Week 1 Forum - Electronics, Instrument Building and Improvisation

This week Christian introduced us to what we were going to do this semester in Music Technology Forum. I think the expectations of us are really high this semester. It's a big ask for students with no previous knowledge in electrical engineering to build something like this:


[1]
I wouldn't have the heart to do this to my Super Nintendo. . .


[2]
Circuit Bending Improvisation. . .


In forum this week we look at the Victorian Synth. Basically this is the process of connection a speaker to a battery and creating sounds by experimenting with the positive and negative terminals. I also used rice, tacks and jilla mints on top of the speakers to create different sounds. Overall it was an interesting and tasty experience.


[2]
Victorian Synth experimentation. . .


My main problem this week was working out the order of connecting devices. I also found it difficult to get any kind of varying sound effects. I found my speakers made the same noise regardless of the position they were in.[3]



[1] Video Thing. 'Circuit Bend Sega Megadrive', http://videothing.blogspot.com/2006_12_01_archive.html (Accessed 26/7/7)

[2] youtube. 'Simple Victorian Synth' & 'Circuit Bending Live Set', www.youtube.com (Accessed 26/7/7)

[3] Christian Haines. "Music Technology Forum: Semester 2 - Week 1 - Victorian Synth". Lecture presented at the Electronic Music Unit, University of Adelaide, South Australia, 26th July 2007.