Many fellow Orchid-ians will be interested to know about this new
technological development being applied to acoustic stringed
instruments. It is first being perfected for acoustic guitars, while
future possibilities for other stringed instruments abound.
This new method applies wave-form changes directly to the vibrating
strings and the sounds generated are amplified by the natural
"voice" of the guitar - the resonating sound chamber of the acoustic
guitar itself! Sound synthesis applied to acoustic stringed
instruments is a bold new adventure! It’s really a quantum leap -
like back when guitars first got electrified and amplified.
The device is called the “Vo-96 Acoustic Synthesizer”. You can find
lots of videos via Google. IT SOUNDS AMAZING!
For now, as I understand it, the strings have to be “ferrous
friendly”, i. e., made of steel or wound with steel. Nylon and gut
aren’t affected by an electro-magnetic field.
However, this actually may not strictly be a limitation in terms of
desired tones produced by non-ferrous strings. At first glance it
would seem so, because nylon or gut “sounds more mellow and less
bright” than steel. On the other hand, the Vo-96 Acoustic
Synthesizer can most likely, with the right instructions, produce
those same overtones (those which make a gut string “sound” like a
gut string) within a steel string on the same instrument! I mean,
LIsten to That!
According to what I googled and read on Paul Vo’s web site, this
seems easily possible to me.
I’m really looking forward to hearing it (and using it) in first
person to know what it can do!
I Just saw a couple of the Vo-96 acoustic synthesizer videos, and my
first impression is kind of mixed. I’m as much or more for this kind
of thing as the next …guitar player, so I really am into the idea
of electronic noises, synthesizers, lots of electric guitar, and all
that, both from a listening standpoint and the perspective of a
strictly acoustic guitar player. I need to look into the Vo-96 more,
because Isee some real potential for experimentation myself, but the
videos I sawwere intriguing, yet slightly annoying at the same time.
It seemed just a little …(trying to think of a word that won’t
offend)…well, maybe it was just the particular style of the
examples I saw, so I’ll reserve judgement until I hear more and
maybe play with one.
The experiments I have done along these lines are here
specifically ‘Solarian Modifications Part 1’, ‘Third Solarian
Resonance’, and ‘Part 2 of 3 : Integration’, and they were done by
taking the original acoustic guitar track and processing it heavily
with reverb and feedback (software)and mixing that back with the
original acoustic track. Also, I made some single note recordings
and processed those and mixed them back asroot notes of chords to
enhance things. Anyone unfortunate enough to gohave a listen will
need to look for track descriptions to avoid getting sucked into
some highly annoying electronic music and noise, and find the
acoustic work These are all several years old, and it’s all free,
not for sale. My playing is at a higher level now but I’m not quite
ready to record anything new. Soon, my pretties, soon…
Since it came up, I thought I might as well share my stuff. Life is
the sameas it ever was out here out in Chihuahua Galaxy ; busy
making dies.