Technology which seems odd today

[Dave2002]

I found this article about the Mellotron - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mellotron

The notion of having notes generated by pressing tapes against a capstan seems very odd today. I’m amazed it appears to have worked. Presumably the tapes wore out over time, or even broke, making some notes unreliable or unplayable.

Was this one of the first instruments to use pitched samples?

Maybe there are other examples of strange technology from previous years. I found another one not too long ago, but not music related. That is the speed/power regulation on a Kenwood Chef mixer, which uses electromechanical switching - and seems to work up to the point where the machines become erratic or perhaps too noisy in operation, or at very high speeds.I would expect such a method of electrical power control to generate horrible electrical interference.

[MrGongGong]

Plenty of folks still using Mellotrons these days
and lots of interest in the instruments https://www.mellotron.com

The principle is very old, the Hurdy Gurdy has been around for a long time !

Not sure if it was the first instrument to use "samples" though ?

If you are interested in this kind of stuff
Tom Richards is worth checking out (along with many others!)

http://minioramics.blogspot.com

[cloughie]

The principle is very old, the Hurdy Gurdy has been around for a long time !

Not sure if it was the first instrument to use "samples" though ?

...and of course George Martin used the jumbled up bits of tape of fairground organ in ‘For the benefit of Mr Kite’ on Sgt Pepper! A random melletron?

[Richard Barrett]

Plenty of folks still using Mellotrons these days

Yes, it's amazing how some people prefer old, heavy, complicated, unreliable and expensive machines to using contemporary technology...

[MrGongGong]

Yes, it's amazing how some people prefer old, heavy, complicated, unreliable and expensive machines to using contemporary technology...

Yes, it's totally bonkers
I've got a set of S950 discs which would dispense with this entirely

[Richard Barrett]

I've got a set of S950 discs which would dispense with this entirely

They wouldn't really of course, because that slab of wood and metal with strings stretched over it is a highly sophisticated piece of technology developed together with its repertoire and its playing techniques over a couple of centuries - whereas a Mellotron is a primitive device invented to do something that the technology of the time wasn't yet capable of doing, and was completely superseded by your S950 (or an EPS16 in my case). People getting interested in Mellotrons in 2019 is really just gear fetishism, they're the same kind of people that think if you have a roomful of modular spaghetti you don't need an imagination!

[MrGongGong]

They wouldn't really of course, because that slab of wood and metal with strings stretched over it is a highly sophisticated piece of technology developed together with its repertoire and its playing techniques over a couple of centuries - whereas a Mellotron is a primitive device invented to do something that the technology of the time wasn't yet capable of doing, and was completely superseded by your S950 (or an EPS16 in my case). People getting interested in Mellotrons in 2019 is really just gear fetishism, they're the same kind of people that think if you have a roomful of modular spaghetti you don't need an imagination!

Dangerous talk Richard

I did a gig in Nottingham in January where one chap had a Mellotron BUT he was putting it through so much Eurorack stuff that it was hard to hear the distinctive sound.

[Bryn]

. . . People getting interested in Mellotrons in 2019 is really just gear fetishism, they're the same kind of people that think if you have a roomful of modular spaghetti you don't need an imagination!

I bet such people put the results out on vinyl, too.

[Richard Barrett]

I bet such people put the results out on vinyl, too.

No doubt.

[Beresford]

In the 1950's there was a method for halving the electrical power to heaters etc by putting the mains through a big diode (?) which in effect chopped off the lower half of the sine wave. But it meant the average voltage wasn't zero any more, putting DC on the mains, and buzz on audio transformers. Eventually it was banned.

[cloughie]

Yes, it's amazing how some people prefer old, heavy, complicated, unreliable and expensive machines to using contemporary technology...

Hipp rock?

[Richard Barrett]

Hipp rock?

Way back in the 1980s, a friend of mine, the composer Glyn Perrin, was assisting in a performance in London of Steve Reich's Four Organs which was to be attended by the composer. When he turned up to a final rehearsal SR was extremely annoyed to see that the organists were using Yamaha DX7 synthesizers instead of the (notoriously unreliable and even then hard-to-find) Farfisa electric organs the music was written for. Don't worry, said Glyn, I've programmed these keyboards so you won't tell the difference. And after a lot of harrumphing, SR eventually had to admit that they sounded as close to the original as made no odds. Nowadays the excellent French firm Arturia makes a software version of the Farfisa which reproduces its sound with quite uncanny precision, including the hum (which can now be turned off!). You can download the software for not very much cash, instead of searching around for an instrument that's probably in bad condition, plug in your MIDI keyboard and you're back to the 1960s Reich/Glass sound... that is progress surely.

[MrGongGong]

Way back in the 1980s, a friend of mine, the composer Glyn Perrin, was assisting in a performance in London of Steve Reich's Four Organs which was to be attended by the composer. When he turned up to a final rehearsal SR was extremely annoyed to see that the organists were using Yamaha DX7 synthesizers instead of the (notoriously unreliable and even then hard-to-find) Farfisa electric organs the music was written for. Don't worry, said Glyn, I've programmed these keyboards so you won't tell the difference. And after a lot of harrumphing, SR eventually had to admit that they sounded as close to the original as made no odds. Nowadays the excellent French firm Arturia makes a software version of the Farfisa which reproduces its sound with quite uncanny precision, including the hum (which can now be turned off!). You can download the software for not very much cash, instead of searching around for an instrument that's probably in bad condition, plug in your MIDI keyboard and you're back to the 1960s Reich/Glass sound... that is progress surely.

Hummm I'm not 100% convinced
one of the most disappointing gigs I have been to in the last 10 years was Pauline Oliveros playing with a Max Patch version of her tape system

History (and music history in particular) isn't always a process of improvement
having said that i'm just off to the airport to fly to Porto to do some gigs which in the past would have needed a transit van full of gear and i'm going Ryanair (not my first choice)

[cloughie]

Way back in the 1980s, a friend of mine, the composer Glyn Perrin, was assisting in a performance in London of Steve Reich's Four Organs which was to be attended by the composer. When he turned up to a final rehearsal SR was extremely annoyed to see that the organists were using Yamaha DX7 synthesizers instead of the (notoriously unreliable and even then hard-to-find) Farfisa electric organs the music was written for. Don't worry, said Glyn, I've programmed these keyboards so you won't tell the difference. And after a lot of harrumphing, SR eventually had to admit that they sounded as close to the original as made no odds. Nowadays the excellent French firm Arturia makes a software version of the Farfisa which reproduces its sound with quite uncanny precision, including the hum (which can now be turned off!). You can download the software for not very much cash, instead of searching around for an instrument that's probably in bad condition, plug in your MIDI keyboard and you're back to the 1960s Reich/Glass sound... that is progress surely.

I assume that 60s Hammond users such as Georgie Fame, Alan Price, Zoot Money and Brian Auger are happy with the recreated sound they get from modern synths. Lightness, reliability and versatility obvious bonuses!

[Richard Barrett]

Hummm I'm not 100% convinced
one of the most disappointing gigs I have been to in the last 10 years was Pauline Oliveros playing with a Max Patch version of her tape system

Should have involved a better programmer...