21 Ways of Looking at Things
Sound Instruments Designed by Bart Hopkin
Audio CD with 4-page booklet. Published by Experimental Musical Instruments, 2007
This is the newer of two audio CDs featuring instruments made by Bart Hopkin. The style of the other one, Instrumentarium Hopkinis, is more familiar in terms of melody, harmony, rhythm, grooves. This one, while equally musical, is a bit more textural and atmospheric. It contains 21 pieces featuring dozens of very diverse instruments ranging from unusual to scarcely imaginable, including gurgle flutes, plosives, flex short strings, steady-on-stainless, mild steel, string-on-tine, trillium harp, stroked zither, formant changer, and many more. Those names won’t mean much to you if you haven’t yet heard the instruments, so let me just say that they’re surprising and flavorful throughout, with moods ranging from sweet to obnoxious. You can hear several audio samples below.
Tracks included:
Mild Steel & Cube
Steady on Stainless & Twist String Harp
Trillium Harp and Flex Short Strings
Mvet-Like Thing and Venusian Voices 1:37
Not Lincoln Park 2
Metallophones
Cellophane
Bells & Music Box Innards
Woodkal, String-on-Tine, Dual Slide Whistle
Harmonic Zither & Elastic Zither
Stroked Zither & Gurgle Flutes
Wetter Bird
Speaker Driver and Formant Changer
Tubulon & Dual Slide Whistle
Xylophones & Trillium Harp
Interrupted Recorder & Rumba Box
Short Strings & Sleigh Bells
Aquavina & Cowbells
Plosives
Not Lincoln Park 1
Trombone Bell
For digital download, you can go to iTunes, CD Baby, or other download services.
Excerpts from 21 Ways of looking at Things