The Uberorgan is pretty much what it sounds like: a huge organ that looks like … well … a bunch of huge organs.
It’s the creation of artist Tim Hawkinson. It isn’t an instrument so much as it’s sort of a performance installation; it “plays” “music”:
“Several bus-size biomorphic balloons, each with its horn tuned to a different in the octave, make up a walk-in self-playing organ. A 200 foot-long scroll of dots and dashes encodes a musical score of old hymns, pop classics, and improvisational ditties. This score is deciphered by the organ’s brain – a bank of light sensitive switches – and then reinterpreted by a series of switches and relays that translate the original patterns into non-repeating variations of the score.”
In other words, it makes sounds. Click through to that link up there at the top of the post and feast your ears on two samples of the Uberorgan’s music. It sounds like whale songs, actually. I wonder if I can get a CD of it?
A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character comes across a gigantic version of an ordinary musical instrument.
MA
Jane
April 24, 2014 at 9:38amI used to go to a sandwich shop which called itself “Subs” i think. Just delicious roast beast on a sub bun. This was back when the meat was sliced off a roast, for real. Somewhere downtown, off to the side of the main streets, this shop was a shotgun, high-ceilinged, walls torn back to the brick, etc. old-fashioned/modern, cool place to eat.
One day, I go in and find a genuine, elderly upright piano which was playing itself! Yes, it took quarters! It played tunes from a music roll. You couldn’t pick whihc ones. All you could do was get it rolling.
Nice 😉
Marian Allen
April 24, 2014 at 10:04amThere used to be a sammich shop on Bardstown, not far from Eastern Parkway, that had a player piano. Oh! And I just remembered that my Aunt Rose’s piano had player piano capability, unless I totally dreamed that. lol
Teresa Cypher
April 24, 2014 at 11:41amNeat. I’d never before heard of it. It sounds incredible! 🙂 There’s something so cool about musical instruments that step away from the typical.
Marian Allen
April 24, 2014 at 1:06pmThat’s one of the many reasons I loved P.D.Q. Bach concerts. They had instruments like the left-handed sewer flute. lol