TONAL PLEXUS - part 4

[Sepprrrrrd]

it looks incredible boring to play

[AaronAndrewHunt]

@Sepprrrrrd ... and some YouTube comments are incredibly boring to read ; ) It's fun to play. Not easy, but fun. Thanks for watching!

[Sepprrrrrd]

@AaronAndrewHunt what's boring about my reaction? it barely took 2 seconds to read. sounds great indeed, it's maybe fun to play, but to me it seems like there isn't that much of action while you play it.

can't have always positive reactions ; )

[LofiFreq]

@Sepprrrrrd no knobs = no fun.

[poof12321]

they look like little legos



[ericoschmitt]

it is easier to play a continuous fingerboard..

[EDOM666DEVORE]

wow this plays every in-between possible dosen't it although infinite is in-between aaswell

[kratanuva725]

What kind of intervals/tuning systyems are you using here?

[AaronAndrewHunt]

@kratanuva725 thanks for the question. It's in Just Intonation. The opening features 8:11. There are minor thirds 6:7 and 5:6, Major seconds 8:9 and 9:10, etc. Check out the h-pi website for more about JI and the Tonal Plexus (XENTONAILITY has a lot of theory pages under H-System).

[kratanuva725]

@AaronAndrewHunt Ah yes, I have learned lots of things from your website alteady, and there is still much more to learn.

I want to learn more about tridecimal and I geuss... septadecimal intervals? heptadecimal? I'll just go with 17-limit, lol.

[ttcfcl]

Is this a Lego compatible playset?

[CorralesID]

WTF you are the craziest man i have ever seen. to play that ....i even have'nt description how to call that (i guess Plexus LOL), of course you are a Progdgy. Iook im serious, even there are people who play the 13's or 32 tones, they not handle as you, congrats, and keep working!!!

[AaronAndrewHunt]

@CorralesID many thanks! Thanks also for subscribing ; )

[KaslarProductions]

why does it sound so out of tune and drifting....... I realize it is intentional. but I would like to understand why...

[AaronAndrewHunt]

@KaslarProductions what sounds 'out of tune' is complex and has a lot to do with conditioning; unfamiliar pitches and intervals, or new versions of those you are familiar with, may sound weird and even plain wrong until you have become acquainted with them, after which they sound right. About the 'drifting', you're likely hearing the pitches as close to what you know, but different enough that you feel you're standing on quicksand. That perception changes over time as you get to know the sounds.

[KaslarProductions]

@AaronAndrewHunt Thanks for the information. great tune.

[0707NicePlayer]

I like it very much. But I think that the music had to be develped during the time/

[darkbarrage99]

I think the guy that puts all the music together for Xasthur uses one of these, and he does a wonderful job with it, you can get lots of beautiful but melancholy sounds out of an instrument like this

[eFFeeMMe]

Holy crap this looks difficult to play. Aren't there simpler, non-complete approaches to microtonal music?

[darkbarrage99]

@eFFeeMMe that doesn't look that hard to play. i already understand the layout by looking at it; left to right are like the keys of a piano if the black and white keys were on the same plain, up and down is pitch bending. simple, and i would really love to play with one

[eFFeeMMe]

Same here. By hard to play I don't mean hard to understand, I mostly mean "hard to make your usual breed of music with"

[AaronAndrewHunt]

@eFFeeMMe it's not made to play idiomatic keyboard music, if I understand what you're getting at. It's a new instrument, that requires new playing techniques. It creates its own idiom. As with any other musical instrument, to play it well requires practice, but the way it works is pretty self evident, and it's really not that hard to play in terms of its own idiomatic techniques. It is, as you allude, of a 'new breed', opening up possibilities that simply don't exist in any other instrument.

[eFFeeMMe]

@AaronAndrewHunt Sure! And that's why I like it :) I was replying to darkbarrage, who thought I was calling the instrument "hard to play" from a conceptual point of view - I was actually talking about the ergonomics.

I'd suppose the multitude of small buttons is harder to hit accurately than chunky piano keys. Could there be a way to retain the note layout and improve the playability?

[AaronAndrewHunt]

@eFFeeMMe, one might ask if a violin could retain its note layout but have its playability improved ; ) A 'keyboard' could be made having flat surface like a touchscreen, but such a surface typically doesn't feel right playing with more than 1 or 2 fingers, with no physical terrain to navigate (lack of haptic feedback as it's known in design terms), not to mention that a large flat panel with adequate polyphonic tracking would be prohibitively expensive. See also the h-pi.com TPX prototypes page

[JLMoriart]

First vid of the plexus that used different sizes of the same harmonically functioning intervals to sound cool, that actually did sound cool. I didn't think there was much too it, but this is very good.

I'd still rather have a Thummer though!

=P

[VMTphoenix]

I wonder what js bach would say to this.

[quartercherries]

this reminds me of a car built to turn itself over.

[DaveWangisJesus]

Yeah, this thing definitely sounds like it sacrifices sound for its microtonal keyboard.

Does anyone know if it can put out controlled voltages though?

That thing would be amazing if there were a decent synth working with the keyboard.

[GordonCSA]

So is the amount of 'microtonality' (i guess thats the right word) on each note decided improvisationaly or is that a part of the decided composition? And how would you write down music for this?

[nvalidscreename]

seems like a sort of uncreative way to use the machine though

[Xoltoath]

dude this is one of the coolest things i've ever seen. i almost want to dedicate my life to educating those who don't understand the beauty of microtonal stuff. bravo!

[Zukhramm]

It's cool, but I assume one of those are quite expansive.

[audiotrax2000]

Coolest looking keyboard ever. I want one so I can install it in my Tardis.

[grschmidt]

I just want to rap with this tune