Re: Acoustic/Koto with Paper Clips and other tips for PREPARINGLOOPABLE INSTRUMENTS

[Richard Zvonar <zvonar@zvonar.com>]

At 5:53 PM +0000 2/7/01, Jon Wagner wrote:

>Get a piece of plastic flexible tubing and fit it airtight into a 
>drum.  Then play the drum while blowing/sucking into the tube.  You 
>can get a really cool realtime pitch shift by altering the pressure 
>in the drum.

>Also I was experimenting with placing splash cymbals on my drums and 
>playing them.  If the drum is tuned just right for the cymbal, you 
>can get some really cool sympathetic vibrations with incredible 
>sustain.

>Also try rubber bouncy balls scraped on the heads of your drums.  I 
>once saw Tuttie Heath play with mallets with bouncy balls on the 
>ends and he did this really cool scraping/bouncing sound on the toms 
>which had a very wierd effect.


I explored similar techniques and others in a piece for percussion 
and tape. One movement used a set of three timpani, amplified using 
contact mics. The head tension of the timpani could be controlled 
dynamically with mechanical pedals. This is similar in effect to the 
breath pressure technique but in addition to allowing resonance 
glides it also enables the tension to be left for a time at a useful 
pitch. This works very well when the timp acts as a resonator for 
cymbals, which are played as Jon describes. Bowing (a cello bow works 
well), scraping, and rubbing with superball mallets all result in 
interesting tones, some of which resemble guitar feedback. Working 
the timp pedal enables you to pick out various resonances on the 
cymbal sound, and you can even create some interesting vibrato by 
working the pedal periodically.

Superballs drawn across the drum head produce a variety of sounds 
depending on the degree of stick pressure, the speed of movement, the 
area of the head, and the pedal tension. Light stick pressure at a 
slow speed near the middle of the head, combined with slack pedal, 
will generally result in bouncy effects. Heavier stick pressure at a 
faster rate near the rim, combined with tight pedal, will generally 
result in continuous tones and even squeeks. Between the two extremes 
are rich growls and even hornlike tones.

Bowing a metal rod, such as a triangle beater, while holding it flat 
against the drum head at the rim will result in a similar range of 
sounds. The length of the free section of the rod outside the rim is 
critical, as is the bowing technique. A shorter length of rod can 
produce a continuous tone, while a longer free section can result in 
chattering sounds. Working the pedal and sliding the rod can both 
create gliding sounds resembling whale songs. I ran these sounds 
through a tape delay to great effect.

Wire drum brushes lightly swept over the drum head can produce a 
continuous white noise effect. Another noise effect can be created by 
spinning disks on the drum head. We used crotales (antique cymbals) 
spinning two at a time on each of two timpani, while the 
percussionist worked the pedals to change the relative pitch of the 
sound.

All of these effects benefit greatly from amplification, though not 
without feedback hazards. I used a combination of contact mics 
(attached to the heads near the rim to minimize damping) and air 
mics.  Some of the sounds (such as the brushes) ended up on the tape 
part only, some (such as the spinning crotales) were live only, and 
others (cymbal, syperball rubbing, and rod bowing) were both live and 
on tape.
-- 

______________________________________________________________
Richard Zvonar, PhD                     zvonar@zvonar.com
(818) 788-2202 voice                    zvonar@LCSaudio.com
(818) 788-2203 fax                      zvonar@well.com

                 http://www.zvonar.com