Yamaha CP-60M

I own my fair share of electric pianos.  I have a Rhodes 73, an ARP 16 voice, a Hohner Pianet-T, and a Wurlitzer 200A.  So why did I want to buy my friend Ben's CP-60M when I found out that he might be selling it?  For starters, the CP-60M is actually an electric PIANO, where the others, although called 'electric pianos', are more like electric music boxes or an electric celeste.  The Rhodes, Wurlitzer, and Hohner all use tines or bars to create their pitch for each key, where the Yamaha actually uses strings.  

The advantage about this over a sample of an acoustic piano is that this instrument doesn't have to be perfectly in tune.  Sometime, you want a sound where some of the keys are slightly up or down in pitch - not out of key, so to speak, but just detuned enough to add some chorus or beating to the sound.  This makes for a rich, beautiful sounding piano.  If I want something perfectly in tune, then I will reach for a sampler.  

I have also been using this with a vintage "harpsichord bar" that I bought and cut to fit the CP-60M.  This bar dangles a piece of metal in between the hammer and strings to make the piano sound like a harpsichord or "thumb tack" piano (thumb tacks onto the hammers of a piano give the same results).  The advantage of this bar is that it is easily removable so you can change back and forth from piano sound to harpsichord sound by lifting the bar.

 

A few more things to mention about this.  The "M" stands for MIDI and although this does not have a MIDI input and solenoids to actuate the hammers (that would be cool), it does have a MIDI out to also layer other sounds along with the piano.  Another great thing about the CP-60M is that it has a nice built in EQ to make the piano pickups sound as bright or as dull as you wish.

My first Portativ / Portative / Portativo / Portable Pipe Organ!!!

 

Here is a photo of the portativ organ that I built.  The pipes were salvaged from a large organ and bought on Ebay.  Everything else was made from scratch and figured out along the way.  Originally, I had piano style keys on the keyboard, but the mechanism that I used seemed to bind the keys where they would stick open.  So I ended up just going to a simpler key.  These are simple button keys on a dowel rod that pushes a block out of the way from the pipe so that the pumped air (you can see the bellows on the back right of the instrument in the photo) can move through the pipe.  The instrument was sealed with caulking.  The first 2 times I put it together, there were leaks or problems with the mechanisms or keys.  I finally feel that it is where I would like it to be now.  The wooden pipes give a hollow steamboat sound.  The metal tabs on top of the pipes are for tuning. 

I have a second set of metal pipes that I plan to use to build a second portative organ.  I hope to use keys of some sort for that one.  If it is successful, then I may retrofit this one with keys again but for now, it works just fine.  

The downside of the buttons is that the dowel that holds them has to be pressed pretty hard and I worry about the dowel breaking if someone tried to play it and put pressure on the button at an angle.  I did see someone build a portative where there was tubing after the key and before the pipe - that method would certainly allow a more flexible key bed layout.  For mine, there is an angled piece that connects the bottom of each button to the lever on the pipe - it was rather cumbersome to make and took a lot of sanding to get things so they would not bind to the surrounding pieces.   The valve that opens and closes has a piece of cork covered in Chapstick to block the passage for air leaks.

Portativ Organs

So I have been obsessed with portative/portativ organs lately. I used to think that possibly modifying an accordion with pipes would be sufficient, but the pipes for more than a 2 octaves would end up being too bulky to be small and portable - most accordions are 3 octaves or more. The following is a video of a portativ organ, played beautifully in the perfect environment - a hall for reverberation.  This last weekend, I picked up 2 ranks of pipes to build 2 portativs that I had won in an auction - one out of 4' Tenor Celeste pipes and one out of 8' Flute pipes. Obviously, I will not be using the entire rank but only about 2 octaves. I will have to figure out a good way to make the bellows and action.

 

Semsemia, Anklung, and Gopichand

I collect, own, and play a number of musical instruments, whether electronic, electric, or acoustic.  I used a variety of acoustic instruments on my "Acoustic Selections" album.  There are a couple reviews of the album that claim that I used homemade instruments and names like semsemia, anklung, and gopichand must be made up names.  Although these words are unfamiliar to most of the western world, these are real names for instruments and not made up words.  Any of these instruments can be searched for and numerous images can be found.

The Egyptian semsemia that I have is very much out of tune and I use it more for a percussion dissonance than any type of melodic track (unless I play a single string with a glass slide).  I leave it out of tune because when I first got it, I took all the strings off and all the pegs out (I can't remember the reason that I did this, but I am sure there was one), then I must have put pegs back into the wrong slots because ever since then, some of the pegs do not grab.  I even tried the old violinist trick of using chalk to cause more friction between the peg and the hole.  No luck.  I need to just take it apart again and find the best hole for each peg.

Both the semsemia and anklung have a prominent place in the acoustic version of the song "Winter".   They can distinctly be heard on that track. 

Though I own an authentic gopichand, the one that I used and recorded with was homemade out of a metal can, wood, and a guitar string.  I authentic one uses traditional animal skin rather than the bottom of a can, but the concept and method of playing remain the same.

Acoustic Instruments Part 2: The Stroh Violin

Developed in the early 1900's and sold as early as 1911, the Strohviol, or Stroh Violin, was an attempt to increase the volume of the violin.  The one that I own is a modern copy and not an original from the 1900's, though I have seen and played an original one before.

Instead of a bridge resting on a wooden resonant body, the bridge is connected to the horn much like the phonograph needle on a Victrola is connected to its horn and the thin, tinny sound of the Strohviol is projected and directed out of the horn.   I was never a good violinist, but the violin and the cello are two of my favorite instruments, so I have this, a violin, an electric violin, and a cello in my arsenal that I sometimes attempt to play and record.

Acoustic Instruments Part 1: The Silver Queen

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I had a post about my electric autoharp a while back. Here is an acoustic autoharp that I own. I am not sure how old this one is, but it is similar to some that I have seen dated back to the late 1800's.

The unique thing about this particular autoharp, named "the Silver Queen", is that it has a drawer that slides back and forth to transpose the chords into any key and since the strings are tuned to the chromatic scale, so you can literally play any chord in any key that you wish .

Please do not email me about prices for this or any other items on my blog - for I am just sharing information and not interested in selling any of these instruments.