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Exertion Instrument Design initiated by Noah Vawter

Exertion Music and

Electric Eels

Electric Eels on:

DIY

How-To Section

Introduction

Generators

Circuits

Acoustics

Music Scores

Advanced Projects

Workshops and Performances are on temporary hiatus while Noah completes his dissertation.

Performance, San Diego, California, Feb. 24-25, 2011

Pictures Posted from Recent Workshop October 16-17th, 2010

- Machine Project Workshop December 11th - December 17th, 2010 -

The Exertion Music project introduces an electronic music instrument in acoustic form.

Like most acoustic instruments, power for every note comes from the player's hands.

Like electronic instruments, the oscillators and effects operate in the electrical medium.

Thanks to research and design in generators, charging circuits and acoustics,

it can be taken for granted that the instrument will produce musical electronic sounds

without batteries. Like traditional instruments, the playing power all comes

from the player: to play loud, one may sacrifice instrument or self.

Instruments Built at Workshop at TEI

These two instruments, constructed in an afternoon by workshop participants, show the reference design for Exertion Instruments - Electronic instruments with built-in electrical generators. They can play harmonic music across several octaves, while powering their built-in speakers, keyboard, and synthesizers with a bowing motion between the two Lego wheels.

Famous Hardrock Bassline

This video shows Noah Vawter and Kelly Snook breathing life into a classic Finnish folksong, while Ryan O'Toole does a leekspin. More videos are at our youtube page.

Bass Electric Eel Unveiled on Beach in Cape Cod:

This new instrument, on the left, is called the Bass Eel. It is produces the loudest bass

of all Exertion Instruments so far. In this video, Rob Gwin (formerly of The May Fire, currently of

Ettie St. Project and Planet Booty) plays the bass part to "Tequila" as recorded by

The Champs in 1957, while Noah plays chords on the Red Eel.

Sounds of Several Different Synthesizer Algorithms

A demo of some of the synthesizer algorithms possible on the Electric Eel, including brief technical discussion.

How to change the software in your Electric Eel

Exertion Guitar #2

To play, press a chord button, andbackdrive the motor in the printer carriage.

It generates enough power to run a synthesizer and amplify the sound. The harder you pump, the louder the sound. I'm in the process of developing the synthesizer algorithm now. It's going to be played more like a guitar, but will retain as much of the electronic sound as possible. There's more

information at Exertion Guitar 2.

This instrument, the Blue Electric Eel, cardinal and forsythia edition, synthesizes a variety of

important electronic sounds when the slider is moved left and right. Its waveforms include

PWM, sine waves, filters (low, band, high, notch, allpass), string simulations, noise, etc.

News:

8/2/2010 - Michael and Noah share some research into acoustics which can increase the efficiency of selectively-chosen, yet reasonably-priced woofers. Yes, for those who love to get down and to the source, I can heartily recommend Keele's paper and especially On the Specification of Moving-Coil Drivers for Low-Frequency Horn-Loaded Loudspeakers, from W. Marshall Leach, Jr. Or, if you would like to skip to the chase, and actually build an instrument making use of this technology :) then please check out the most recent update to our Speakers Wiki . We go as far as to list 5 part numbers from PartsExpress.com. These are the ones you should use to produce the most sinister possible bass technology known to man.

7/29/2010 - A massive update to the software archive has been made! Take a browse through it. This release includes all of the synthesizer code that has been written so far! Go download it!

This summer (2010), we have a special addition to the Exertion Music team! We are lucky enough to be loaned the brain power of Michael Harradon, undergraduate researcher from MIT. Michael will be helping publish the design files for Exertion Instruments, help maintain the fleet of instruments for the instrument library, and is also conducting some new research into generator-powered soundfield generators! Welcome Michael! Here's some early work by Michael, a video with related information on making a multi-channel sound field.

There is now a Google discussion group for Exertion Music. Please invite people in!