Monday, July 14, 2008

Playing the Building

I always like David Byrne (of Talking Heads fame). He has enough of a unique viewpoint but not so much that he has lost it. He latest creation is a new instrument in Lower Manhattan - the Battery Maritime Building - an empty 9000 square foot space with exposed beams, pipes, rafters... By adding various actuators (vibrating motors, air blowers and percussion strikers) which are wired into the back of an old pump organ, you can now "play the building". Some of the parts were actually "tuned" so that a chromatic scale of sorts exists. While the building doesn't have the subtle nuances of Rachmaninoff's Second Concerto played by Jean-Yves Thibaudet, it still is a neat idea that such potential exists in an otherwise vacant building.

Apparently I am well behind the times as this site has been open since May and will be closing next month. So what else is new? I found out about this from Design News (July 14, 2008, Supplemental), a trade mag that I really enjoy. It's somewhat geeky (the Gadget Freak files is way too much) but I always make time for this mag much more so than any of the dozens of others that are on my desk.

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