I build the WORLD'S LONGEST monochord (probably)
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- Опубликовано: 22 окт 2023
- Second episode of my dan bau series, go watch the first one here :
• My own version of the ...
the dan bau is a one string zither from Vietnam played with harmonics and bends with a unique technique and sound, I explore this idea to create new instruments. There will be other episodes!
I made a sample pack for my Patreon page, you can support the channel and get access to my ebook and exclusive content here:
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I'm Nicolas Bras, musician and homemade instruments builder, on this channel you will find tutorials, compositions, building projects, improvisations, live concerts
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Find my music on nicolasbras.bandcamp.com
Music :
Nicolas Bras - Guyane, Homemade (album)
Nicolas Bras - Mouth Violin (unedited)
Nicolas Bras - Very Long Dan Bau (unedited)
Nicolas Bras - Multisoufflant, Homemade (album)
Sandrine Morais, Nicolas Bras : Video edition 
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Wouldn't piano strings work better? This is incredible.
I think they are such high tension that building a frame to support them would be a lot of work
@@EchoBuildsThings The thinnest piano string you can find is basically the same as the thinnest guitar string (0.2mm or 0.008"). It's just a steel wire, after all
Harp strings might also be an option.
was just thinking this .
Why not start with a piano and modify it into a multiple dan bau instrument?
Metal suppliers will sell big rolls of spring steel wire in any gauge. And it's cheap. Sometimes it's called "music wire" because it's the same alloy they use for piano strings, and maybe also guitar.
Back in 1975 I built a 300' electric guitar with 0.80" music wire between the balconies of a college dorm at U.C.S.D. It was awesome.
@@prentrodgersthat's so sick. Apocryphal story from my engineering school. One time some students got into the maintenance tunnels. The campus is all hills so the buildings are anchored to uphill foundations with giant cables. They found the resonant mode of these cables and hit them with a sledgehammer in time. The geology department thought it was an earthquake!
Weights on a strings (where you tie them) completely mess up overtones but make crazy sounds) Piano string or double bass string would produce clean overtones being long enough, or just look for spring steel wire as already suggested in the comments. As a suggestion for more interesting sounds and a lot more overtones try using sitar-stile bridge (like piece of a metal tube with big diameter).
That must be why the first string sounded strange. The ball ends are basically weights in odd places.
Bart Hopkin has a couple great videos about adding weights to strings to give them bell-like harmonics. Like you said, the guitar string loops were the reason for the messy overtones. I wonder what that first string would sound like with a bandpass filter, wah pedal, or other effects!
You should investigate the Tromba Marina - a 15th century monochord played using harmonics
I saw a band called Sleepytime Gorilla Museum that had a bass type thing like this back in the mid 2000's. I think they called it a 9 foot slide bass. Kinda a evil vaudeville vibe. They made a lot of their own instruments.
Dude! I instantly thought of them! The track "powerless" came to mind straight away. Good taste in music, btw :)
Some of these sounds near the end remind me of the Blaster Beam, though that was made with long tight springs instead of a wire. I bet you’d be able to build your own blaster beam pretty easily with all this experience! If you wanted to, of course.
One heck of a talented musician - such an exciting sound.
You must have a blast building all of these cool instruments. Great videos on this channel.
Beautiful and strange sounds. Run it through some fuzz pedals, please!
Really interesting and thought-provoking as usual.I always love the final result and all the different ways you find to generate sound.
Incredible sci-fi sounds from such a simple instrument.
My mistake - his name is Huxley and the Blasterbeam has been used in several films. Your instrument reminded me of some of its sounds. Thanks again Nic.
You beat me to it by 45 minutes! Love the blaster beam. I bet replacing the wire with a spring on this would yield even more similar results! (That crashing sound and long tail in a blaster beam is basically what happens in a spring reverb. I guess the blaster beam is basically a really long reverb tank…)
I know that bass strings tend to be longer than guitar strings, or you could possibly get some bass piano strings for 2m+ long instruments
I don't remember the name of the musician but many years ago, a specially made piano string was stretched between opposite doors of a church.
