Blowwalker
A wind controller (also electronic wind instrument , Blassynthesizer , English wind controller , wind synthesizer , breath controller ) is an electronic musical instrument , which in the way of playing a conventional instrument (. Eg recorder , clarinet , saxophone or Melodica is) modeled. The blow converter scans the musician's blowing air flow and the handle combination of a flap-like switch combination using special sensors . These electronic signals are converted into MIDI data in modern instruments and are used for the actual sound generation in an internal synthesizer or an external sound module .
history
In the 1930s, the American engineer Benjamin F. Miessner worked on various electroacoustic instruments. Among them was an electro-acoustic clarinet, which he applied for a patent in 1936. For this he developed a special electromagnetic pickup that could be used to sense the vibration of the reed . This invention marks the beginning of the history of electronic wind instruments.
The first experiments with fully electronic musical instruments are known from Leo FJ Arnold . In 1941 he applied for a patent for an electronic clarinet. In this instrument, the blowing pressure was used to activate an on / off switch.
The French Georges Jenny and the German engineer Ernst Zacharias played an essential role in the development of the first electronic blow converter in the 1950s. Jenny applied for his first patent for an electronic wind instrument in 1951. It describes a blow converter for continuously variable volume control that works with a piezo element . The prototypes of Zacharias, who developed electronic wind instruments from 1956, led to the first commercially marketed electronic wind synthesizer - the Hohner Electra-Melodica, which was published in 1967. American trumpeter and engineer Nyle Steiner began developing an electronic trumpet in the 1960s. The prototype of the EVI (Electronic Valve Instrument), developed in the early 1970s, has been further developed to this day and temporarily sold by the Akai company.
In the 1970s, the Electra-Melodica was followed by other analog wind synthesizers such as B. Crumar Lyricon, Steiner EVI, Martin Martinetta and Realton Variophon. From the 1980s, the blow synthesizers were increasingly combined with MIDI controllers (e.g. Casio Digital Horn, Akai EWI) and subsequently developed into pure breath controllers without their own synthesis unit (e.g. the Yamaha WX Series or TEControl USB MIDI Breath Controller). To date, new devices are being developed, such as B. the 2016 introduced Roland Aerophon AE-10 and the Aodyo Sylphyo.
Playing style and technique
A blow converter can be played in different ways. For example, Yamaha offered a saxophone or recorder-like plastic mouthpiece for the WX5. The fingerings are adjustable to some degree but are largely similar to those of a saxophone. On the WX5, the flaps are built in such a way that you have to press them, while you only have to touch the buttons of an EWI from Akai (touch sensitive pads). The range is 6 to 8 octaves, which can be selected with the thumb on the back.
Modern devices react like a conventional instrument to the dynamics and strength of the air flow and thus change the timbre . The selection of playable instruments is fed by a so-called "sound bank" in which the various timbres can be called up.
Major artists
One of the first musicians to play this instrument was saxophonist Wayne Shorter with a Computone lyricon. Multi-instrumentalist Michał Urbaniak of Polish origin played the lyricon with Billy Cobham . The Californian saxophonist Tom Scott helped the instrument to become more popular with his band LA Express and the theme music for the TV series Starsky & Hutch . The American saxophonist Michael Brecker used the AKAI EWI wind transducer at a very high level . Other artists are Martin Hurni, inventor of the synthophone, the Swiss saxophonist G-SAX, Bob Mintzer and the Japanese Masato Honda and Miyazaki Takahiro. In contemporary jazz, wind transducers from Seamus Blake , Mark Shim and Chase Baird are used.
Individual evidence
- ^ Benjamin F. Miessner: Apparatus for the production of music . US2138500A, November 29, 1938 ( dpma.de [accessed April 11, 2018]).
- ↑ a b c d Andreas Swoboda: The beginnings of electronic wind instruments . 1st edition. epOs-Verlag, Osnabrück 2017, ISBN 978-3-940255-70-9 .
- ^ Leo FJ Arnold: Electrical clarinet . US2301184A, November 10, 1942 ( dpma.de [accessed April 11, 2018]).
- ^ Georges Marcel Charles Jenny: Electron musical instrument . DE944649B, June 21, 1956 ( dpma.de [accessed April 11, 2018]).