Roland’s Concept Piano Keys in on Drones For Surround Sound

Designed in collaboration with Japanese furnishings maker Karimoku, the Roland fiftieth Anniversary Idea Piano is a examine of “what if?” – an audaciously conceived and meticulously assembled composition of Japanese Nara oak layered right into a single type containing a 360-degree, 14-speaker system and with a fair wilder proposition: drones for encompass sound.

Roland connects the fiftieth Anniversary Idea Piano to a surprisingly dissimilar descendent, the model’s sharply crystalline obsidian 2020 GPX-F1 Aspect Grand Piano. Whereas that design shares an explorative spirit, it additionally exhibited rectilinear strains of an virtually jewel-like look. The fiftieth Anniversary Idea Piano then again takes on a warmly natural rounded type, one accentuated by its Japanese Nara oak wooden sourced from Hokkaido.

The musical instrument model tapped the abilities of Japanese furnishings maker Karimoku to create the elliptical design with machine-cutting layers of picket items which can be joined collectively to type the physique – a methodical try to make use of historic strategies as soon as used to construct picket Buddhist statues with modern 3D-printing methods. The mission itself was impressed by the forefather of classical ambient music Erik Satie’s idea of “Furnishings Music,” or music that turns into like furnishings in an area. One could discover how the instrument’s relation to adverse house evokes Satie’s personal music’s use of silence to emphasise sparse sound.

A touch-panel pill sits embedded into the middle lid. Solely revealed when open, the show permits the keyboardist entry to Bluetooth connectivity, web entry, video conferencing, piano classes apps, and streaming tutorials.

An identical becoming a member of of previous and future function inside. A 360-degree “speaker ball” resides contained in the fiftieth Anniversary Idea Piano, comprising an array of 14 audio system able to firing sound in any course, “seven on the correct and 7 on the left,” leading to an immersive three-dimensional sound.

The staff needed the sound to really fall from the air across the participant. The answer? A pair of drone audio system that hover over the piano.

And if the design itself wasn’t intrepid sufficient, Roland has imagined the inclusion of drone audio system to hover over the piano to create the flying equal of the Dolby Atmos expertise (purely a conceptual proposal proper now, noting drones are a really audible presence in operation). Roland is making an attempt to deal with a few points confronted when including flying drones to an exercise the place ambient sound can’t bitter the expertise: latency and the noisy sound of drone followers. They’re investigating the incorporation of a know-how that adjusts drone positioning to optimize perceived sound, shifting the drone nearer “when the sound is gentle, after which transfer away when the sound is loud.”

The Roland fiftieth Anniversary Idea Piano is finest acquired because the equal of an automotive idea car: an exploratory enterprise used to push the bounds of what’s attainable to be later included into extra fairly practical (and manufacturable) merchandise. However as an object itself, the 88-key piano keyboard represents a surprising instance of the place artisan craft and musically-minded know-how hit all the correct notes in unison.

Gregory Han is Tech Editor of Design Milk. A Los Angeles native with a profound love and curiosity for design, mountaineering, tide swimming pools, and street journeys, a number of his adventures and musings might be discovered at gregoryhan.com.