Very good explanations, i like your acoustic research. The sound is so amazing. I'm waiting for your following video. Hello from France.
I imagine you've probably heard of Ellen Fullman's long string instrument but it could be cool to do something like this on that scale! Also I reckon the nuts on the guitar strings are introducing their own harmonics that make the effects of the dan bau a lot less pronounced. I don't know where you'd be able to find strings that long, but maybe a pack of harp strings could help, chinese guzheng is pretty long compared to guitar, but I don't know if they're magnetic.
There are companies like Kalium (Canada) and Newtone (UK) that make very long guitar strings. However, for instruments like tambura and sitar, you can buy string by the spool that you cut yourself.
Very gothic and dark. Love it man, keep it up!
This is just incredible. I would like to build Gastons version of a harp after this video ( comic albums).
Le gaffophone 😍
Yes!
Horror music vibes... love it!
Right before you got to the slide part, i was like MAKE A SLIDE !!!!
awesome as all of your projects
Wild sounds!
As others suggested, try piano wire... also please try an overstrung piano wire used in lower notes (like found on a bass guitar)
Should ask “that1guy” what he uses. He’s got that big weird 1 stringed instrument that might have a comparable strong length.
Just the right kind of eerie. I love this
That was absolutely what my soul needed. Such an awesome feel to the sound that one has, what a cool build!!! Have ye experimented with winding your own strings ever? I’ve done a little experimenting with just a drill and swivels, and I plan to try more, but that’d be one way to handle an application like that. It’d take some serious work and patience for one of that size though!
I think the idea of a really long wire works better as a distortion effect. The cup and string is an easy way to explain what I mean. You use the wire to transmit a signal/sound and then pluck the string to apply weird effects. It already exists in amps and as a module in the synth world but I highly doubt anyone's tried making a mega sized one yet.
crazy sounds, from such simple construction. if you need very long strings you can get either plastic fishing line (instead of nylon) or piano wire, both are available in unlimited length and all different thickness.
J'adore cette expérimentation, principe ultra simple, résultats déments ! Tes expériences sont toujours inspirantes
pfouuu ça sonne comme un modulateur en anneaux
I've made a couple of flutes and modified a cheap guitar, but I've never made a string instrument from scratch, a monochord might be my first thing I'll try to make
Track and field for the blind use very long metal wires for the blind to use as guide-wires while they're running. I remember plucking the wire and it sounded like a cheesy laser sound effect. It was really cool. Pew! Pew! You can find them at schools for the blind.
hi dude! longtime fan. i've seen a few videos where the stringed instruments were several meters long. one was played with friction - player rosined their hands and pulled along the string. it was wild.
The piece of music at the end reminded me of the band Einstürzende Neubauten.
I just found your channel. This is so cool!!
I just recently discovered your videos and thoroughly enjoy your work. Also recently, the Car company Genesis released a commercial featuring Onuka and the song Zenit as the music bed of the commercial. I honestly thought it was one of your musical arrangements! It does remind me of your outro music to your videos. Keep up the great content. Thanks for the inspirations.
Everything is clear - the longer the string, the closer the musician is to becoming a necromancer.
The man is crazy! But cool !! 😂
Great video as always. This is getting into the spirit of the blaster beam. (Very different design so not the same at all, but instrumental cousins).
If you wanted to go deeper but shorter, you could try thicker wound wire, like bass strings, piano wire, or even wire meant for high tension physical (non musical) applications or even transition to metal springs. The problem you may run into as you go deeper is that the strength of the wood may not balance with the tension you will need to maintain on the strings if you do take this to it's all the way to it's amazingly absurdist destination you could try taking a page from the blaster beams design and create a metal frame.
You could get natural gut lines in various widths (used for clock weight lines) up to about 12 feet.
I love your musical innovations. Who said music has to fit inside the traditional musical scale box? Not me.
