MetaFilter posts tagged with mellotron

Deep Note

hippybear — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 21:14:00 -0800

The THX logo theme consists of 30 voices over seven measures, starting in a narrow range, 200 to 400 Hz, and slowly diverting to preselected pitches encompassing three octaves. [mp3 link] Created in 1983 by James A Moorer, the famous THX soundtrack has changed over the years. Some think it's pretty loud. It has been played on a mellotron and watched on an oscilloscope. New versions are very different. If you have a copy of SuperCollider, you might want to try to program your own. (Although Dr. Dre was already sued by LucasFilm for recording a cover of it without permission.) Added bonus: A concise video overview of Deep Note.

Long live the the Village Green - and the Mellotron

joseph conrad is fully awesome — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 09:55:25 -0800

The Mellotron features prominently on the 1968 album, The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society, more commonly referred to as The Village Green Preservation Society. The weird, eerie quality of this electronic keyboard, which uses pre-recorded tapes of individual sounds such as strings and woodwind instruments, worked well with singer/songwriter Ray Davies' nostalgic, backwards looking sensibility. For Kinks Mellotron goodness, try Sitting By The Riverside, Phenomenal Cat, All Of My Friends Were There, Animal Farm, Starstruck, and Days, the last of which was originally intended for Village Green but dropped from the final playlist. Bonus Mellotron, not on Village Green: Autumn Almanac, which "relies heavily on the MkII trombones and mixed brass". Nicky Hopkins and Ray Davies played the Mellotron on Village Green. Upon its release, reviews were favorable but the public ignored it, in no small part because it was so at odds with the cultural and rock/pop climate at the time. Village Green is now considered a godlike album and a cult favorite, prompting Ray Davies to state in the 2004 re-issue liner notes, "It's the most successful failure of all time." Previously

Keyboards Back from the Dead

jonp72 — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 16:46:49 -0800

Dead musical instruments... brought back to life by YouTube? Check out this mellotron demo film, a rare trautonium keyboard in some guy's garage, trautonium music by composer Oskar Sala, an original Ondes Martenot, a documentary on the telharmonium (parts 1, 2, and 3), and the Sonovox (used to funny but not-suitable-for-work effect in this parody of Sparky's Magic Piano). Meanwhile, avant-gardists have revived the art of prepared piano, but more mainstream acts such as Tori Amos and Ferrante & Teicher have also experimented with it. Last but not least, another performer of prepared piano is Margaret Leng Tan, but I think she should get more accolades as the best virtuoso of the toy piano since Schroeder from Peanuts.

The Birotron: The Keyboard of the Future

40 Watt — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 12:14:06 -0800

In 1975, armed with a big pile of 8-track car stereos and a whole lot of moxie, Dave Biro set out to change the sound of rock music. He failed spectacularly. This is the fascinating and tragic story of one of the rarest instruments in rock music- The Birotron. Even if you don't recognize the name, you've probably heard the Mellotron. The Beatles, Pink Floyd, David Bowie, The Kinks and countless others featured the unusual sounds of the keyboard on many of the most recognizable songs in rock music. However, despite the popularity of the Mellotron, it wasn't without it's flaws- heavy, bulky, slow, and- most important to this post- limited to 8 seconds of sound per key before the tapes which made up the sounds needed rewinding. Dave Biro decided to improve upon the Mellotron, and by cramming all those 8-tracks in a case and wiring the whole mess together, he was able to create an instrument with virtually infinite sustain. Unfortunately, his timing was a bit off: 4 years after the first Birotron rolled off the line, the world's first polyphonic digital sampling synthesizer was introduced. That, plus some serious technical and quality control issues, was enough to kill off the Birotron after only a handful were made.

The Mellotron

goodnewsfortheinsane — Thu, 07 Sep 2006 18:03:01 -0800

You may have never heard of it, but you've damn near certain heard it. The Mellotron (FortuneCity link) is a keyboard instrument; each of its keys triggers a tape with a pre-recorded instrument on it. It was effectively the world's first sample player. [more inside]

Meet The Melloman

mediareport — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 19:04:28 -0800

"What did you do to my Intelligent Synthesizer?" Wonderful collection of DIY sound gizmos from Mike Walters at Mystery Circuits. Includes the Pena-Tron, the Electronic Earthball and detailed instructions for the Moog Source Membrane Switch Cure. Most recent: The Melloman, a hilariously elliptical DIY Mellotron. [note: 3rd, 4th and 8th links are mp3s] [via]