I am beginning to like Sundays, early start wander in to town to car boot sale and purchase toys to circuit bend over the course of the day. I bought this amazing toy guitar for 20p / 50 cents, it didn’t work when I got it home so I opened it up and found the speaker had some rusting and damage so I replaced it from another to and added in an audio jack and a severe 1M potentiometer pitch bend which is nice. Put it all back together and shazzzzam another toy for “An Apple A day”.

“An Apple A Day” is an attempt to circuit bend / automate one toy everyday for a month, up a maximum of 31 toys, all of which will be accessible as musical instruments for the public to play, perform and record in their own music.

Childrens’ toys are often seen as transitional objects that let the child gain mastery of the world around them. Paradoxically “Childhood Remixed” seeks to re-purpose the toys of Pixelh8’s childhood with the skills and understanding of the world he has as an adult. By rewiring, re-purposing and re-using them he will essentially be remixing his own childhood to form an orchestra of automated toys and interactive instruments.

Scouring the local car boot sales, charity shops and in some cases rubbish bins, Pixelh8 was able to reclaim some of the toys that informed him musically and creatively as a child, by re-working them with new acquired skills it will in turn create a learning curve that folds back on itself.

Childhood Remixed was commissioned by Ipswich Borough Council & Turnstone Arts Grants sponsor Ip-art Award 2007- 2010 and will be on display in Town Hall Galleries from May 29th to July 12th as part of the Ip-art festival.

“An Apple A Day” is an attempt to circuit bend / automate one toy everyday for a month, up a maximum of 31 toys, all of which will be accessible as musical instruments for the public to play, perform and record in their own music.

Childrens’ toys are often seen as transitional objects that let the child gain mastery of the world around them. Paradoxically “Childhood Remixed” seeks to re-purpose the toys of Pixelh8’s childhood with the skills and understanding of the world he has as an adult. By rewiring, re-purposing and re-using them he will essentially be remixing his own childhood to form an orchestra of automated toys and interactive instruments.

Scouring the local car boot sales, charity shops and in some cases rubbish bins, Pixelh8 was able to reclaim some of the toys that informed him musically and creatively as a child, by re-working them with new acquired skills it will in turn create a learning curve that folds back on itself.

Childhood Remixed was commissioned by Ipswich Borough Council & Turnstone Arts Grants sponsor Ip-art Award 2007- 2010 and will be on display in Town Hall Galleries from May 29th to July 12th as part of the Ip-art festival.

On January 31st, 2010 I ran a day long workshop at FACT, Liverpool, teaching people how to use the “SUPER CHIP TUNE SAMBA BAND” software, the new software is made to encourage people to perform chip tune music together in groups. The day long session included an introduction to chip tune music, why and how I made the software, the rehearsal and the performance by the participants. The software was designed to mimic the sounds of a samba band albeit a very chip tune samba band with a Sirdu, Caixa, Rep, Ganza and an Agogo, and utilising the participants existing hand-eye coordination, muscle memory and general video game playing skills to learn new and additional musical skills.

You can read my paper on it below, the research forms part of my Masters Degree at the Centre for Design Innovation, University Suffolk College, UK.

Cultural perceptions, ownership and interaction with re-purposed musical instruments

The event has attracted international press here and here thanks to Wired & GeekDad.

The feedback from the workshop was very very positive and some nice stories about families coming together for the event to make music. Very pleased that they really took to the idea of creating something with the DS instead of just being a passive consumer of it. I also gave them copies of SUPER CHIP TUNE SAMBA BAND and Music Tech Master Stroke so they can go away and make there own music. minus the conclusion which I will write up next week.

This event forms part of FACTs “Space Invaders: Art and the Computer Game Environment” season and is delivered in partnership with Netherlands Media Art Institution, Amsterdam. Special thanks to all staff at FACT and special thanks to Anna Kronenburg for organising the event.

“Beat Unboxed” is a real time musical toy sequencer, allows people to sequence some of the crazy toys in the exhibition. Using an Arduino, a PC, lots of relays, toys and Processing, simply clicking on the the various colour blocks you can trigger off different sounds in this 16-step sequencer to make up your own songs with. Be sure to also check out Warranty Void a circuit bent NES you can play and bend at the same time.

Childrens’ toys are often seen as transitional objects that let the child gain mastery of the world around them. Paradoxically “Childhood Remixed” seeks to re-purpose the toys of Pixelh8′s childhood with the skills and understanding of the world he has as an adult. By rewiring, re-purposing and re-using them he will essentially be remixing his own childhood to form an orchestra of automated toys and interactive instruments.

Scouring the local car boot sales, charity shops and in some cases rubbish bins, Pixelh8 was able to reclaim some of the toys that informed him musically and creatively as a child, by re-working them with new acquired skills it will in turn create a learning curve that folds back on itself.

Childhood Remixed was commissioned by Ipswich Borough Council & Turnstone Arts Grants sponsor Ip-art Award 2007- 2010 and will be on display in Town Hall Galleries from May 29th to July 12th as part of the Ip-art festival.