Have you ever put fishing line weights on a string before? I know Bart Hopkin experiments with these weights alot... I think the two strings conjoined is functioning similarly? Really cool, I love this really long Dan bau idea
your junt always hits
GENIUS
I love that
Une cloche qu'on peut pitch-bend, incroyable, comme d'hab!!
Délire !! ^^ ça fait penser à l'instru de cordes frappées utilisée en trad que j'ai vu dans les Cévennes par exemple.. Super pour faire du rythme bourdonnant transesque à souhait !
You rock bro
I would think your channel is big enough to get like an Ernie Ball/D'Addario sponsorship or something, where you can get spools of it? That's the direction I would go. Might make for good content, too.
For strings I would contact newtone strings in the uk, they offer custom made strings and the prices are very reasonable, I've been using thier acoustic strings for about 15 years and they are very high quality. I'd expect they could help.
Try piano string, a.k.a. music wire, a.k.a. spring steel. Easy to get, costs literally cents per metre, used outside of music industry more often than in it. Would definitely fit this channel and produce better sound at the same time.
Awesome sound sauce!!!! Would be awesome if you ran a couple more strings and turned it into an industrial Octobass!! Must admit it was the popcorn instrument that I first watched. Keep up the good work and sending out those awesome vibes.
OMG, nice idea!
Nicely explained. I built a lyre a couple of years ago with strings 2.4 meters (8 feet) long and i can get up to the 16th harmonic without any problems, playing with a bow.
Two suggestions: one, use 7 strand stainless steel cable for strings- it's easily available, cheap, and sounds great. Two: it's more logical to regard the fundamental tone as the 1st harmonic, the octave as the second harmonic, and so forth. That way the math for the vibrating length and the frequencies works out correctly.
Keep up the good work. Cheers from cloudy Halle an der Saale, Scott
The part of Peter will be played by the violins, the Wolf will be played by French Horns, and as always, V'GER will be played by Nicolas Bras' three meter đàn bầu.
T’arrêtes pas Nicolas même si je pige rien en musique j’adore tes folies ! ;) j’espère pouvoir un jour te commander une BO ! A bientôt en Guyane j’espère 😊 maxime
An alloy wire would work at any desired length. Steel/silver, or nickel. Brass mixes even.
Alternatively you cold use synthetic material such as dacron, fishing line, etc.. but would need a piezo pickup for those to work.
There’s an instrument called a slapperoo which uses a steel strap instead of a string. Wonderful long bass notes.
Making a guitar string with kanthal wire allows you to choose your gauge, and a drill can be used to help wrap the wire.
I can imagine an array of these with pedals that do the bending and finger pics. WhaWha Harp.
Like you said! After the first extension it sounded... oddly bell like? Like large bells, having that resonant deep sound to them. Not what I expected! Fascinating noises it makes :V
Ah... and and then the second and third extensions came in and it becomes the background music for a fever dream lol
Wonderful creativity and sounds. Has me wondering if something like that could be implemented for single strings on a Strat? 🤔
Mais quel boss!
find a broken piano, harvest lifetime supply
awesome!
One time I want to create huge resonator with scale length more than 2 meter. And I Use stainless rope. When you use wire, because of widness you lose some high harmoniks (because of low flexybillyty) .
And, when you use several strings linced tougether - you have multiple wibraiting system linked with ich other. Every linc become wibration center
So, I think next step in your reserch will be another material of base (pine is not musician wood :) ), using steel rope, and maybe another toss rod. Maybe find someone, whom can quench this toss rod.
ones more, thank you for this video!
Mattias Krantz, here on RUclips, also needed long guitar strings for one of his instrument projects. I think he got them from a manufacturer eventually. Maybe he could help.
The Dokumentation is GREAT as always!!! If you want to watch this vid, reduce the Playback speed on 0.75! Its more compfortable to follow.....
J'utilise de la corde à piano pour ce genre d'instruments, on en trouve de tous les diamètres en magasin de pêche, de 0.1 à 1 mm en longueur de 5m (ou 10 je suis plus sûr)
I think you can get piano wire in long spools.
