Music lovers are hacking Apple’s Siri voice recognition technology. By connecting to some of the “intelligence” of the cloud, these tools can make your phone rap or send music files to a player piano for instant musical playback.

First up: Yamaha’s piano taking requests, thanks to music grabbed online. A Yamaha rep explains:

Yamaha consultant Craig Knudsen demonstrates a unique implementation of Apple’s incredible Airplay technology in an exciting new way.
Here’s how it works:
Take a standard MIDI songfile and convert it to an audio file (while maintaining the MIDI data). The songfile is then sent wirelessly via WiFi to an Apple Airport Express (which is mounted underneath a Yamaha Disklavier reproducing piano. The audio output of the Airport Express is then connected to the analog MIDI inputs of the Disklavier, using a standard audio cable.
Then, you simply ask Siri to play your favorite song from your iTunes library, and Siri responds immediately, by making the Disklavier’s keys and pedal move up and down, recreating the performance, including full orchestration.
The result is nothing short of magical.

Of course, the actual “playing” is thanks to the capabilities of the Yamaha Disklavier. I’m actually a bit puzzled as to how the online conversion works, exactly, and I was curious for any Disklavier-owning CDM readers whether this is something publicly available. I’m waiting to hear back from Yamaha.

And now, for something completely different: Siri rapping. (Somewhat … erm … badly, if amusingly. It is a hack.)

My friend Robert “Robb” Böhnke had a lot of fun combining Siri’s voice synthesis and the lyrics of Notorious B.I.G.

My hack for the Music Hack Day 2011 in London, a 24h Hackathon for all things music.

SiriProxy is used to intercept the communication with Apple’s servers. Notorious Siri then sends Notorious B.I.G.’s Hypnotize to the device.

Siri’s speech synthesis is synced to the beat using the timestamps obtained from the Echonest API which were then manually tweaked, to smooth out delays in the text-to-speech engine.

Thanks to Universal Music for awarding me a nice pair of Dr. Dre headphones

The Echonest API, by the way, is an amazing do-everything “API for music,” one that analyzes musical files and connects to a vast storehouse of musical intelligence.

Warning: this video is most definitely Not Safe For Work. (Heck, even the thumbnail isn’t, exactly.) If that concerns you, just go listen to the Yamaha video again, okay?

Siri FAQ [Apple.com]

Previously: Google Translate Beatboxing

…and, of course, that means: Android, your move.

On the road from futuristic instrumental concept to real-world product, the Yamaha Tenori-On as shipped lacked some of the functionality its creator, gifted media artist Toshio Iwai, originally imagined. Notably, wireless networking, which promised social music-making with other devices, was gone, replaced with a more-limited MIDI connector.

Now, in a surprisingly literal translation from the hardware to iPad, it appears the Tenori-On has added that feature – but lost some of its charm. An iOS developer notes to me that pitches don’t sound when you tap the screen, only when they are played in the sequence. That fundamentally changes the interaction with the sequencer: you can’t hear notes until they’re sequenced, and you would presumably lose the sense of playing an instrument. That report is happily incorrect; both the developer and I were mistaken from our video impressions. That makes this far more useful.

My reaction here should be taken with a grain of salt – this is only a demo video. But in observing what is new (networked features look terrific), it’s likewise worth saying that something is lost when you move to tangible hardware. To me, a lot of the appeal of the Tenori-On was tangible: the machined metal case, with curved edges designed to be comfortable to hold, and the feeling of running your fingers against discrete, round keys on the array of buttons. Those are lost by necessity. Yet, oddly, some of the Tenori-On’s features designed primarily for hardware – the menu system and navigation keys – are reproduced here, features necessary on a hardware design but not a tablet.

Yamaha Japan, apologies for going on a rant on a product I haven’t yet used, but I’m concerned at what seems to be a missed opportunity. And designer Toshio Iwai has already conceived imaginative touch-based interfaces that are designed for a screen, in works before iOS had even been announced, like ElectroPlankton for the Nintendo DS and interactive installation work going back some 15 years or so.

Simply translating hardware designs to a screen is novel, but rarely usable. Just ask Tascam, who were roundly (and rightly) criticized for making a Portastudio app for iPad that required you rewind every single time.

At least the good news is, some of the musical personality of Toshio Iwai’s work remains, and in a form that doesn’t require a costly hardware investment. Updated – also, via readers, there’s evidence of MIDI support.You’ll find other videos on Yamaha’s official Japanese channel.

