Northwest Creative Instrument Builders:
A Survey (Part 1)

Since the first set of stone chimes was invented, tools for producing sound have proliferated in human culture. Yet whenever a novel musical instrument arrives in our midst, it is usually relegated to the category of the "weird" and sometimes even the "dangerous," as was the case with the advent of synthesizers. It seems that until a newly invented musical instrument proves its commercial value, it is considered an aberration by academics and the mainstream music media; hence, few listeners are exposed to the cutting edge of instrument design.

We in the Northwest are fortunate to have among us a relatively large number of notable instrument inventors — musicians and composers who have consciously eschewed the factory-built and the conventional in favor of building their own musical instruments to capture the sounds they hear in their mind's ear. Local instrument builders range from the internationally acclaimed MacArthur "Genius Grant" awardee Trimpin to closet visionaries who build and perform on their unique creations in relative obscurity. Regardless of their visibility, these inventive musical minds and their creations are of particular interest to the Tentacle, with our mission to "sound the depths of Northwest Creative Music."

For this survey and exploration of the Northwest's creators of unique musical instruments, the Tentacle contacted more than 25 individuals who not only design their own instruments but also use them specifically to create adventurous, non-mainstream music. The responses to our questions about the respondents' instruments and inspirations reveal an impressive variety of approaches to instrument construction and the philosophy of sound. Doubtless there are others pursuing similar work of whom we are unaware; no omission is intentional. Among the musical inventors we were unable to include in the survey but would like to acknowledge are Seymour King (found object percussion instruments), Jeph Jerman (found percussion and cacti), Philip Arnautoff (a student of Harry Partch and instrument inventor in his own right), Peter Bonnett (a contributor to the Trimpin exhibit at EMP), Wynn Burke (unconventional stringed instruments), Frank Junk (mechanical percussion generators), Dan Senn, and Ellen Fullman (inventor of the Long String Instrument, currently serving a fellowship in Berlin).

We hope you will find this overview of Northwest instrument inventors as fascinating as we have. If readers have questions or comments about any of the artists and their instruments, please do not hesitate to contact the Tentacle and we'll pass on your queries. Bon voyage!

 

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Troy Swanson

Troy Swanson's instruments are featured in recordings by Mabuse, Brent Arnold, Bill Horist, and a film soundtrack by Eric Ross. They have also been used in live performance settings with Mabuse, Thickness, the Matt Chamberlain and Jon Brion duo, and on Sonarchy Radio, where they were also played by Brent Arnold and Zeke Keeble. Sounds from Troy Swanson's instruments can be heard at www.speakeasy.net/~friction/corpusweb.

Instruments

Corporal callosa are specifically designed instruments using piano strings (under high tension), which have a high upper-harmonic content. They are essentially custom-size replications of the conventional piano hearth, but contain no keys resembling a hammered dulcimer. The strings are prepared (a process using mechanical stops placed at strategic harmonic nodes of the string and developed by John Cage in the 1930s) and played with mallets, screwdrivers, bows, and picks. The stop material and harmonic placement determines the timbral quality of each sound. These instruments are acoustic in nature, but are amplified by the use of pickups and processed electronically sounding through stereo Leslie speakers. They sound similar to the sounds from the gong chime culture of Southeast Asia, or more specifically, Gamelan music. By adding effects, they can generate a wide variety of sound to the point of a heavily processed rock guitar.

My prototype was built in 1995 and named the Lilith (Adam's first wife, later exiled from the Garden of Eden) because of its demonic shrillness from the effects I was using at the time. It is still being used, but I don't take it out as often. I then changed its name to corpus callosum, after the region of the brain uniting the cerebral hemispheres comprised of the commissural fibers. I think of this instrument as a hybrid, bridging the two schools of thought: acoustic and electronic.

