Tag Archive

Get Started Building Your Own Instrument

By oneoverphi

It’s time to pull out your tools. Sharpen your chis­els and your mind for build­ing your own instru­ment. You’ll be rewarded with more than sat­is­fac­tion of a job well done, you will also get the gift of music. I’ve rounded up some links to get you started. Musicmaker’s Kits — An awe­some place for harp, dul­cimer, banjo,... »

Odd, Unusual, and Downright Weird Instrument Links

By oneoverphi

I’m a big fan of unusual and home­brew instru­ments. In fact I’m mak­ing a cajon (also known as a box drum) right now, which I’ll post a walk-through and plans for when I’m done. For all of you that share this inter­est in the DIY­ers that add to the musi­cal may­hem in the world, I’ve assem­bled some links... »

Look to the Past For New Sounds

By oneoverphi

Ever wanted to go old-school with your instru­ments? I mean really, really old-school? Well you’re in luck my dear read­ers, I know a place where you can go back to the stone-age for your heavy rock sound ( I couldn’t resist, I’m weak ). Pale­o­planet, a site devoted to pre­his­toric tech­nol­ogy, hap­pens to have a forum sec­tion on music. Not... »

Cool Percussion Instrument

By oneoverphi

The Hapi drum is a tuned per­cus­sion instru­ment that you tap to have it chime sweet notes. You can try it out vir­tu­ally to see how it sounds. They come in pen­ta­tonic scales for their stan­dard tun­ings, although other uncom­mon tun­ings are avail­able. I would love to get my hands on one. It seems to me... »

Instrument Causes Insanity?

By oneoverphi

Ah, the glass armon­ica. Is there ever a more pleas­antly haunt­ing sound? For those that are unfa­mil­iar with this weird and won­der­ful instru­ment it is a super-duper, glass-rub-o-matic, Ben Franklin spe­cial. You see, old Benny had the bril­liant idea of automat­ing the whole rub­bing the rim of a wine glass trick by skew­er­ing a bunch of glass bowls... »

You Put Your Violin Where?!?

By oneoverphi

Here’s an inter­est­ing thing you can do with a cane, play music on it. I came across in my web trav­els this won­der­ful gad­get cane where­upon a work­ing vio­lin was stuffed into a cane. Now I can’t attest to the sound of it (though I have dug up video on youtube of a Pochette Fid­dle which is very much related to... »

How Can You Live In an Instrument?

By oneoverphi

Con­tin­u­ing on the theme of an ear­lier post on unsual instru­ments here is this awe­some musi­cal house. It seems that some­one decided to make their house into an instru­ment, or a house sized instru­ment depend­ing on your perspective. All the Archi­tec­tural instru­ments are based around strings. The Archi­tec­ture becomes the struc­ture, bridge and res­onator for these giant... »

Extreme Instruments

By oneoverphi

It’s been a while dear read­ers. I’ve had a lion’s share of my time taken by the arrival of my sec­ond off­spring. But I’m here now to serve some music goodness. I’ve found some won­der­ful exam­ples of instru­ment mak­ing gone amok (much of it hav­ing to do with scale, hehe). For instance a real playable tiny grand piano or... »

DIY Musical Mayhem">DIY Musical Mayhem

By oneoverphi

For those with a DIY bent, Instructa​bles​.com has a group devoted to audio projects. While there are many projects related to iPod speak­ers, there are some projects more related to music pro­duc­tion. Take the Looper for instance. Many a time when I’m did­dling on the gui­tar I come up with a lick I’d like to expand upon. It’s a bit... »

Build Your Own Instrument

By oneoverphi

For all those inter­ested in build­ing your own instru­ment visit Harp Kit. They have all sorts of kits and plans avail­able for a myr­iad of tra­di­tional instru­ments. Harps, dul­cimers, ban­jos, even a Hurdy Gurdy! I wouldn’t mind pick­ing up a gui­tar kit so that I could build a fret­less gui­tar to exper­i­ment with. http://​www​.harp​kit​.com »

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