Just mark my words: the hardware is still cooler, and there’s a lot of potential in hardware and software sequencers alike beyond this yet to be realized, whether by Yamaha or by someone else.

Updated: I want to re-emphasize that there appears to be auditory feedback as you press buttons for sequences, which is great news and vastly improves usability. And while I stand by some of what’s advantageous in hardware, I’m excited to learn that we may get both networked and MIDI functions here, as we’ve seen in apps from makers like KORG.

Reader comments are very positive, so amidst this hopefully constructive criticism, I think it’s encouraging that the software looks promising and people are eager to try it! (And being critical of some features does not mean you can’t eventually like the product – part of why I tend not to shy away from criticism.)

http://www.youtube.com/user/yamahajp

Yamaha’s CP-35 may fall short of being a classic, but it is capable of some pleasant, dreamy sounds. That is, if you can actually lift it. Impossibly heavy and cumbersome, here’s a job for sampling if ever there was one. A free Ableton Live rack gives you convenient access to the instruments and live effects. I should note, by the way, that Ableton Live is not a prerequisite to using the samples

AfroDjMac, aka Brian, aka Nairb Funk, aka the guy who’s been giving us the gift of tons of free Ableton Live stuff, talks to CDM. He shares some thoughts on how he put together this rack and what his approach was. He also tells us about a project to make 100 one-of-a-kind CDs, all unique, all hand-painted – which, in turn, explains what’s up with these cowboys in the picture.

The CP-35. I tried to copy the effects that are present on the original CP-35 (tremolo and flanger) while adding a few additional ones (delay, chorus, vibrato). This particular keyboard has been on many recordings I’ve done in the past and offers everything from a nice subtle “backbone” to guitar chords, to some prominent lead melodies (adding distortion or running it through a guitar amp an be a lot of fun). I’m finding I can get an extremely wide range of tones running this through Ableton’s Amp/Cabinet plug ins. Maybe in the future I’ll record some shorter samples and reverse them to create something similar to my reversed piano rack.

[At top is] a better picture with some of our mascots from the soon to be release “Cowboys and Synthesizers EP.” My collaborator SuperKid and I painted 100 album covers, made a large collage from them, and then took a picture of them all. That picture is the actual album art, and when we release the hard copy, the first 100 will be 1/100 of the actual album art.

I really like the idea of something hand made, especially these days when everything is so digital and mass produced; we are making an EP that has some tangible, original artwork. Hopefully it’ll give people a reason to want an actual copy and not just a digital version. I love how your album has an actual painting as the artwork. Sometimes in the digital realm it is easy to forget that people’s hands actually touched and crafted the art.

More on both these stories, plus the free CP-35 download:

Free Weekly Ableton Live Rack #9: Yamaha CP-35 Rack

“Cowboys and Synthesizers” EP artwork preview

And if you feel the need to get a bit crafty. (I love craft time with glitches and cowboys…)

The beauty of modeling an instrument is that it involves ideas – taking a design from one context and translating it to another. With software, we’re able to put sound-making things everywhere, from obscure game consoles to a tab in your web browser that can distract you with music instead of Facebook updates. In the process of moving those ideas from place to place, we discover things.

Just ask Shannon Smith. He’s been on a great tear emulating favorite synthesizers in free toys for the browser. Through the power of the Internet, the New Zealand-born, California-based developer heard from Japan-based Monotron designer, who shared tips like these:

- filter doesn’t sound nearly as aggressive at maximum peak.
- LFO is slower at minimum (about 15s period) and faster at maximum (>1kHz).
- monotron resets the LFO at the moment the ribbon is touched, so it
works like a simple cycling EG at slow LFO rates.
- monotron has fixed intensity keytrack. cutoff tracks ribbon position
by factor of two. only tracks ribbon not pitch knob.

(We get to enjoy a much cooler industry that keeps friendly, and leaves the competition more often to the engineering departments than to the legal departments.)

And so there’s something wonderful about getting to fiddle with squelchy sounds in the tab of Chrome or Firefox. A few examples:
“Webotron” (Korg Monotron)
“Webotribe” (not-even-out-yet Monotribe)
Yamaha CS01
A 4-op FM synth
A (mini) Minimoog

There are useful tools, too, like a Java patch editor for the microKORG XL. Amazingly, it can actually transmit MIDI to the keyboard:
microKORG XL

Shannon tells us a bit more about the development process…

How they were developed:

All Java (interface and sound). It’s not really possible to use flash to generate sound real-time with low latency. Java also has built-in MIDI support that works in your browser which is pretty handy.