I built the corpus as an addition to my keyboard rig (including Hammond, Rhodes, and various vintage synthesizers), rounding out the sound, and to be played on stage or in a club setting. Three instruments exist today, with plans for four more in the near future. In 1997, after playing in live stage settings, the stock Leslie speaker sound was no longer adequate because of volume vs. feedback issues resulting in distorted sound from trying to turn up with not enough headroom. I then modified the Leslie amp into a stereo Leslie p.a. I employ a bi-amp with separate sends to each individual horn and woofer with a total of 2600 watts, plenty for any house without a reinforcement system, or for use as a monitor. I also gutted the two-speed synchronous motors controlling the vibrato/tremolo effect of the Leslie and installed variable-speed, independently controlled motors for a more diverse vibrato/tremolo, which in turn creates ratio metric rhythms from the oscillations of the speakers, and further enhances the overall timbre of the instruments.

Inspirations

In 1986, while studying robotics in Spokane, I began building circuits for effects to be used with my analog synthesizers, and became involved in mixed-media performance. That same year I collaborated with Don Davis on an automated playing drum set using a 555 timer and a 16-step analog sequencer for a live performance. In 1988 I moved to Seattle to pursue robotics, only to find myself back in school a year later studying music at Cornish. I began working with prepared piano in 1989 while studying composition with Jarrad Powell and Sam-Ang Sam, a Cambodian-born ethnomusicologist. At first, I worked mostly timbrally, and then through Jarrad found the world of alternate tunings. It was there that I invented a system of bi-tempered tunings in the piano (without detuning the strings), utilizing equal and just temperaments by use of preparations, and created charts for harmonic exploration not included in Hemholtz's On The Sensations of Tone or Harry Partch's Genesis of a Music, yet drawing heavily from their inspiration. Another large inspiration came from (composer) James Tenney during his residency at Cornish. We talked about the charts I was working on, and he became excited, urging me to continue on with these studies.

In 1991 I met up with inventor/composer Trimpin and began a decade-long relationship, first as an apprentice and ongoing as his primary instrument fabricator, with the most recent sculpture being "if VI were IX" at the Experience Music Project. That year I quit school and shifted my focus toward improvisation.

In 1995, without access to a piano and wishing to continue my studies of alternate tunings, I built the corpus. I found the timbre so interesting that I actually forgot about tunings and focused on different effects and various ways of playing. With the new p.a. system, even more sound emerged and I found myself using fewer effects and relying on the acoustical properties of the sound. I went back to temperament studies, trying to find the right combination. I am currently working with a 24-tone scale described in Johannes Kepler's Harmonies of the World and based on the intervallic relationships of the motions of the planets in their orbits.

Instrument building has enhanced the way I hear music. The anticipation of hearing an instrument designed from a piece of paper while drilling and fabricating is exciting and often surprising. Sometimes I run out of sounds or ideas with instruments I've played for years, but it's refreshing to know ... there's still one more sound. In January of 2000 my wife and I had a child. We named him Kepler.

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John Bain

John Bain has two degrees in architecture and currently is working in sound, video, and interactive lighting devices. To Bain, working in sound is "like practicing architecture blind." Sound samples of his Mutant Data Orchestra can be heard at (206) 736-7300.

Instrument

The Mutant Data Orchestra is a project centering around an analysis of digital culture through the elucidation of hidden sounds within cheap electronics. Through the act of circuit bending, or the extreme modification of electronic devices, I am able to produce completely alien sounds from apparently benign devices.

I find most of my devices at thrift stores for very little money, looking mostly for toy keyboards, digital answering machines or sound-making toys. When I get a device home, I'll open it up and look at the circuit board and try to determine where I should put switches and potentiometers, using my fingers to run the circuit through my body or using a clip lead with two needles to select specific shorts. Generally, I tend to look for the biggest, juiciest chips on the board, since they usually are the digital ones, which only deal with two voltages, +5v and 0v, which represent high/low or 1/0 in digital parlance.

I tend to shy away from the analog sections, but these areas can be fruitful as well. The area I avoid is the amplifier section, since this area has a specific function that I need and usually only causes problems. After determining the relevant contacts I'll be using, I decide what type of switches to use and how they should be placed on the surface of the instrument. The internal design has a direct relevance to the external interface, so often I'll be using switches in arrays, or program switches layered with throw switches. I also install a banana jack into each device so that they can communicate with each other. It's a one-channel buss that is very flexible due to the wonders of banana plugs; I call it the NDB, or the Naïve Data Buss, and it has proved quite interesting in the generation of autonomous sound organisms.

