Early Promo of Chameleon & Gecko

Jim's Zapperesque draft promo for 'Shape Of Music's (then) new 'Opal' range of MIDI controllers. Includes young Kate & Alice playing it for the first time, me playing Beethoven's "Fur Elise" with bass & Melody played with left and then right hand alone, Bessie Smith's blues "Nobody Knows You When You're Down & Out" and Jim's improvisation. The 3 instruments used here are prototypes of the Opal models: Chameleon and Gecko.

I think Jim would have liked Frank Zappa to have narrated the text,;it would have sounded very much like Frank's narration in 'The Muffin Man"!

Category:

Music

Tags:

• alternative MIDI controller
• electronic keyboard
• new musical instrument
• sonome
• invention
• Fur Elise
• classical music
• blues piano
• Deep Purple
• Smoke on the Water Riff
• improvisation
• music education
• Beethoven
• Left hand playing
• Right
• hand
• playing
• Melodic Table
• Harmonic Table
• music research
• music theory
• Isometric Keyboard
• Reaching the notes
• Frank Zappa
• The Muffin Man

[technoholic562]

It's amazing, but I still like piano better.

[notepool2]

@technoholic562 Well, my first love was the piano, because my grandma had one when I was little. Then I heard the guitar and that was what I wanted to play, and I've been playing for 56 years! As for the sonome, I originally derived this from analysing chord structure on the guitar fingerboard. But t was never supposed to take the place for the piano, it won;t anyway - there's always room for another instrument - then it's 'different strokes for different folks' I guess!

[KojiroGanryuSasaki]

@notepool2, the switches are a very clever solution to which I can claim no credit. A bunch of guys at soundbuilders lvl1 (google the name) are building something they call the ax15-64 and they have basically hardware hacked cherry mx computer keyboard switches. They found out that by cutting out the bottom of one of the switches the plunger actually pokes out of the switch when pressed. Simply placing another switch below means two switches per key with a delay between them.

[notepool2]

@KojiroGanryuSasaki Yes, I know wht you mean, this is why it took us so long to build a keyboard I invented in 1983! My first prototype had key caps that I cut out of hex-section nylon rod. For my second one I made a vinyl mould and cast the keys in resin. What switches are you using?

[KojiroGanryuSasaki]

@notepool2

I have now finally secured quality switches AND a way of making them velocity sensitive. My current problem is getting the hexagonal keycaps. It costs about 1000 euro to have them made and that's far beyond what I'm capable of playing.

[notepool2]

Your switches can have a shorter travel than the key travel as long as the keys have a separate means of pushing them back up.

[KojiroGanryuSasaki]

My main trouble at the moment is getting my hands on the switches. I don't need velocity sensitivity as I will use this mainly to control a virtual electric organ. The only real problem is most of the affordable switches have a travel of 0.25mm and that seems much to short.

If I ever finish this project I will upload a video here on youtube :)

[notepool2]

You're welcome! The key travel is 3mm, which we found works best for weight & high resolution velocity. It was slightly less on the prototypes in this video. Please let me know how you get on :-)

[KojiroGanryuSasaki]

Thanks for the help! As I haven't yet had any opportunity to try out the sonome I'm a bit curious about the switch travel. From the videos it looks like it is around 2mm. Is that about right?

[notepool2]

Thank you Kojiro, I appreciate your kind comment. The hexagonal keys took a long time to develop. They are injection-moulded for us by a company in the UK and are only cost-effective in large batches. For a DIY project, it might be possible to use some material that has a circular section, like timber dowel, or plastic or metal rod. After all, circles stack the same way as hexagons :-) The key spacing is 19mm centres. Good luck with the DIY!