Fantastic Music Machine
My friend Ruthie sent this awhile back. When I finally got around to watching, I was blown away!
Watch it first, then read on!
According to several YouTube subscribers, here’s a description of the contraption:
This incredible machine was built as a collaborative effort between the Robert M. Trammell Music Conservatory and the Sharon Wick School of Engineering at the University of Iowa . Amazingly, 97% of the machines components came from John Deere Industries and Irrigation Equipment of Bancroft Iowa , yes farm equipment!
It took the team a combined 13,029 hours of set-up, alignment, calibration, and tuning before filming this video but as you can see it was WELL worth the effort. It is now on display in the Matthew Gerhard Alumni Hall at the University and is already slated to be donated to the Smithsonian.
I did a quick “urban legend” search on Snopes.com, and found that it is (not surprisingly) computer generated.
So, unfortunately, the Fantastic Music Machine is fantastically fictional.
But, oh, so cool!
If you’re interested in seeing the creators and/or more videos like it, click here.
If you want to see the whole thing in its 3:49 sec entirety, click here.
Filed under: General, Catbird, Random Thoughts on December 21st, 2006
Hey Cathy -
There’s a meme that’s been going around to reveal 5 things about yourself that people wouldn’t know. My wife reads your blog all the time and I thought I’d tag someone she was interested in so I hope you join the fray.
I think our connection to you would be via the Hersman’s - I grew up with Erik in Africa.
I was all set to send this to Dad when I saw that it was made of John Deere parts. He would have quickly set me straight. On second look, even I realized that those weren’t John Deere parts–wrong color! But it was still cool (would have been much cooler if it was from tractor parts)!