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Eigenharp

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Eigenharp

Eigenharp is a brand of electronic instrument made by Eigenlabs, a company based in Devon, UK, invented by John Lambert and released in 2009 after developing it for eight years. The "instrument" is in essence a highly flexible and portable controller, with the sound being actually generated in the software it drives.

Characteristics of all of the instruments are:

  • A matrix of velocity sensitive multi-expressive keys, each of which act like a 6-way analog joystick. This allows the simultaneous pitch bend and modulation (or other parameters) of each played note individually.
  • A stick-like vertical form factor akin to a sitar for the larger models or a flute in the smaller ones.
  • A built-in wind controller, giving the larger versions of the instrument an appearance similar to a bassoon.
  • One or two ribbon controller strips.
  • The software is available as open-source under the GPLv3 and runs both on Macintosh and Windows.

    • Additionally, the larger models have:

  • A series of percussion keys
  • A built-in step sequencer with indicator LEDs for each key.
  • A headphone amplifier with an output on the instrument

    • Models

    The instrument comes in three models: Alpha, Tau, and Pico, in decreasing order of size. Each has a breath-pipe, a key matrix (120, 72, and 18) and a ribbon controller. The Alpha and Tau also have 12 percussion keys each, a second ribbon controller, and headphone output. The Alpha also has microphone preamplifier with an input on the instrument.

    References

    Eigenharp Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA