Microtonal Music Studios Exhibition and Event week: “Electroacoustic hurdy gurdy: playing and modifying the instrument” by 
Timo Viialainen 08.03.25 at 18:00

TimoViialainen_haastiskuva

Microtonal Music Studios Exhibition and Events Weeks
21.02-09.03.2025

08.03. Saturday

Event 18.00–19.30 – Lecture-Performance

Timo Viialainen: Electroacoustic hurdy gurdy: playing and modifying the instrument

Timo Viialainen will introduce some of the processes related to using electroacoustic hurdy gurdy as a tool for sonic experimentations and seeking out new ways to do music. The event is will be in two parts.

First the artist will play a solo gig for around 30-40 minutes to demonstrate in practice what I do with the instrument. After the gig he will do a demonstration oriented lecture on how the instrument works and how the electro-acoustic sound is picked up processed and amplified.

The instrument he plays has currently 4 piezos, 4 magnetic pickups, 8 preamps and 6 outputs in total (which Intend to modify to 8 outputs). All the different channels which also match different string groups go thru a specific processing done with plugings on a laptop and this creates the sound that he plays. Instead of playing an acoustic instrument with fixed possibilities he could describe it more like playing a medieval modular synth.

Timo Viialainen will also talk about differences with different string materials (steel, nylon, gut, silver plated gut etc.), differences with different piezos (which are huge), how to process electro-acoustic sound (ie. How to make something quiet sound big), and some philosophy behind using eq, distortion, and how to create musically meaningful space for electroacoustic sound with reverb and delay in combination with eq which is by far the most important tool for processing any sound.

Timo Viialainen is a multidiscliplinary artist working with sculpture, performance art, sound art and music. He first studied sound engineering in Sibelius Academy open Univesity (2003-2007), Metropolia (2008-2009) and later on sculpture in the Fine Art Academy in Helsinki (2014-2021). As a performance and sound artist he has performed in numerous events and festivals in 21 different countries. Currently he is mostly occupied making electromagnetic sculptures and playing electro-acoustic alto hurdy gurdy. Besides playing he is also modifying and developing the instruments electro-acoustic properties.