BuzzBird

 Sound examples (mp3):

  Birding
  Buzzing

BuzzBird

My first curcuit-bent instrument. A MusicTime "keytar" with organ and piano sound, vibrato and 10 demo-tunes and a crude record-and-playback 'sequencer'. The pitchbend wheel was not functioning when I got the keyboard. The most characteristic bended sounds of this instrument reminds of chirping and buzzing, hence the name BuzzBird. Painted but still needs a cool logo.

Circuit bends

Body contacts: Bridging the two body contact spikes with a finger gives an extremely sensitive pitchbend up. A third body contact - a brass rail in front of the keybord - gives moderate pitchbend when touched together with one of the spikes. My idea with the railshaped body contact was, that you could touch it with your right hand while playing the keyboard.

Vibrato pushbuttons: The two buttons adds vibrato. One with constant the other with fading intensity. (the effect is affected by other settings, swith some combinations they choke the output)

Pitch/speed control: Adjust pitch and playback speed of demo tunes or recorded sequences. A slideswitch lets the pitch/speed control be bypassed. A trimmer resitor in line with the potentiometer (turnable with a small screwdriver) lets you set the lowest pitch/speed for the potentiometer.

Distortion: The toggles switches on two different bends, that gives different kinds of distortion, depending on their combination and other settings.