barbie and the new digital instrument for the 21st century

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the other night, i was very excited to go to the launch for the TENORI-ON, a new instrument conceived by the überawesome media artist Toshio Iwai (pictured here) in conjunction with yamaha. apparently it took them 6 whole years to develop...

according to the press release,

the TENORI-ON is a 16x16 matrix performance instrument of LED switches which allows everyone to play music intuitively, creating a "visible music" interface. By operating and interacting with the LED buttons and the light they produce you gain access to the TENORI-ON's numerous performance capabilities. The TENORI-ON provides six different performance and sound/light modes for broad performance versatility, and these modes can be combined and used simultaneously for rich, complex musical expression.

the instrument looks like this:



and it's both a performance input controller and display which you control with LED buttons and the light they produce. it has six different performance and sound/light modes and these modes can be combined and used simultaneously for musical expression.

if that sounds too complicated, this image should clear it up for you:



basically, it works like this:



if you would like to see it in action, here's a demo from gary kibler:



or watch toshio iwai himself perform at the u.k. tenori-on launch:



or check out this short tutorial that shows you how to use the tenori-on to write a song;



you can also download mp3s of some tenori-on tracks from electronic music artists jim o'rourke, atom heart, and robert lippok here and here and here.

and if you would like more info, you can find it all here at yamaha's official tenori-on website.

anyway, i had an awesome time at the event, ESPECIALLY when i got to play with the thing and it is very cool, indeed. my initial explorations are documented here:



(what i was trying to say at the end of this video before i got distracted by all the pretty sounds was that it lets you choose what key you're playing in so that it's impossible to hit a "wrong" note.)



i also compiled a very brief sampler from the video i took of some of the artists who performed -



i have to say that by the end of the evening, once the novelty had worn off (ooh! the lights! pretty!) i'm not sure that it's all that much more entertaining to watch than any other midi controller. in particular i found nathan michel's music the most compelling, but his performance reminded me of being stoned on a friday night watching people play video games...

however, i think that like any new technology, it has tremendous potential to innovate in terms of how it will be used once it gets taken up by a wider sphere, corrupted and bastardized and used in ways that no one has yet envisioned...

and on that note, i'm going to get back to writing my own music now that i've gotten my usb hubs in place and my theremin put back together again after its long journey.

bis bald,

random bounce mode barbie