriedly returned it.

disquiet0385
More on this 385th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Audubonus Instrumentum / The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it — at:
https://disquiet.com/0385/
More on the Disquiet Junto at:
https://disquiet.com/junto/
Thanks to Paul Harrington for the Latin assistance.
Subscribe to project announcements here:
http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/
Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0385-audubonus-instrumentum/

The Nail Chello (disquiet0385)

Contribution to Disquiet Junto Project 0385: Audubonus Instrumentum
The Assignment: Imagine a fake instrument, and make music with it.
For more info, go to: https://disquiet.com/0385/

Where a standard accordion uses manual bellows to mimic a lung's in-out breathing patterns, Jensen's Inexorabilis uses a silent air compressor to duplicate the circular breathing feats of a didgeridoo master. Pressure sensitive keys allow the player to control each note's air flow, from sustained flows to brief, percussive spurts. This recording features a rare "whistling" inexorabilis, which employs flute pipes rather than free reeds for the higher octaves.

Relentless Étude No. 2 [disquiet0385]

The Steam Powered Panharmonicon was invented in 1859 in the American southwest. Only one instrument was built. The core of the instrument was a steam locomotive, modified to create musical tones as the engine runs. Different tonal devices, driven by the speed of the locomotive, were used depending on the music being performed. Most typical were chimes struck by hammers mechanically connected to the rods on the side of the instrument. Sequenced percussion sounds were made by attaching wooden planks to the wheels at strategic points depending on the rhythm desired, much like children do with playing cards attached to bicycle spokes. Unfortunately, the planks never survived long enough to complete a performance, so the idea was dropped after the first few performances. Other sound-making devices were attached to the locomotive as the composers attempted to make ever more complex music, sometimes successfully but usually not.

A musical performance required several people to operate the instrument: one person to shovel coal into the engine, one person to maintain the throttle to the desired tempo, two people hanging precariously on each side of the instrument to adjust the chimes as the music progressed, and one person to watch the tracks for cows.

Power requirements were extensive: approximately 154 pounds of coal and 100 gallons of water per minute of performance. A smaller so-called “skiff-friendly” version of the instrument was planned that would fit narrow gauge railroad tracks and consume less power, but it was never built.

The instrument was tragically destroyed in 1861 while crossing the San Luis Gorge when the bridge collapsed. Fortunately, all the performers escaped serious injury or death when they leapt from the instrument, diving into the river below as the bridge collapsed around them.

[This recording was created for the Disquiet Junto project: record a piece of music with an instrument that doesn’t exist. It was created with a modular synthesizer and Ableton Live. All the train sounds were synthesized on the modular. The chimes and all audio effects were created in Ableton.]

Locomotive Motif

Locomotive Motif - Disquiet0385

My 33 1/3 series book about the Aphex Twin album <i>Selected Ambient Works Volume II</i> was published in 2014. The book was one of the top 5 bestselling titles for the calendar year, and in 2015 was ranked by Pitchfork as one of the "33 best" of the 100-plus books in the 33 1/3 series. It has subsequently been translated into Japanese (2019) and Spanish (2018)

Since 2012 I have moderated the Disquiet Junto group, which began on SoundCloud. More at disquiet.com/junto. 

I've written for Nature, Pitchfork, The Wire, Down Beat, Boing Boing, NewMusicBox, Red Bull Music Academy, Art Practical, the website of The Atlantic, and many other publications. 

I've exhibited sound art at galleries in Los Angeles (Crewest), Manhattan (apex art), and Dubai (DUTAC), and I had a audio-visual installation at the San Jose Museum of Art as part of its 45th anniversary.

And since 1996 I've run the website Disquiet.com about the intersection of sound, art, and technology.