Stainless Steel Ondine
August 27, 2007 2:18 AM   Subscribe

Steve Mann's hydraulophone with sculpture gallery and performance video snippets: [1] [2] [3]
posted by Blazecock Pileon (8 comments total) 3 users marked this as a favorite
 
Stuff is so much more fun when you're wet.
posted by Shakeer at 2:30 AM on August 27, 2007


That's excellent, I must try one of these once.
posted by swordfishtrombones at 2:30 AM on August 27, 2007


Yes, this is the same Steve Mann [1] [2]. Awesome!
posted by honest knave at 3:17 AM on August 27, 2007


And no problem if you get thirsty on the gig, too!

But as for this claim, found on YouTube link #2:

" This is the world's first orchestral performance in which instruments make sound from all three states of matter (solid, liquid, and gas). Other orchestras use only 2 states of matter: solid (percussion and strings), and gas (wind instruments). "

They must be forgetting about the Glass Armonica, which uses water-moistened fingers in playing, was in relatively wide use as an instrument between roughly 1770 to 1830, and has seen something of a renaissance since the 1980's. There have certainly been orchestra performances with the Glass Armonica, as well as with players of tuned glasses. I'd also imagine there have been any number of orchestral performances of modern works which include bowls of water, water-filled glasses and the like.

Just thought I'd be a bit of a stickler for accuracy there...
posted by flapjax at midnite at 3:55 AM on August 27, 2007


Very good point, flapjax. Hooray for Benjamin Franklin! And Toronto, where Mann is based, even has a glass orchestra.
posted by honest knave at 4:09 AM on August 27, 2007


He was playing this thing with one of his students during Nuit Blance last year in Toronto. I took some photos. It's a strange thing to see live.
posted by chunking express at 6:07 AM on August 27, 2007


Supposedly their was some antique fountain designer who devised resonant chambers that would fill and spill in such a way as to speak words.
posted by StickyCarpet at 7:09 AM on August 27, 2007


resonant chambers that would fill and spill in such a way as to speak words.

twitch.
luminescence.
snapdragon.
flagellate.
bifocals.
disengage.
wherewithall.
comma.
thwart.

I can hear it now!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:42 AM on August 27, 2007


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