I was curious if things like this would be useful on tablets (particularly if someone got them working with HTML5 in place of Java – it’s a bit sobering that our “futuristic” Web tech represents a step backward in some respects):

I have considered writing apps for tablets and have been meaning to look into it but can never find the time. Also the market seems pretty saturated with much better products than I could produce in my spare time.

Shannon’s background:

I studied Electronic Engineering at a university in New Zealand and now work full time as a developer for a GPS company in California.

The most important lessons learned by doing these:

Hmm, that’s a tough one. I guess an appreciation for just how hard it is to digitally generate good sounds from scratch. I assumed before I started writing synthesizers that doing it digitally would be trivially easy compared to the analog days. In the digital realm you can do things with a few keystrokes that would have taken dozens of components and hours to wire up physically. Unfortunately even though it’s easy to get something working quickly there are some rather nasty artifacts that creep in when you do things digitally that means you have to be very careful anything you do doesn’t generate frequencies outside of the limited range dictated by your sampling rate. Anything you generate that falls outside this range folds back down into the audio spectrum and makes it sound crap.

I’m actually supposed to be writing games in my spare time. I only started writing synthesizers because I thought it would be a way to have decent sounding music in my games and keep the download size very small. I started out trying to do a Nord Lead emulation but utterly failed and realized just how complicated it was to get a good sound. Even though it was a failure it was a lot of fun to try and I continued writing them and lately I’ve been writing many more synths than games, also I tend to finish (mostly) the synths which is something I can’t seem to do with games.

Lots more goodies to explore:
http://www.angryoctopus.co.nz/

While Roland this week is pushing their JP-80 and celebrating a 30-year milestone (the Jupiter-8), Yamaha has a different tack. They’re talking about the 10-year anniversary of the MOTIF workstation line, and introducing a version that’s actually easier to lift and afford. That could be friendly to the current economic tough times. But with all that people love their software synths, can Yamaha make a compelling case to the computer user, too? I put Yamaha on the spot to answer that.

First, here are the specs:

• MOTIF XS sounds, with 1,217 voices and 355 MB of waveforms. (Okay, that’s nothing to HALion’s 15 GB of sounds on a computer, but Yamaha promises content with “Expanded Articulation” features.)
• Virtual Circuit Modeling and MOTIF XS synth engine, with 18 filter types.
• 256 performance patterns, 6,720 arpeggiator patterns, MOTIF XS four-part arpeggio engine.
• USB audio/MIDI interface to record directly to a PC – 4-in, 2-out, stereo input for vocals or instruments/guitars.
• Onboard sequencer and direct-to-sequencer recording so you can use the keyboard as a sketchpad.
• MIDI controller functionality.

None of that is terribly earth-shaking; where the MOX line is worth mentioning is on weight, size, and cost. The MOX6 weighs 15.4 pounds with 61 semi-weighted keys; the MOX8 gives you 88 Graded Hammer Standard keys in 32.6 pounds.

MOX6: US$1199.99 MAP
MOX8: US$1699.99 MAP

That still isn’t quite an impulse buy, but there isn’t a whole heck of a lot of competition, particularly if you want a lightweight, playable hammer-action keyboard with these kinds of features. (Roland and Kurzweil compete in the same space, but only Kurzweil I think is on the same level for pianist-friendly hammer action keybeds.)

In fact, if you look at it this way – a keyboard with controllers and a real Yamaha keybed that you can still lift – the MOX fills a long-quiet spot in the market.

Having onboard sounds is a nice backup, but for most of us who are addicted to superior-sounding soft synths, half a gig of MOTIF sounds just won’t cut it. (Side note: I really do think there’s something to the Japanese aesthetic of miniaturized sample content. I’m stunned engineers at these makers can voice these things as well as they do.)

So, I asked Athan Billias of Yamaha’s Pro Audio and Combo Division to tell us more about the computer workflow and keybed. It brings up features you might miss, like controller capabilities, using the sequencer and arpeggiator with other gear, and other details.

