Comments on: MIDI-Enabled Pipe Organ Rocks Edinburgh

By: (noou)

(noou) — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 20:48:00 +0000

I love it! Congratulations Gareth!

By: Rasmus Kaj

Rasmus Kaj — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 22:53:54 +0000

Johan Liljencrants, a former professor at KTH Dept. of speech, music and hearing, has built a very cool organ. Every piece of the organ, including every pipe in it is beautifully crafted by Johan, and much is constructed by him. This organ is entirely controlled by midi.

By: Ranjit

Ranjit — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 15:18:45 +0000

The Curtis Organ at the University of Pennsylvania is something like the 11th largest pipe organ in the world, and it was wired for MIDI around 1990 — as, if I remember correctly, an EE undergraduate’s thesis project! For a while, at least, it was by far the biggest MIDI instrument in the world; I wonder if there are any new contenders?

The Curtis Organ was built in 1926 with electromechanical controls, so adding MIDI control was a matter of tapping into the existing cabling rather than having to press the keys mechanically like in Edinburgh. We ran an early version of MAX on a little Mac SE-30 to do MIDI experiments. I once wrote a little MAX patch which would take MIDI channel pressure and use it to activate more and more ranks of pipes and open the baffles (basically giant acoustic venetian blinds the size of a van!) as pressure increased. Then I went down to the stage with a toy-like Casio MIDI saxophone to play the building-sized organ. Yowza!

By: Paul

Paul — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 16:25:28 +0000

this was covered earlier but
http://greenlineblog.com/playing-the-building-harmonics-and-transparency-of-building-systems/
i know it isn’t quite midi but at least some kind of control method from an organ rather than to it though

i have always wanted to make a physical interface though pure data and an (or a set of) arduino(s) for a guitar
that is not only effected by sound
but also by a monome controlling arduinos controlling motors automating the tuning of the guitar

By: Gareth Edwards

Gareth Edwards — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 13:36:54 +0000

Good questions, Marc.

The solenoids we had available (surplus units) have a limited travel, the “finger” provides a lever to allow the white keys to sound properly. The black keys require less travel – these are pushed directly by a pin on the solenoid core – but they still click as the solenoid core bottoms out in the coil.

Also, you have to remember you are only hearing the clicking because the video is being shot right next to the keyboard, but this is on a balcony at the back of the meeting hall and the best listening position for the organ is down in the hall, and the solenoid noise is much attenuated down there.

By: Marc

Marc — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 04:28:17 +0000

I don’t get why they went through the trouble of having mechanical “fingers” to press the keys. Why don’t they just trigger the note directly with a servo or solenoid?
It would at least get rid of that annoying clicking noise every time a key gets pressed.

By: cancurry

cancurry — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 02:19:35 +0000

The Grand Organ of the Sydney Opera House has always had remote recording and playback since it was installed in 1979, but the electronics were upgraded in 2002 to include MIDI. Tech Specs pdf

By: flubt

flubt — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 22:38:14 +0000

saw this the other day, check out his final countdown video, amazing stuff.

By: RyanOnCoffee

RyanOnCoffee — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 22:09:38 +0000

Melbourne Town Hall (Melbourne, Australia) has MIDI on their pipe organ too, which was refurbished around 2001. I’m pretty sure it goes down to a 32′ pipe. The main reason for the MIDI (I think) is so they can use the remote console that wheels out to the middle of the room – it looks the real deal with four manuals and pedals and drawbars and can do everything the organ’s console can do – but via MIDI. The latency gets pretty insane though, not just from the distance the sound travels to get to you, but also the 50+ foot MIDI lead in between.
The console has a MIDI IN too…hmm…Bach on keytar anyone?