The Vinyl Harp

For the lack of a better name, I have dubbed this simple little MSP app the Vinyl Harp. For awhile now I've been interested in the potential of using vinyl run-out grooves as a compositional device. Philip Jeck and Christian Marclay's investigations into this esoteric medium are pretty well known, so I've been trying to produce something original for the past week.

As the record player's stylus is stereo it reads both sides of the run out groove which are diffrent to each other on a micoscopic level, but can be articulated with the right kind of processing.

The Vinyl Harp is straightforward enough; it's a two-channel input into Max/MSP where the signals can be sonically tranformed using a biquad filter and comb filter. Each of these effects can be used individually or in consort with each other. I've found that the most interesting results have been acheived with the comb filter - applying a quarter to half second delay and using a strong feedback level. This articulates the vinyl's clicks, pops and crackles quite well and produces a nice sustained bell/plucked string sound. The biquad filter is also useful for scanning the resonant areas of the clicks and pops and can be very handy in conjunction with the comb filter.

I've also incorporated a sample playback option for pre-recorded run-out grooves.

I did some documentation last night, but I don't have time to upload it today. Check back here in a couple of days. There's plenty more to come over the next couple of weeks.