Give a harmonica to a kid. What do they do with it? First, they breathe in and out of it, using a number of holes corresponding to the width of their mouth. Later, if they are imaginative, they learn arpeggios, sliding the harmonica quickly to the right and left. How many of them, though, make it to the point of controlling tongue placement and embouchure necessary to play single notes? Or discovering the pattern of blows and draws necessary to play a scale? The answer is, very few. They will move onto the next toy in their toy box before that happens.
Compare that to a piano. Kids discover quickly that a single key plays a single note, that moving to the right raises the pitch and moving to the left lowers it. They also learn how to play melodies on the piano by ear quickly, though they may start on the wrong note, making the melody eerily modal.
Suggesting it’s never about the device…is a bit too “bootstraps” for my taste. Reminds me of the Peanuts comic strip where Charlie Brown asks Schroeder how he’s able to play such complicated piano music when the black keys are just painted on. Schroeder’s answer: “Practice.”
I could certainly switch my AR for this Chorda and some people in my family wouldn’t even notice it’s a different “toy”. As long as I’m not playing a “real” instrument, say guitar or piano, it’s not “real” music and I’m not a “real” musician. sigh. (tbf, they might feel like Chorda is a bit more like an instrument! and no sequencer for real? Am I supposed to record loop in time? )
I’m not really sure I understood your angle but it feels like a good old “sampling is cheating” debate but at a different level.
I would be interested in an article explaining the cognitive effects these tools could have on a kid if used to introduce them to the art of creating music compared to different “traditional” instruments. My first thoughts would be: positive only (grow from there) but is it really?
a need for instant gratification making them less prone to succeed in learning instruments that require more time (guitar sucks, it hurts my fingers!!). Hence, instead of unlocking their creativity, you could hinder their capacity to stay focus on something and be creative (reducing their capacity to learn at school too?).
force them into a musical framework (no wrong notes, a certain scale…) that could be hard to let go
create gear horders? (because of a “it’s the gear, not the man” mentality?)
I know shit about this kind of things so I’m certainly wrong on all points but that would be an interesting read!
This Chorda seems cool! I could certainly sample some happy accidents and go from there but then I remember that I hate managing samples and sampling, too hard for me to handle.
Well that’s true and playing piano steers you in a different direction from say playing a guitar… so there will always be a notion of that, but to me it feels like the more a device is “create expert songs in no time” the more narrow it is in that aspect.
exactly my thoughts. The device itself is what it is. Its an object, it cannot have the properties of “good” or “bad” until we the consumers assign those values. A big part why we assign those qualifiers is: “Did this device do what I expected it to do”. Ofc those expectations are influenced by everything we read (true or not) about it. Manufactures know and understand this VERY well, and spend oodles of money trying to shape your expectations to secure a sale. Once you hand over your cash, whether or not the expectation is met is irrelevant, you own it.
I think that if people would be more objective and read manuals, and watch tutorials, and really think about what the device can/should do for them in a realistic way, put in some research leg work, and suppress the knee jerk emotional reaction to advertisements, then I think that a lot of these products wouldn’t get the bad wrap they do.
As I said a big part is the aggressive targeted marketing, but that is driven by profit so it wont change, so it leaves us to be responsible for our own happiness i guess.
My take on the promo was consumerism at its finest.
I don’t see the shortcut angle or instant gratification angle either. I see a company interested in selling as many as they can.
Yeah you can make music with anything, so it could still be useful. I thought Orba was a crap cash grab and tried unsuccessfully to talk a few out of buying it, even though, yeah it can still make noise. So does banging on a sink, and that’s cheaper.
Roli and now Lumi were created to cash in on the desire of everyday people that want to play music, or to feel like they could if they bought their products.
Obviously, musicians could also use their products, but their target was bigger than just musicians.
I think some people might be misreading what OP is saying. He was mostly talking about the personal fulfillment that the musician feels using an instrument, not necessarily talking about gatekeeping, sampling and open mindedness. I agree that the Chorda will probably end up being boring for most people, but maybe it will fit into the lives of some people.
On the other hand, if we wanna turn the convo to “what is art,” tons of great music has been made using shortcuts. At a certain point it’s like, you’re having so much fun and you’re so relaxed as a musician, that you no longer care about other artists’ standards for virtuosity, so you release this: Gorillaz hit song 'Clint Eastwood' revealed to be keyboard preset
so idk, definitely possible to find gold in toy instruments. I just don’t think most people who buy the Chorda are going to feel as good as the people in the ad.
I don’t think there’s a misreading, but an observation of what someone can take from reading an article that suggests what is premised with instant gratification and short cuts.
That may not be the intent, but gate keeping is one way of interpreting it.
I do think there is an oddly bad mental state people get put in with these sorts of gadgets making music “easy”, people tend to turn off or limit there creativity with the device. In a weird way the marketing that seems to make them sell well also seems to make people give up on the devices creatively.
This guy a bamboo flute that plays one note and his voice makes something moving.
I am sure orba or chorda offers more options than a one note flute right? I suppose it doesn’t change that people seem locked into what it can do for them instead of what they can do with it when pushed to the extreme.
feels almost like a moot point because like nearly any other thing on kickstarter, it will be a flash in the pan. i dont think these kinds of music gadgets really matter because they will only exist to a very small population of people and then fade away into obscurity. no significant impact will be made. this is the economy of kickstarter/indiegogo.
to further exaggerate your point, I became interested in a kickstarter project/ product a few years ago and almost threw money at it. yesterday, after wondering what ever happened with it, I found evidence that the project had raised $94,000 USD and still has not delivered to peoples ferocious cries of scam. meanwhile, kickstarter is deleting comments of angered investors for, I don’t even know what reason. I think that kickstarter could use a little bit of gatekeeping, but that may be an unpopular opinion as there have been some good things to come of it in the arts and entertainment industry regarding game and movie releases. however, kickstarter musical instrument campaigns tend to be a shitshow.
it seems like a really cool product but I don’t know why it would take 7 years to release…
This was the motivation for my original comment in this thread
sometimes I question the legitimacy of claims that a company can provide what they promise at the price they promise more than the legitimacy of the instruments they are promising to deliver. I’d love to see a strum controller, it’s hard to play strummed guitar sounds on a keyboard - you can buy a soundpack of strumming chords, but it doesn’t allow you to nuance the timing the way I like to. I used to record individual notes and space them how I want but it’s a pain in the rear. if a real, inexpensive strum controller came along, I’d consider it.
I think it is entirely possible, but the problem is to be successful in this you need to have a lot, A LOT of capital upfront. Takes money to make it and to be efficient about it.
So through the lens of “can a couple of broke college dudes with brains actually develop, produce, and deliver”…no. Its happened but, generally, no. Especially with niche products like those in question.
But there are many instances of small upstarts run and managed by experienced professionals with money to throw around that have started with a core product that was highly successful and ended up growing beyond a start up. Its rare though.
excellent example. thats why i always put those conditions on my statements lol. You can never say never, and im certianly not trying to discourage people from taking their shot, its just the realistic cynic in me that emphasizes the huge task it is to do this.
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