Packaging is also important, so I usually go for appropriate casings. I have one briefcase that houses two interconnected Casio SK-1 samplers and four digital answering machines with 15-minute recording times each. I'm working on a larger flight case to house several keyboards and other devices as well. Coupled housings with internal power and mixing make setup at performances a lot easier. One thing I really try to do is make sure that when all of my new switches are in the off position, the device plays the way it was originally intended. Sometimes this is impossible, which is fine as well.

I have about 15 different instruments in the orchestra, each one having its own unique voice. I am always looking for more instruments to work on, and even hacked an analog test oscillator, homemade by someone else. Soon I will begin work on a telephone voice scrambler used for secure conversations. Anything is possible, and with the current and growing electrosphere, more and more different devices will surely be available in the future. I usually avoid pro gear due to the cost. And a lot of work can happen within the software realm, so it's pretty pointless to hack it.

Sounds

Shards of digital noise. When I interconnect all of the separate instruments, I often get waterfalls of layered sound working as an autonomous organism. At other times transient signals have a completely alien nature, surprising one of the possibilities within the realm of synthesis. Whenever I tune into an interesting rhythm, I'm usually attracted to it through an interest in discovering patterns that aren't available elsewhere. The sounds and patterns seem endless, so whenever I am working with these units, I like to have a tape deck available because I usually won't be able to reproduce any interesting sounds I come up with. They become highly potent sound objects, just waiting to be turned on and reveal totally new sounds.

I usually use this system in a live context, whether performing or recording. Recorded works can later be assembled into compositions, but I'm really more interested in live sound and real-time composition, with a close interaction between the performer and the instruments. It's a real-time balance between the machines surprising me while I surprise the machines through the selective pull of a switch or an added connection to another device. Ideally, I attempt to build living organisms in front of the audience where my brain has an integral place within the network. Every performance is different and encodes a certain state of mind relative to that moment.

I basically designed the Mutant Data Orchestra devices for my own use, and since I don't label any of the switches, it would be hard for other performers to use them. I have performed on them with my brother, Mark Bain, but I trust his aesthetics so it worked out well. It was at my first show with my extended kit at the 1998 Dutch Electronic Arts Festival (DEAF) in Rotterdam (www.v2.nl). He was vibrating the V2 building with a computer-controlled motor system, and I invited him to collaborate on the performance as well. The theme of the festival was "The Art Of The Accident," which seemed appropriate to both projects. Another show we did, in 1999, was at the Het Paard, a large night club in Den Haag, with me on stage controlling the MDO and him on vibrating building being fed back through the mains from several arrays of geophones. Some destruction happened as well, but that was the point of the exhibition. So his vibration projects do work well with the MDO since it adds a rhythmic element to the proceedings.

I enjoy collaborating with others but end up gravitating to those who have sensitive ears and are able to direct their consciousness appropriately. Currently I'm working with Ffej Mandel on analog synthesizer and Mishka Morris on cello and effects, which is working out well. When they are around, I also work with Tero Nauha, a Finnish throat singer who has the uncanny ability to sound like a machine, and David Ledogar, a dancer who dances to be felt and not to be seen. He channels energy from the sound and projects it into the audience as subtle energies. I don't know ... it works for me, but I tend to suspend disbelief. Eventually I want to hook him up to the NDB with an eeg device.

The sound of the MDO isn't for everyone. The first show I did was a rave at the old Eyedrop studio, and in the middle of the set a person announced that there was belly dancing in the next room, so everyone left, pretty funny for a first show. I've also worked with the (Boston-based) out-jazz group nmperign, including Bhob Rainey on soprano sax, Greg Kelley on trumpet, and James Coleman on theremin; it turned out pretty well. It was at a defunct cold war lab at MIT that had isolation pads in the middle of the room for testing gyroscopes, part of Draper labs. We had the two horn players on each pad, and surrounding them was a suspended floor of 1/2" aluminum that my brother was vibrating. It was interesting, because at the beginning of the sets the audience would be sitting against the wall, but as the sets wore on the audience would slowly move out onto the vibrating floors, some completely sprawled on their backs, like testing the water with your toe.