Keybed: Yamaha’s keybeds are some of the best-liked away from actual pianos, so this comes as good news: “The Graded Hammer Standard is what we use on many of our digital pianos- the P95, etc,” says Athan. “It’s a graded hammer action that was designed to be lighter and allow for a more streamlined design than the Clavinova’s, but uses a similar mechanism.” Now, it is lighter – otherwise the keyboard would weigh more – but if portability is key, this could be a player.

Streaming from the audio engine: With USB onboard, being able to record the internal sound bank is essential; I saw commenters elsewhere asking about this. The answer is, yes, you can: “It is a 4 in ( to the computer ) 2 out interface. So yes, you can stream directly from the synth engine will also recording the L&R analog inputs.”

USB audio drivers: The keyboard isn’t class-compliant, says Athan, because it’s both multi-channel audio and multi-port MIDI. (I believe the latter is the issue.) You’ll need Yamaha drivers – so, no Linux / iPad.

Computer integration: With inexpensive controller keyboards available, Yamaha has a little something to prove to convince computer users. They’re obviously thinking of that use case, as they include soft synths in the box. Here’s Athan’s argument.

I think this is the coolest thing about the MOX. So let’s talk computer integration.

The MOX comes with Cubase AI of course, but it also has a suite of other software.

YC-B3 – Yamaha Organ Modeling VST soft synth
Prologue – Steinberg Virtual Analog softsynth

MOX VST editor – This turns the hardware into a VST so you can treat the hardware exactly like a softsynth. Save your project, open a month later and it recalls the setting of your hardware exactly as they were when you were last working on the project.

Remote Editor- The remote mode turns the MOX into a very comprehensive DAW and VST controller. There is an AI knob which means that rest the mouse over any parameter in Cubase and the AI knob can tweak it. You can use the Remote Editor to select almost anything in Cubase to be controlled by buttons on the MOX.

You can open, select and tweak VSTs , control the EQs of audio channels, open and close the mixers and other windows and many other things.

However, it is not just the software. The MOX is an audio interface so you can play back your VSTs audio out through the MOX. A MOX, some VSTs and a laptop are all you need ( besides a PA system) to play live. The MOX has a DAW level control on the front panel which is the output from your computer.

Sequencer / arpeggiator: Okay, actually, I find this potentially the coolest feature. The sequencer can record internal MIDI or external MIDI, so you can use the keyboard as a sketchpad or use it to sequence hardware. I’m not terribly familiar with the MOTIF sequencers, so I have to give this another try to see how usable it is, but it is one advantage of workstation-style keyboards – here, without all that extra cruft (and heft, and cost) you don’t need or want.

Also, a MIDI output switch lets you use the arpeggiator and patterns to sequence your external MIDI instruments.

Otherwise, this is effectively a MOTIF XS in the guts, just with less weight and cost. That’s, um, how I expect to celebrate my next birthday/anniversary, I hope.

This isn’t a review, but this looks like a contender – and I’d love to stack the Kurzweil and Yamaha offerings against each other. Cheap controllers are nice, but having a superior keybed and some useful functions and (even just as a backup) standalone sounds has some appeal, without feeling like your keyboard is trying to be another computer.

The only unfortunate detail is that the keyboard would share the name of nuclear fuel at a most inopportune time. Then again, if I plug it in here in New York, there’s a 30% chance I’m running off nuclear fuel, too. Think of it as short for “moxie” instead.

Every so often, I’m reminded of a simple fact: the greatest machine on the planet remains the human machine. So, yes, it may seem strange to one of the uninitiated to imagine strapping an iPhone to your wrist. And yes, musicianship in the digital age is partly about triggering, not just playing (though Onyx can really blow on his Akai wind controller.) But the bottom line is, the precision of movement and the genius of human musical creativity wins out. However unusual the technological solution, it can still tap into that power.

In the video above, our friend Onyx Ashanti shows off his proof-of-concept work-in-progress as he assembles a new musical rig. Open source patching software Pure Data (Mac/Windows/Linux) is the sound source, proof that you can substitute free software at the center. The controller is an iPhone running TouchOSC (though this makes me want to revisit ultra-portable, open, embedded hardware with sensors). And yes, that’s a Yamaha WX5 wind controller, a digital input tool of choice for those with a wind background. Onyx says this is only to be one of two iPhones.

