The world is full of geniuses that are happy to tinker away in their garages, sheds, and basements, quietly building amazing things that the world never sees. When those people pass, their creations often end up in landfills, because well-meaning family members simply don’t recognize what they see. But every now and then we get lucky. That was the case with a collection of unique instruments found and rescued by Lucien Nunes and now Sam Battle. As part of his quest to restore that collection, Battle resurrected a DIY bell-banging instrument with modern MIDI control.
This instrument came from the estate of one Mr. Stockdale from Leeds, who had assembled a very interesting assortment of instruments. That included two very rare Compton organs, but also several DIY instruments of Stockdale’s own design. The world is fortunate that those were recognized by Lucien Nunes and are now in the hands of Battle, who is one of the few people in the world that can both understand what makes them special and can get them working.
There are many DIY instruments in that collection, but Battle’s most recent video is about one particular example that is a bit like a huge automatic glockenspiel. It is a percussion instrument with wood mallets that bang on metal tubes. Large solenoids actuate those mallets and Battle’s goal was to modernize their control so the instrument could live on.
That is exactly the kind of work that Battle does and he already designed a MIDI controller board in the past to work with a church organ. That has a Teensy++ 2.0 microcontroller development board that accepts MIDI input and toggles power to connected solenoids. Battle was able to use that board, without any modifications needed, to control this tubular bell instrument. With this, Battle can play music with any MIDI input device or a computer.
But part of Battle’s job was also to make the instrument available for the world to enjoy in his THIS MUSEUM IS NOT OBSOLETE space in Kent. The instrument was originally mounted directly onto a shed wall and was never intended to be transported, so Battle had to construct a new frame to accommodate it. He made that with little more than some plywood, a circular saw, and paint in a lovely shade of blue.
Now you can hear it for yourself on tracks that Battle recorded or see it at THIS MUSEUM IS NOT OBSOLETE.