There are a lot of other people who circuit bend, and I would be into performing with them, especially if they could incorporate the NDB so that it would be a networked performance, but so far I am the only one who utilizes a network in this medium. I also would want to make sure that the voltages other performers send are safe for the devices.

Basically I'm performing without a net. It is very easy to flip a switch and crash all the devices, so I do have to be careful about what decisions I make. This is what makes it interesting to me the fact that I always have to work against failure. I'm working with broken gear, so failure is always part of the equation.

Inspirations

I've been interested in producing electronic music since the late 1970s. Eventually I got into the whole sampler/MIDI reality, but became less than enthralled due to its lack of "liveness." Samplers have their uses, but the sound is still prerecorded and dead to me. And MIDI? There's nothing worse than seeing a MIDI band set up their complete studio on stage, press one button and then proceed to remix a prerecorded sequence that's deader than dead. I think liveness within electronic music is important these days because so many people pass off prerecorded electronic music as being live, especially within the electronic dance community.

Modular analog gear has always been influential, especially the Buchla stuff as well as the EMS Synthi with its matrix patch board and briefcase packaging. The whole history of electronic musical instruments is of interest to me, and I especially appreciate the more odd devices like the Mixtur-Trautonium played by Oskar Sala, or the behemoth built by Thaddeus Cahill called the Telharmonium. (www.obsolete.com/120_years). Recently, I've been impressed by the work of Raymond Scott at the Manhattan Research Inc. (www.raymondscott.com).

Eventually I gravitated to researching electronic sound circuits and then discovered the plethora of cheap sound circuits in the thrift stores. I began working on the dual SK-1 briefcase when I found an issue of Experimental Musical Instruments (EMI) with an article on bending the SK-1 by Q.R. Ghazala. I tried out a few of the bends and was hooked. I ended up writing to the author expressing my excitement with the possibilities of his techniques and he even responded with a letter on his amazing stationery, covered with his drawings. He seems like a great person, and he's been doing this since the late 60s, starting out on old transistor radios.

The Japanese noise scene was also very influential. I saw a great Merzbow show in 1994 at the Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco, which clued me in to the spiritual potential of pure noise and the fact that some noise is good and other noise can be bad. Noise can have a quality that goes against the common belief that all noise is the same, and that it annoys. A lot of noise projects utilize interconnected pedals and effects that I can also appreciate from a network sensibility. One of the first people to utilize these ideas of interconnected electronics was David Tudor. I really liked his algorithmic approach to live work the composition is the setup, the algorithm.

Finally, I would have to mention the first circuit benders, Bébé and Louis Barron, who did the soundtrack to the 1956 film Forbidden Planet. For this they built several types of sound circuits and then proceeded to distress them through overpowering; then they recorded the resulting sounds for the film.

Locally, I really like the work of rebreather, who use similar techniques but produce a completely different sound than mine. Paul Rubenstein also makes some great string instruments that are auto-activated through motorized magnets. He also has a great ear with his devices and winds his own coils as well. I'm always interested in checking out what others are doing with homemade or modified electronics, since it usually reveals truly new sounds that you might not find with commercial gear.

Advice for instrument inventors

First of all, I would check out www.antitheory.com and Q.R. Ghazala's excellent articles on basic circuit bending techniques and the sample shuttle article on bending the Casio SK-1. Then I would just start messing around with shorting circuits in cheap electronics. Of course you have to take precautions when working with electricity, so if you are unsure of what you are doing, either give up or just use batteries. I'm pretty much self-taught on electronics, but that is why I started this work: to demystify the workings within electronics, especially digital electronics.