Wow le son est envoûtant ! Belle idée, comme d'habitude. Pour la corde tu peux demander à un fileur de corde. Philippe Carrère est très sympa. Je l'avais contacté quand j'avais le projet de faire une table de massage monocorde.
I don’t quite understand how it works but it would be great as a background track in a stressful scene
The way he describes it with nodes is accurate to a degree, but the main part which hopefully will help you is that strings actually vibrate along all those nodes simultaneously rather than only one at a time like in the animation.
The harmonic series (which he showed the first few of in the animation) is present in all instruments, be it a piano, guitar, flute, etc - every resonating body will have those higher multiples of the frequency. Different geometries make various upper harmonics/overtones (it’s the same thing here) louder or quieter than others, and that determines an instrument’s timbre. The only thing separating a piano from a guitar from a violin is that harmonic ratio.
The fundamental frequency is usually louder than its harmonics, so what is happening here and in the guitar demo at the start is actually the cancelling-out of the loudest frequencies to allow the upper harmonics to be more audible. That is also why they get quieter as they get higher pitched.
It’s a lot like sending white light through blue glass, to block the red and make the blue and green components more apparent. A little more complicated than that but it’s a similar idea of removing one part to make another part more visible.
This principle of harmonics applies to a lot more than just sound - it’s also part of why some white LEDs have “spiky” emissions rather than broad spectrum white light, or the audible interference on an old radio from a modern power supply, or the “echoes” in the wake of a boat which pile up behind the main one!
the projects are getting larger and larger x)
next step: the basement is the resonator
My dad has told me about this concert he went to once where they made had made stuff like this with piano wires I think that spanned an entire airplane hangar
I *think* I've seen guitar strings for sale that are meters long and you cut them yourself. I've never purchased them myself because I don't go through strings that fast.
That might change now with the guitars I'm building. Thanks for the inspiration!
For anything up to 2 meters, I could imagine that an upright Bass string (or as mentioned, piano or harp) could work. I think a lot of the strange harmonics are due to your quick-n'-dirty splices giving weighted node points on the string. A clean string would provide a cleaner sound.
You could ask the people who produce harp strings to make some long custom made ones?
Music On A Long Thin Wire, Electric Boogaloo!
So now we know why people don't extend strings by tying them together. Huge difference with the steel wire.
Very cool! Check out Ellen Fullman - Long String Instrument.
I've already used a string on a construction site as an instrument. You had to put your ear to it though
Maybe the guys at Kalium Strings could help you out? They do unusual string gauges and I think lengths, too. I think it's worth checking out^^
Piano strings or double bass strings and even gauge wires will work I think
Basically how the star wars laser blaster sound was invented
Interestingly the 'joined up' guitar strings sounded quite piano-like esp. at the longer lengths.
Dulcimer strings are sold in spools.
Piano strings would be the way to go, their basically exactly the same as guitar strings just a lot longer. 👍👍
New sound track for Noita confirmed xD
Just get high tension cables and hit it with a hammer like they did for star wars laser sounds. Its just a big string, should still be capable of harmonics
Awesome work as usual!
with even more work this could be the soundtrack of dune 2 xD
For a few years I have had planned to make the world's largest diddley bow. Perhaps in a few days I will post a video. Should only take me about 20 minutes to assemble it. It will have a 20 foot scale length. :-P
Jadore
Woah
Oddly long didly bo))
as always a very interesting and entertaining video🎼👌
Roll music wire is an option. Whatever length you want. Whatever diameter you want. Cut length about a foot longer than need so you can have enough wire to tension the string you’ve made….
Hello Nicolas, I was thinking, what about the drones from a Theorbo?
Kalium strings font des cordes de 37 pouces de longueur ;) autrement une corde de piano. Dernière solution, demander une corde sur mesure à un fabricant. Bonne continuation !
Ha si j'ai vu des gens faire leurs cordes eux-mêmes, il ya des vidéos sur YT
Tu peux utiliser des lignes de canne à pèche en métal, les plus épaisses font le diamètre d'une corde de guitare.