Original friction plate

This is how our first prototype of the simple friction drum looked like:

SOURCE

It's a copper plate divided into five rectangular shapes, each one connected to MPR121 Capacitive Touch Sensor and then to Raspberry Pi.

New sounds

Strange Sounds:



Ode of Joy:



Fun:

All the friction 'bout that drum

This summer I've been given a nice opportunity to work on interesting musical project at my school's Laboratory of Computer Graphics and Multimedia. You probably heard or at least saw this instrument once in your life:

It's a friction drum, an instrument used most commonly in folk music. It consists of a membrane stretched over a sound box and the sound comes from vibration that is achieved by friction.

Here you can listen to the sound of friction bass I recorded.

Laboratory's idea was to create a similar but electrical instrument using cheap and simple electronics.

And this is the result!

I'm gonna post more project's details in the next days. Stay tuned. :)