Expect craziness to come, but I like watching things in progress, too – so I couldn’t resist sharing.

http://onyx-ashanti.ning.com/

Correction: Instead of looking closely at what Onyx was playing, I relied on my memory, and egregiously called the WX5 an Akai EWI. Thanks to commenters for spotting that.

The Tenori-On, the grid-based musical instrument with whimsical sequenced lights created by Toshio Iwai, has been gradually becoming more affordable. The original model, complete with its rounded metal case, has already been cut to US$999 here in North America. Now, Yamaha announces that it is making an “Orange” version which also slices costs. A plastic case stands in for the metal one, the lights are orange instead of white, and lights appear only on one side. Yamaha says this is for “home use” — that is, you don’t need the device lighting up on the other side if no one’s watching you. Unfortunately, by removing this novelty and eliminating the Tenori-On’s fantastic battery power option, I suspect Yamaha may also be slicing out some of the appeal of the device.

In the UK, MusicRadar reports the device will ship at £649. Here in the US, I’ve confirmed with distributor Keyfax that the price will be $699. Now, unlike other recent grid rivals (Launchpad, APC40, Ohm64) and the monome, the Tenori-On is capable of making sound. But I’d be inclined to either spend the extra $400 and make it light up on both sides and use it in bed sans wires or skip the idea altogether. I’m curious to know if others feel the same way.

MusicRadar also gets the scoop from Yamaha in the UK that a firmware upgrade is due for the Tenori-On fixing its somewhat problematic MIDI sync:

We’re told that this will address a number of areas, including syncing of the Tenori-on to DAWs and also the MIDI sync implementation.

Yamaha announces ‘more affordable’ Tenori-on Orange [MusicRadar]
Tenori-On product page [Yamaha worldwide]
Tenori-On USA [Keyfax]

It’s worth poking around the store if you do own a Tenori-On. Those brave early adopters can now make the instrument a pretty practical addition to a live set, with a nice case, stand, and (finally) stand mic stand adapter to feature it in your sets. And in another nod to the design, the Tenori-On recently entered the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

In the meantime, I’m still curious to see if someone mashes up a synth engine and monome to make a computer-less monome.

A chap named Nick Ciontea has created a channel on Vimeo collecting odd videos folks have made with or regarding Moog products. I know about this, because two of my videos made it in. It’s a grab bag, but a lovely tribute to how much people love this gear.

My favorite selection is the video here, because it’s not what you’d expect sound-wise from either Yamaha’s Tenori-On or Moog filters. Artist “Smith” says:

This first test is a prepartory work to a series of solo pieces inspired by John Cage’s experiments for prepared piano and Conlon Nancarrow’s player piano studies.

Yes, things you don’t normally expect to go together: Cage/Nancarrow, Moog, Tenori-On. And he successfully erases the Tenori-On’s beautiful if predictable signature sound. This is what I imagine music boxes would sound like on Alpha Centauri. In other news: I can’t afford this rig.

- 2 TENORI-ON(s)
- MI Audio Pollyanna Octave Synth
- Moog Low Pass Filter (MF-101)
- Moog Ring Modulator (MF-102)
- Moog Bass Murf (MF-105b)
- Jomox M-Resonator
- Rotary Ensemble (Boss RT-20)
- Boss FV-500L (as expression pedal for LPF Resonance)
- Boss FV-500L (as expression pedal for RM Frequency)
- Boss EV-5 for Rotary Ensemble speed

But, involved as that is, it’s further evidence you can push sound in new ways. And if online videos do nothing else, they can lay the gauntlet down in terms of what you think possible – both by demonstrating the generic and the unusual.

US distributor Keyfax NewMedia reports that it has Yamaha’s Tenori-On in stock and shipping out now. (Pre-orders began at the beginning of May, but this is apparently the first the US unit has made it to our shows — unless you happened to win one from createdigitalmusic.com, that is, in April, in which case you know who you are.)

