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Odd Musical Instruments

Here's an avant garde / home-built musical apparatus nobody asked for - the Furby Organ! :nails:




i know thats an older post, but i love that! i'm not sure the furbys are actually doing anything other than furbying but the guy is so enthusiastic!


this has been doing the round for a few years

a tumblr post about silly instruments.

 
In case you've ever wondered how much apparatus it would take to allow the maximum number of people to jointly play a single piano ...

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Schoolchildren break world record for playing piano simultaneously

Schoolchildren in Cambridge have broken the Guinness World Record for the highest number of people playing the piano at the same time.

A team of engineers from 10 UK universities came together to create an enormous contraption that allowed 88 schoolchildren to play the piano simultaneously.

Children from across the country were selected to break the record previously held by 21 people.

SOURCE: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/20...ak-world-record-playing-piano-simultaneously/

SEE ALSO:

https://www.sheffieldtelegraph.co.u...ns-and-kids-gain-guinness-world-record-491457

https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2019/0...ingle-piano-break-world-record/2301566483207/
 
The Octobass.
No, not some mythical hybrid of a fish and cephalopod, but the very rare and largest of the symphonic stringed instruments.
The fingerboard is so long that the musician is required to stand on an elevated platform and use a system of pedals and levers to play it.
The deeply resonant sound is an octave below a standard double bass, with the lowest C note at 16 hertz being below the hearing threshold of most humans, although you can hear the overtones (and feel the vibes).

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Here is Pachelbel's Canon in D performed by eight floppy disk drives. The notes are produced by varying the head movement rate. It actually manages to produce a decent performance.

For some reason Pachelbel's Canon was played at my Techy's and my wedding. Wish I'd had this version to hand! :chuckle:
 
Ben Franklin's instrument that he invented, the armonica, is rotating glass cups in a water trough.

You can see a picture and hear some tunes here:

http://sln.fi.edu/franklin/musician/musician.html

Benjamin Franklin's glass armonica featured on today's Quora.

Franklin came up with the idea after attending a concert in Cambridge. The performer was rubbing the rims of wine glasses to produce musical notes.
Franklin thought that was inefficient. Why move your arms when you can move the glasses?
So, he hired a London glassmaker to construct 36 bowls to specific thicknesses and sizes. He mounted the bowls horizontally on a spindle with the largest bowl on one end and the smallest on the other.
In this way the musician can play the glass bowls like a keyboard.
It started out as a popular novelty. Before long though, armonica players became ill and had to stop playing the instrument. They complained of muscle spasms, nervousness, cramps, and dizziness. A few listeners were also subject to ill effects. The instrument was actually banned in a few towns. By the 1820s, it was nearly a forgotten instrument amid fears that the ethereal sounds and unwholesome vibrations had the power to drive the listener insane.
I just played the YouTube video below and my cat woke up suddenly with that feline alarmed expression (big eyes and one ear up and one to the side):

So, listen at your peril!

 
The Octobass.
No, not some mythical hybrid of a fish and cephalopod, but the very rare and largest of the symphonic stringed instruments.
The fingerboard is so long that the musician is required to stand on an elevated platform and use a system of pedals and levers to play it.
The deeply resonant sound is an octave below a standard double bass, with the lowest C note at 16 hertz being below the hearing threshold of most humans, although you can hear the overtones (and feel the vibes).

View attachment 64049

How do you transport that monster?
 

Sound of the underground: This guitar maker finds music in mushrooms​

Guitar maker and master luthier Rachel Rosenkrantz thinks she’s hit the right note crafting bespoke instruments out of biomaterials. From mushroom ukuleles and beehive guitars to banjos made out of kombucha leather, she’s assembled a curious collection of biodegradable instruments.

https://www.cnn.com/style/guitar-maker-mushrooms-biomaterials-rosenkrantz-spc
 
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