Diego Stocco - LCO Light Controlled Oscillator

Diego Stocco - LCO Light Controlled Oscillator from Diego Stocco on Vimeo.

follow-up to the One Knob to Rule Them All post.
"The LCO is an instrument I assembled when I was creating the score for "The Conduit". I used it as a starting point to create a variety of bass sounds, ambiences and strange noises.

The pitch of an optical theremin responds to the intensity of external light, which makes playing specific notes difficult. I wanted to find a better way to control not just the pitch but also the trigger of the sound in order to create rhythmic patterns. I used the chassis of an old device to host the circuit, connected a dimmer to control the intensity of a light bulb and a push-button switch to break the circuit, so I could control the note on/off. To fatten up the sound I connected it to a spring reverb, an hi-fi amp and two old speakers, recorded with a stereo microphone. The instrument needs to be be played in semi obscurity.

In this particular session I was also post-processing the sound of the LCO with modulated chains of comb-filtered delays and reverbs.

P.S. Careful with the volume, the sound gets pretty intense in the second half of the video."