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Susie Kozawa

Susie Kozawa is a sound artist, composer, and performer who works mostly with sound collages and site-specific installations in which the gathering of sounds is a primary activity. Her current project is a collaboration with choreographer A.C. Peterson and set designer Erin Shie Palmer on the House of Dames production of "Silk Road," to be presented at Consolidated Works in April 2001, and including fabric music boxes that are played by the dancers.

Instruments

I make many kinds of instruments out of found objects, kelp, modified toys (or in the case of natural materials, they sort of make themselves). They tend not to be electrically amplified. They have different timbres and personalities. I feel they are tools for listening to a space and exploring what different spaces sound like. In many cases my instruments are derived from others, for example, hum bows (rubber band or tape attached to bamboo sticks) came from my hummers (paint-stirring sticks with rubber bands, rudder, and string). It's all part of the process.

I've always been interested in what objects sound like, and in what different spaces sound like. These instruments help me to play with a space and serve as a listening tool. I like to augment the sounds that are already there. My first performance with found objects was in 1987 for Alex Souldancer's Fire Ceremony at Carkeek Park. I made flute, trumpet, clarinet, and oboe instruments out of bull kelp, and still use some of them now. My first improvised performing was with Lori Goldston and Matthew Sperry for the Seattle Improvised Music Festival at On the Boards in 1993. I then found out how much fun it was playing with others. However, many of my instruments are not tunable to specific predictable pitches, so harmonic counterpoint is difficult with traditional tuned instruments.

Many others have played my instruments, including dancers, whose movements make the sounds. Bill Blauvelt and Esther Sugai especially, from our group Aono Jikken, have played my instruments in many performances including live accompaniment to silent films. A Page of Madness, a CD made though Jack Straw Audio Center's Artist Support Program, is an expansion of the themes of the live music accompaniment to the silent Japanese film of that title. This features some of my instruments including kelp horns, bass baliphone (ABS tubing, film canister, and balloon), scrap 2" x 4" wood studs, and toys.

Inspirations

I first heard New Music at Seattle University in Contemporary Counterpoint classes taught by Louis Christensen in the early 1970s. This was the first time I felt "Yes." David Mahler inspires me because of his focus on listening to a space. Stuart Dempster, because of his being seriously unserious. Trimpin and Jarrad Powell help me because of their generosity of spirit. There are many others who inspire me, including Dave Knott, Ellen Fullman, Ela Lamblin and kids, because they invariably come up with different ways of making sounds out of objects that I never thought of.

Also, nature, and what cityscapes sound like.

Advice for instrument inventors

Listen to what things sound like. How many different sounds can one object make? What does it sound like in different spaces?

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Ela Lamblin

Seattle resident Ela Lamblin is a composer, inventor, and performer who creates musical sculptures and utilizes them in performance and on recordings. He co-directs the performance company Lelavision, which is pioneering a new genre called Physical Music. He has three recordings to date: "Sculptaural" (1996), "Tone Pond" (2000), and "Raga to the River" (2000). He is also featured in the compilation book and CD Orbitones, Spoonharps, and Bellowphones, and in the book Musical Craftsmen of America. More info can be found at www.lelavision.com.

Instruments

I have invented a number of instruments including the Stamenphone (a bowed sculpture with piano-wire strings); the Rumitones, (large and small spinning aluminum chime-vibes); the Singing Stones (100 rocks suspended on music wire from a wooden sound box, played with rosin gloves); the Livewire (a longitudinal harp played with rosin gloves); and the Bellwheels (a percussion instrument made from a bicycle wheel and tuned brass telephone bells). Currently I am working on the Pandamonium (an organ-like instrument utilizing a rubber reed). Most of my instruments are tuned to concert pitch, and are thus capable of playing all sorts of music.

Primarily I make instruments for my own use in performance and for recordings. I have released three CDs featuring unique instruments, and co-direct a performance company with my wife (choreographer Leah Mann) that combines my musical sculptures with dance to create what we call "Physical Music." These shows are presented in theaters and typically feature 2-6 performers. I spent four years providing musical accompaniment for the Vashon Island–based physical theater company Umo Ensemble. I have also sold instruments to other musicians including local artist Bill Blauvelt, who featured a Bellwheel on the (Aono Jikken) CD A Page of Madness.