Every time I mention Tenori-On, despite the awe and lust it inspires in some musicians, someone raises the point of its somewhat retro-styled, simple sound bank. Fair enough: the minimal sounds are fantastic in the hands of creator Toshio Iwai and were specifically programmed and voiced to match his aesthetic. Other people, perhaps, not so much. So it’s interesting that reader Steven aka Nomad Cinema sends along this video (seen at top) of the Tenori-On paired with the absurdly deep luxury modular synth Kyma, along with a couple of beloved new analog synths. He writes:

In order to tap the real power of Yamaha’s new Tenori-on, it helps to pair it with external equipment capable of producing more satisfying sounds than the somewhat lackluster soundset included with the Tenori-on itself. In this video, no internal Tenori-on sounds were used whatsoever. Tenori-on is functioning purely as a sequencer with external equipment, including advanced sound-shaping from Kyma and analog synthesis from Alesis Andromeda and Dave Smith’s Prophet ’08. Sequencer data coming from Tenori-on is processed in Ableton Live (utilizing midi scale and chord filters, as well as injecting some generative randomness) before reaching Kyma, Andromeda, and Prophet ’08.

That to me remains the Tenori-On’s unique strength: to me it’s really an alternative step sequencer, exploded into an array of flashing lights and animated with game-like motion. This is to me also another way in which it isn’t a Monome, which feels more like an intelligent, programmable set of pads an an extension of your software, in comparison to the Tenori-On which seems to be re-imagining a giant pixel as a controller. I will be getting around to showing off some hands-on applications very soon, at long last.

http://tenori-on.keyfax.com/

Keyfax explains:

So that everyone has an equal purchasing opportunity, pre-sale orders are being taken via Tenori-on Registration on a first-come first-served basis.

As shipments arrive, KEYFAX NewMedia will personally contact those registered; your order will be processed, and your unit shipped.

I’m not entirely convinced Keyfax and/or Yamaha understand Web communities. Aside from a clunky website design, they’re asking for people to manually send them MP3 links and videos "for review and consideration." (That’s a bit odd coming from a hardware distribution company; if that site is supposed to be a "community," why the tough content policy?) There is some sparse but useful discussion on their forum.

So, anyone with cool tracks on Tenori-On, feel free to send CDM links. We’re happy to look, too.

But all of this makes me wonder — how much longer will Yamaha treat Tenori-On’s launch as an "experiment"?

It’s been six years in development, publicly discussed by Yamaha for over a year, and on the market since September, yet we’re still told that Yamaha can only make Tenori-On units in "limited quantities" via exclusive distribution. Everything — even this forum — has a temporary feel, with various apologies posted around about how the product is still "early" in its development. At about 100 units per month maximum (both for the UK launch and now the US), the reality is that the device is shipping a volume more in line with DIY projects and boutique music electronics, not Yamaha-branded, robot-manufactured gear. Yet Yamaha keeps talking about popularizing music to non-musicians, even though the device’s price and limited availability means the only people buying it are hard-core musicians with cash to spare.

And mostly what we’re getting is mixed messages. So, for instance, hundreds of people fill a packed, hyped "launch" event here in New York. But then someone asks about price or availability, and suddenly the conversation turns awkward, as if Yamaha didn’t expect you to actually buy it. That’s not really a criticism, just confusion. And I know it’s not just my confusion, either, because I’m in touch with other press who covered the launch events. They’re baffled. The hyped-up launch campaign doesn’t seem to jive with the almost apologetic stance on sales and production.

One possibility is that Yamaha is planning a very big launch for a consumer device, or at least thinking about it. That’d make the tenuous position now a little more logical. But then, the device itself feels like a complete experience. Could it really be translated to something else — either at the low- or high-end? What would happen to musicians who spend $1300 on this if a $400 version showed up at Best Buy? Or, more to the point, what does Yamaha think about this and how it relates to the other stuff they make? We’ve heard lots from Toshio Iwai, and quite frankly, his descriptions have been artful and elegant. Now we’re just waiting to hear something coherent from Yamaha. Curiously, that message so far has been "look at this new gadget for people who don’t play instruments," followed by "now listen to experienced musicians playing it, since they’re the ones we’re selling it to."

And, hey, Yamaha, I do hope you don’t take this the wrong way. Welcome to the blogosphere — now you get to know what we’re thinking.

That said, in the musician community the limited availability is having the effect of separating the smaller group of people who want and can afford Tenori-On from everyone else. Those who want it are working hard to get it, and everyone we’ve heard from who’s got one has been really happy with it.

Whatever marketing and distribution may be doing, I still see the product itself as a separate story. Yamaha confirms one is on its way to me, so I look forward to sharing some hands-on time with the device. I still think the design itself is fascinating, not only in terms of what it says about Tenori-On itself, but what it says about the possibility of music instrument design.

Stay tuned for our hands-on.