MATRIXSYNTH

Fukushima 50 - nuclear echoes in our hearts

YouTube Uploaded by TouchedByInspiration on Mar 28, 2011
On the gear: "Nord Wave, and a very old tube-driven tape echo, produced by a german company called "Klemt" in the late 60's. As far as I know, this company finally became the german company 'Dynacord'. We recorded the piece with the Fostex LR16 and two Neumann mics for the piano. The mic signal was fed into the tape echo via an aux bus. Christiane was controlling the feedback of the tape echo manually while playing the piano. The recording was mixed afterwards in Logic 9."
follow-up to Sendai - Improvisation for the japanese people

On the performance:
"Piano-Performance by Christiane Dehmer.
The disaster in Japan still occupies me. The earthquake and the Tsunami are over now. But Fukushima and what it means for our world will remain.
In this video I play a piece of music that I have dedicated to the "Fukushima 50 ". When the disaster took its course in Fukushima, 50 workers remained in the damaged nuclear power plant, to avoid that the situation gets completely out of control. With primitive means they fought under the most adverse circumstances against the radioactive danger and put their lives to risk. The catastrophe of Fukushima and the actions of these people show once again that bravery, courage and personal commitment in the face of the complete failure of high-technology is the only reality that we have. Security, however, is an illusion.
The piece was recorded live during the night of 24.3.2011. I played piano, synthesizer and vocals. In addition, I used a more than 40 years old tube tape echo (Echolette S) which produced pretty crazy sounds from the piano. This ancient device and its distorted sound symbolizes in a special way, how outdated and not very controllable some of our technologies became.
Listen to the echoes in our hearts...
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Die Katastrophe in Japan lässt einen so schnell nicht los. Das Erdbeben und der Tsunami sind vorrüber. Aber Fukushima, und das was es für unsere Welt bedeutet, wird bleiben.
In diesem Video spiele ich ein Stück, das ich den "Fukushima 50″ gewidmet habe. Als die Katastrophe in Fukushima ihren Lauf nahm, blieben 50 Arbeiter in dem havarierten Atomkraftwerk, um zu verhindern, dass die Lage völlig außer Kontrolle gerät. Sie kämpften sie unter widrigsten Umständen gegen die radioaktive Gefahr aus den Reaktoren uns setzten dabei ihr Leben aufs Spiel. Die Katastrophe von Fukushima und das Handeln dieser Menschen zeigt einmal mehr, dass Tapferkeit, Mut und persönliche Hingabe im Angesicht des vollständigen Versagens von Hoch-Technologie die einzige Realität ist, die uns bleibt. Sicherheit dagegen ist eine Illusion.
Das Stück ist live aufgenommen am 24.03.2011. Gespielt habe ich Piano und Synthesizer und Gesang. Zusätzlich habe ich ein mehr als 40 Jahre altes Röhren-Bandecho (Echolette S) verwendet, das aus dem Piano recht abgefahrene Sounds produziert hat. Dieses altertümliche Gerät und sein verzerrter Klang versinnbildlichen auf besondere Weise, wie überholt und wenig kontrollierbar manche Technologie mittlerweile ist.
Höre die Echos in unseren Herzen..."

Buchla Model 251e QUAD SEQUENTIAL VOLTAGE SOURCE

The official product image and description via Buchla. You might remember this one from this NAMM post with video.

"Four 99 stage sequencers, each with programmable pulse and control voltage outputs. A separate editing section permits setting each parameter for a selected sequence; sequences can be edited while running and follow the edit stage when stopped.

Intervals may be entered for each stage, with variable note values from 1/32 to whole notes. Triplets and dotted notes are readily accommodated. Pulse durations may be set to fractions of the intervals.

Output voltages range from 0.0 to 9.9 volts, conveniently accommodating oscillators with a sensitivity of .1 volts per semi-tone.

Tempos may range from 10 bpm to 250 bpm.

Additional features include:

Inter-sequencer triggering
Variable start delay
Retrograde capability
Multiple nested loops
Master voltage-controlled clock

A 200eUSB card is necessary to download new firmware for this module.

With the help of a 206e or 225e Preset Manager, the parameters of the 251e can be stored and retrieved as part of a preset."

Buchla Model 272e POLYPHONIC TUNER

The official product image and description via Buchla. You might remember this one from this NAMM post with video.

"4 stereo F.M.tuners, each with voltage controlled tuning and separate audio outputs. The 272e features a common station memory and a polyphonic output with individual envelope generators. Station tuning tables may be loaded automatically, particularly handy for the traveling musician.

A remote switch is provided to permit storing the settings of the 272e as a portion of a preset, as well as to retreive presets. A model 206e or 225e Preset Manager is necessary to accomplish this function."

VERMONA goes Eurorack!

via the Vermona Blog

"After the modular dock – our first step in to the world of modular systems – we will present our second eurorack module at the Musikmesse 2011 in Frankfurt.

TAI-4 is a high-end audio interface with transformer isolated in- and outputs. To ensure highest audio quality the module uses custom-made audio transformers to bring balanced signals into and out of your modular system. The TAI-4 will be available in May 2011."

ether^ra EVAC-U

YouTube Uploaded by potterpaint2000 on Apr 2, 2011

"an improv featuring a Oberheim OB-1 crossmodulated noise loop w/my Serge Creature/Seq A combo and Doepfer Dark Energy. http://etherra.blogspot.com/"

An Exclusive First Look at Tim Thompson's Kinect-Based Instrument: MultiMultiTouchTouch

YouTube Uploaded by newechoproductions on Apr 2, 2011

"MultiMultiTouchTouch is custom solution invented by Tim Thompson that offers players any number of arbitrarily-shaped multitouch areas with three-dimensional spatial control. Interaction with this space allows users to control and play virtual synthesizers using nothing but a Microsoft Kinect as the controller. In this video Mark Mosher interviews Tim who offers a behind-the-scenes look at the technology. At the end of the video Mark gives MultiMultitouchTouch a try. More interviews like this at http://www.modulatethis.com/interviews"