In the last 10 years I have made around 40 instruments, and I figure I'll be alive another 70 years, so I'll probably make around 280 prototypes in my lifetime!

Sounds

Kind of like a hybrid of a sitar and a cello, the Stamenphone has a distinct long-ringing resonance caused by the use of harmonics, and also by sympathetic ringing of the 16 strings. The Stamenphone is pretty adaptable to any stage or situation. Many other instruments, however, are so large and complex to set up that they require days to prepare and tune.

Inspirations

My parents told me they would not buy me toys, but would help me make anything I wanted. I was home-schooled, and they had a very good collection of ethnic instruments. When I attended art college in Georgia, I began combining sound principles with sculptural form. I have been making sound-sculpture ever since.

Mostly I have been inspired by ethnic instruments from around the globe. Trimpin is a visionary in this field; I am always encouraged by his commitment to acoustic sound, even if it is triggered by a computer.

Advice for instrument inventors

Most important, I think, is to try ideas without worrying about success or failure. It is in the process of making something that the genius is discovered. Most of my good ideas started out pretty crude, but by solving problems as they come up, I have been able to turn a basic idea into something extraordinary.

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Eric Muhs

When not inventing instruments, Eric Muhs teaches physics at Shorewood High School.

My theses :

• INSTRUMENTS are a crutch for people who can't make NOISE
  
  
• NOISE is more fun when it's for free (or at least really cheap), so the best noisemakers are found objects. The second best come from thrift stores, garage sales, or in trade.
  
  
• COMPLETE control over the noisemaker is not essential: The noisemaker is more fun when it has a mind of its own. Motorize it!
  
  
• CONTACT MICROPHONES can turn any object with the ability to vibrate into an object that can be recorded and electronically manipulated.
  
  
• Instruments were made to be attacked.
  
  
• Learn the physics of sound, but don't place undue importance on theory. Especially, don't take yourself seriously

Instruments

• Potar: one-string guitar with plastic pope plate
• Shitar: double-neck guitar with toilet seat and lid
• Tone Motor: one-string guitar with whammy tuner and motorized variable-speed pick
• Cage Bow: magazine rack played by mechanized cello bow
• Flaming Screen Door, accompanied by Flaming Cardboard Didgeridu
• Crusher #1: destroys fine China and squeak frogs
• Crusher #2: crunches styrofoam and cans
• Spring Suit: foot and breast plates, worn and struck
• Reverb-O-Can: large can mounted with spring
• Catapult: gate spring hurls objects into the air
• Tiny Motors: screech and grind on strings and metal
• Mechanized Forest: turns and groans
• Bottle Axe: guitar with tuned beer bottles and blower
• Whiffle Bat: strikes magazine rack twice per minute
• Particle Board: connects through Reagan's head
• Dinosaur Enclosure: motorized Godzilla pen w/ Tiny Attacking Airplane
• Crawler: drags can at 3 feet per hour
• Buzzer Board: four buzzers and a light for the dark
• Barrel Basher: lifts and drops pole into barrel
• Bubble Factory: bubble-blowing auto-xylophone
• Boinger: plexiglas bow
• Bonetar: femur w/ string
• Singing Fish on a Switch
• Bedpan Drumset

And much, much more ...

rocketpix: From one of a hundred performances using a four-track tape loop system to record and manipulate input sounds, in this case from a one-string stick, equipped with contact mic, used guitar string, and tuning peg. Any instrument I make eventually gets fed to the tape loop to build enormous textural edifices.

PIart: Got a bass with a wobbly neck and no fingerboard for $2.50 at a garage sale on Whidbey Island. When I was looking for a metal plate to stabilize the neck, I came across a hinge: Cool! So the neck is on a hinge and can completely fold over: tremendous wailing sound with distortion as the strings tighten! Drilled a hole for a piece of electric conduit with a tuning peg for a single bass string. A piece of ABS pipe slides up and down the conduit for all kinds of sliding and stretching maneuvers. Spray painted it all silver and put a big porta-potty sticker on it. Not all at once, because these things grow ...