About the project
The project is directed at the musician community at large, both professional and amateur, acoustic and electronic, as well as to audio enthusiasts, sound engineers, and people interested in pioneering technologies in the audio domain.
The project views the HANDMADE theme as a contemporary issue and includes under this title a range of artisanal activities such as custom analogue electronics buildings, computer programming for specific applications, sonic interaction design as well as traditional instrument craftsmanship.
Acoustically Active Augmented Instruments constitutes a pilot project for bringing together acoustic lutherie, electronics, computer programming, and interactive design in order to create new types of hybrid musical instruments. Electronic sounds are driven into the physical structures of acoustic instruments via structure-borne sound drivers, enabling the coexistence of acoustic and electronic sounds within a single instrument, bypassing external speakers and audio gear. For example, an acoustically active guitar builds a layer of electronic enhancements and alterations on top of the instrument’s acoustic sound, the whole soundscape radiating directly from the instrument itself.
Sensor technology can be implemented in the instrument, enabling user interactivity with the electronically generated or processed sounds. Acoustically Active Instruments is a project at the crossroads of the physical and the digital, bridging musical instrument craftsmanship, acoustics, signal processing, and physical computing, all approached as artisanal activities centered on individual craft. Active Acoustics is an emergent field combining the ancestral art of lutherie with the latest audio technologies and physical computing in order to create pioneering hybrid instruments. The project’s aim is to unite experts from the different fields of specialisation required for the design, implementation, and construction of Active Acoustic Augmented instruments in order to achieve the “critical mass” for developing professional concert instruments within the project’s two-year span.
Objectives
The project’s aim is to unite experts from the different fields of specialisation required for the design, implementation, and construction of Active Acoustic Augmented instruments in order to achieve the “critical mass” for developing professional concert instruments within the project’s two-year span.