I am really pleased to announce that Marshall Amplification have sponsored the Super Chip Tune Samba Band, by way of several Marshall MS-4 Micro Amps. I am incredibly thankful for their contribution, it means the band can now be a full on marching band, no complicated wires and PA systems, just plug and play. More videos and pictures from the upcoming workshops soon!

Thank you so much Paul and all at Marshall Amplification.

I was fortunate to meet Allison Boggis at UCS and talk about my research the “Super Chip Tune Samba Band”, who in turn asked me to put together a short presentation for the UCS Early Years Academic Community meeting, it was nice to find out that there were other researchers interested in this area and how different all of our research is. It looks like their might be some interesting collaborations in the future.

Things are getting pretty hectic in the build up to Childhood Remixed, however I am still managing time to run some workshops. This time it’s a collaboration with The New Wolsey Theatre Creative Learning and Holywells High School. The plan is to use the green screen composite technique to put students in to a video game about students that have been shrunken down and teachers turned in to zombies. So this is gonna be good fun working with fellow project leader Laura Norman and her vast array of skills we shall be zombifying Holywells. More news an pics of the game in progress as it happens.

“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.

Today I gave a  Q&A session at the V&A it was part of the SAP Digital Design Weekend. There were loads of other events and talks by different artists like Memo Akten and Jason Bruges and the amazing Decode exhibit. I will be giving the talk again tomorrow same time same place.

I also ran a circuit bending workshop earlier that morning for NESTA as part of the idiscover programme which was really good fun and the students really enjoyed it too. They were able to create a fully working circuit bent keyboard for each of them to take home at the end of the workshop. You can listen to the sounds they made below.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

I got to give a work in progress report to the researcher at the Institute of Astronomy about the “Observations” project, and play them a few extracts from the new piece and explain some of the ideas behind the work. Although it went down well, it was pretty tough for me because I wanted to dazzle them but I had to save all the really big moments for the performances on March 12th & 13th.

I am very excited about it, it is both new and yet linked to “Obsolete?” rhythmically in places.  The events on the 12th & 13th are free and are at the Sackler Lecture Theatre, Institute of Astronomy, Cambridge between 7:30pm and 9:00pm which includes a performance and Q&A afterwards.

A lot of public talking today about four hours actually! Two events. First up was a visit to ATM Norwich which I am a patron of to talk about chip tune music, circuit bending with some level three students, who asked some very good questions and showed some good lateral thinking with regards to their own music. Secondly was “Decent Exposure” a Q & A on how to deal with the press, I was on a panel with Wendy Roby of Drowned in Sound, Bob Patterson of BPA Live Agency, Bobbi Coppen of All About Promotions and Alex Mann of the Musicians Union. It was very nice to do something for the Musicians Union, who have been very supportive of me in the past. Again good questions were asked and the crowd enjoyed the evening.

Two days in a row I did a Q&A with two different schools the Academy of St.Francis of Assisi and Holly Lodge Girls College and others at FACT, it was great some good questions coming out of the students, I demonstrated circuit bending, discussed “Obsolete?” and did a short mini-gig where the participants could ask questions in between songs about how and what I was doing to create the music.

Photos courtesy of Anna Kronenburg and Louise Latter @ FACT, Liverpool

Today I did a Computer Graphics Workshop with two different schools the Academy of St.Francis of Assisi and Holly Lodge Girls College at FACT, Liverpool as part of the current Space Invaders exhibition. They were a fantastic group, so good in fact we even had time to make sound effects for the game as well. The space was perfect as we could beam the game on a huge cinema screen as we were making it.

The game will be all edited and back to them in a week for them to play on in school and at home. Next up tonight “An Evening With Pixelh8” all sold out!!!