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The Rearticulated Piano (2017)



Mutant piano instrument at the Bijou. Image by Dirk Hugo

Iron and steel sculpture and instrument and accompanying performance in collaboration with Daniel Bruce Gray, presented at the 12th Edge of Wrong festival 2017, Cape Town.

A discarded baby grand piano’s iron frame provided a structure upon which we could build various rudimentary idiophones, chordophones and membranophones, resulting in a sculpture that could be struck, bowed or blown into to make sound. Daniel and I collected materials from scrap yards, steel suppliers and music teachers. We designed the sculpture together, discovering principles of acoustic sound production through basic research combined with trial and error. Daniel completed most of the construction in his workshop. For the performance, we placed the sculpture adjacent to a grand piano and amplified it with contact microphones, which were connected to samplers and other hardware units. We performed a 20 minute improvised piece on the two “pianos.”
 



Daniel at EOW. Image by Dirk Hugo


Coila at EOW. Image by Dirk Hugo


Daniel at EOW. Image by Dirk Hugo

Since neither of us have studio space any longer, the instrument has been kindly adopted by Crain Soudien, as a sculpture for his garden in Athlone, Cape Town. 

In the garden