Godfried-Willem Raes
Musical Robots and Automatons

Programmable modular pipe and reed organs

• Bourdonola (automated pipeorgan, flue pipes, bass, 1995)
• Harma (an automated reed organ. 2000/2005)
• Harmo (a large automated reed organ. 2009/2010)
• Melauton (an automated melodica, 1998/2017)
• Piperola (automated pipeorgan, flue pipes, soprano)
• Vox humanola (automated pipeorgan, vox humana, 1995-2005)
• Trump (automated organ trumpet, 1999-2004)
• Puff (quartertone puff-organ, 2004-2010)
• Ake (automated accordion, 2003-2008)
• Qt (quartertone organ, 2005-2007)
• Krum (automated pipeorgan, reed pipes, 2005-2006)
• Bako (automated bass accordion, 2006-2007)
• Bomi (automated pipeorgan, closed wood pipes, 2010)
• Hybr (hybrid electroacoustic organ using membrane driven pipes, 2014/2015)
• HybrHi (treble electroacoustic organ using membrane driven pipes (2015)
• HybrLo (subbas electroacoustic organ using membrane driven pipes (2016)
  
• Klaks (under construction)
  Pi (extreme diskant buzzer driven pipe organ, 2017)

Slagwerk - automated percussion

• Klung (automated brass angklung, 1998 - 2006)
• Rotomoton (five automated rototoms, 2000 - 2007)
• Springers (automated siren, shakers and springs, 2000)
• ThunderWood (automated 'nature' noises, 2000/2010)
• Troms (automated drums, 2000 / 2004)
• Vibi (automated vibraphone)
• Belly (automated carillon, 2001-2006)
• Flex (automated singing saws, 2002-2016)
• Tubi (automated quartertone tubophone, 3 octaves, 2004)
• Llor (twelve large automated stainless steel shell-bells, 2005)
• Vacca (48 automated cow bells, 2005)
• Casta uno 1(15 castanets, integrated in Vox Humanola)
• Casta due (16 castanets, 2007)
• Vitello (36 automated cow bells, 2006)
• Psch (12 small thundersheet noise generators, 2006)
• Snar (an automated snare drum, 2006)
• Xy (an automated quartertone xylophone, 2007)
• Simba (a cymbal playing robot, 2007)
• HAT (a hit anything robot, 2009)
• Temblo (an automated set of 12 chinese temple blocks, 2013)
• Rodo (an automated set of clamped brass rods with radar sensors, 2014-2017)
• Snar_2 (an improved automated snare drum, 2014)
• Tinti (high pitched indian bells, 2015)
• Chi (bronze chimes with ultrasonic demodulation, 2016)

Stringed Instruments

• Player piano (piano vorsetzer #1, 1994)
• PP2 (piano vorsetzer #2, now with pedal, 2005/2016)
• Hurdy (2 stringed automated bass hurdy gurdy, 2004/2007)
• Aeio (aeolian cello, 2007-2014)
• Spiro (automated spinet, 2011)
• Ribby (ribbon-string instrument, 2012, under construction)
• Synchrochord (synchronously driven monochord, 2011-2014)
• Zi (automated 38 string Qanun zither, 2014-2017) under construction

Wind Instruments (Monophonic)

• Autosax (an automated saxophone, 1989 - 2009)
• So (tuba playing robot, 2003-2007)
• Bono (automated valve trombone, 2007-2010)
• Heli (automated helicon, 2007-2008)
• Korn (automated cornet, 2008-2010)
• Ob (automated oboe, 2008-2010)
• Fa (automated bassoon, 2009-2011)
• Klar (automated klarinet, 2012)
• Horny (automated horn, 2013)
• Asa (automated alto saxophone, 2013)
• Bug (automated flugelhorn, 2016-2017)

Others

• Bell tryptych (sound sculpture, 1970-1972)
• Sirene (interactive sound sculpture, 1986)
• Dripper (dripping automat, 2002 - 2005)
• Raspa (automated precision ratchet, 2004 - 2015) under construction
• Sire (24 sirens, 2005)
• Toypi (automated chromatic 35 note toy piano, 2008)
• PolyMetronome (an automated polyrhythmic conductor, 1994/2012)
• Whisper (automated set of cavity resonators, 2013)
• Rumo (automated intonarumori, 2014-2015) under construction
• Balmec: Robotic instruments for George Antheil's Ballet Mecanique (airplane propellers, electric bell robot, siren... five modules)(2014-2015)
  • Prop1
  • Prop2
  • Prop3
  • Bello
  • Balsi
    

Information

• CD Release: <Automaton> (LPD007)
• CD Release: <M&M> (LPD008)
• CD Release <More Automats> (LPD012)
• CD <Machine Orchestra> (LPD013)
• CD <Robodies> (LPD14)
• CD <Lonely Robots> (LPD19)
• Godfried-Willem Raes' instruments catalogue
• The Logos <M&M> Orchestra (<Man and Machine>)
• Het houten been alleen op stap (notes on automation, in Dutch)
• Expression control in musical robots (the most exhaustive technical article I wrote sofar on this topic)
• Composers guide to the robot orchestra (a popular users guide)