That's right
An Explanatory Primer
CREATING the MIDIMBIRA
A Weathered Academic Trooper
It took me 5 years to fully develop the MidiMbira. It was created as an exploration of DMI (Digital Music Instruments) with the goal of creating a hybrid acoustic-digital instrument that would be able to output MIDI and audio simultaneously as well as control various parameters mapped to hardware, plugins or DAWs.
Building
Hammering, cutting, sawing, sanding, assembling, tuning, testing, disassembling, tweaking, adapting, reassembling, and the fun part: playing.
Prototyping
Night after night in the lab, prototyping led to something that exceeded even my wildest imagination, and let me tell you, that one is usually pretty wild.
MidiMbira 1 (MM1)
The MM1 is a hybrid acoustic/digital instrument; a hyperinstrument, and is equipped with a pot, a LED and 10 push buttons.
Under the Hood
Underneath, the MM1 was something to behold, a DIY retro-futurist contraption, assembled without regards to finesse; just raw, unrefined 'Making-Do'.
The MM2 comunicates with any Smartphone App that accepts OSC (Open Sound Control) messages, which gives the MidiMbira control over multiple functions.
MM2
The MR1 emulates mappable controls for mixing (and otherwise), extending the MidiMbira acoustically and digitally.
MR1 (Midi Resonator 1)
The MM3 has muted acoustics and outputs only MIDI.
MM3
The MM4 bridges Mbira playability with Controllerism.
MM4
The MR2 further bridges the Mbira with the functionalities of a MIDI Controller.
MR2
