Building and Testing

I constructed a set of canvas bellows that seem to work well. Millboard was cut and glued to the inside of the bellows to provide a structure.





Here is a video of the bellows in action.



I still need to work out a way of sealing the ends of the bellows and attaching a tube to carry air to the accordion. I hope to build a few sets of bellows that will operate in concert to provide air to the accordion. Having several seperate bellows will provide a way of visualizing what the accordion is doing - giving it a strange set of lungs that show how the Deep Listening Device is reacting to what it hears.

I plan to use stepper motors to operate the bellows because they can be precisely controlled. I started working with the Arduino microcontroller, using it to drive a stepper motor. The stepper motor is connected through a Darlington transistor array to provide enough current to power the motor.



Here are some sketches of what may become the Deep Listening Device.

A Very Flammable Lampshade

I set out to build a test set of bellows today. I found a website that describes how to build a set of bellows for a camera. I modified the dimensions to produce something close to a pyramidal shape, and constructed a test model using Bristol paper for the ribs and vellum for the outer material.



I believe that the difference in dimensions for each end of the bellows that I chose is too extreme for this method. Going through the graphic calculations, the design I attempted required 7mm and 3mm ribs. The 3mm ribs are too tiny for the bellows to function properly.



It does however make a nice, extremely flammable lampshade.



The method of building seems sound, so I will attempt this again with end dimensions that are less different from each other.

Music and Harmonics

Here are some panels I put together showing a little bit about the relationship between harmonics and music.



The musical scale we use today is not as natural as we might think it is. Our scale, known as 12 Tone Equal Temperament, is slightly out of tune when compared to the natural harmonic scale (known as Just Tuning or Just Intonation). This website has a nice example showing the difference between the two tuning scales.

The device I hope to create is informed by Pauline Oliveros' concept of "deep listening." The device, based on my accordion, will listen to the sounds in the room and attempt to "sing along" with them. Sensors in the room will determine what tones are produced by the accordion in response to what it hears. This device would produce a music of observation - a music formed by watching and listening to what is happening in the area. Some behaviours might be built into the device playing on the concept of the "evil" accordion. It may become nervous and angry when it senses many people near it, producing music filled with dissonance and minor chords. When the deep listening device thinks it is alone, it might produce beautiful harmonies with what it hears. A light sensor placed in the window could be used to detect the weather and time of day, which would further inform the accordion about what notes it should play.

There will be quite a bit of work involved in automating the accordion. I will need to find at least 24 solenoids to operate the white keys of the accordion (plus 17 more if I am able to operate the black keys as well). I will also need to build a new set of bellows that could be operated by a motor.

The Accordion is Evil

I've been doing quite a bit of research for the past week, and am in the middle of compiling it now. I've discovered quite a few references in "pop culture" that associate the accordion with hell and/or evil. The "Devil's Dictionary" defines accordion as "an instrument in harmony with the sentiments of an assassin." I've put together a collage linking some of these references together, with hell being inside of the accordion.



I've also been studying the work of Pauline Oliveros, a composer/performer who experiments with electronic and improvised music using the accordion. She developed a concept called "deep listening" - that is focusing and listening to everything that one could possible hear at a moment in time. I've created a couple of panels that summarize some of her work and ideas.





I'm also researching harmonics, the musical scale and basic chord theory. Drawing from all of this research, I propose to build a "deep listening device" that would listen to sounds in the local environment and attempt to sing along to the sounds in harmony or dissonance using a "mechanized" accordion. More details to come...