Built instruments / Resonant objects / Sound installation
Instrument Building
Water Pail Instrument
This page documents instrument-building works that transform everyday objects, found materials and constructed mechanisms into performable sound systems. The instruments are not treated only as tools for producing sound, but as sculptural, spatial and performative objects.
The Water Pail instrument brings together metal pails, bamboo, water, percussion materials, amplified vibration and field recordings. It sits between percussion, object-based sound art and installation practice, where the physical behaviour of the object becomes part of the musical material.
The section below expands this practice through the related cooking oil drum instruments, where transducers activate large metal drums as resonant sound objects.
Detail view of the Water Pail instrument setup.
Audio
Water Pail
Water Pail instrument, including bamboo structure, metal pails and installation materials.
Video documentation of the Water Pail instrument in performance. Open on Vimeo
Instrument building / Resonant objects / Sound installation
Cooking Oil Drums as Sound Objects
This instrument-building work uses cooking oil drums, transducers, bamboo, water pails, low-frequency sine tones and field recordings as a sculptural sound system. Developed within the installation and performance context of Water Pail, the work treats everyday containers as resonant bodies, transforming industrial and domestic materials into amplified instruments. The bamboo and water-pail structure forms part of the same built instrument environment, extending the work beyond percussion into object-based sound installation.
Credits
Instrument System
The installation uses cooking oil drums as resonant sound objects. Transducers attached to the drums activate the metal surfaces with low-frequency sine tones and field recordings, turning each drum into an amplified body rather than a conventional loudspeaker.
The performed component is for solo percussionist using brushes, soft and rubber mallets, finger cymbals, metal güiro, water and an exposed speaker. These actions are played on two metal water pails with a moving bamboo and water-pail structure, creating a physical dialogue between hand-played percussion and transduced resonant objects.
Installation and Scale
The instrument can be realised as a performance system or as part of a sound art installation. In this version, the oil drums, pails and bamboo structure formed a spatial arrangement of sounding objects that could be expanded according to the size of the site.
Full Equipment List
Resonant Objects
- 6 oil drums with red stencilled writing and wooden handle attachments
- 2 plain oil drums with wooden handle attachments
- 2 metal water pails
- Large white plinths
Audio and Transduction
- 8 transducers playing two independent mono tracks across 4 audio files
- 4 amplifiers, 18W/channel transistor amp
- 4 audio playback devices with amplifiers
- 2 phones for audio playback
Bamboo / Water-Pail Structure
- Lazy Susan
- Support wheels under Lazy Susan
- Weighted umbrella base
- Black metal pole
- Bamboo
- Rope
Equipment list excludes cables.
Instrument building · recorder preparations · Dream Recorder
PVC Recorder Experiments: Studies for Dream Recorder
These PVC experiments formed a practical sketchbook for Dream Recorder: Waking, a contrabass recorder work that extends the instrument through preparations, resonating objects and real-time electronics. The studies test how breath, tube length, membrane vibration, transducer excitation and nearby sound objects can become part of an expanded recorder system.
Prepared breath, resonant objects and electronic activation
The prototype tests how a recorder-like tube can be expanded through preparations and simple electronic systems. The work combines acoustic techniques such as tube-length changes and mouthpiece membranes with external resonators including a spring drum, waterphone, toy piano insides, tin foil and chopsticks.
Connection to the finished work
From PVC prototype to Dream Recorder: Waking
These PVC studies led into the contrabass recorder work Dream Recorder: Waking. The prototype stage developed a vocabulary of extended recorder preparations: resonating objects placed near the instrument, physical vibration through a transducer or speaker, and electronic control systems that could be played while performing.
Real-time electronic control
In Dream Recorder, the electronics are controlled in real time using two Bluetooth Mini Programmable Macro 4-Key Keyboards. Both keyboards are attached to the body of the recorder using Blu Tack and controlled wirelessly through Ableton. The dial also functions as a button and is mapped as another note in the 36-EDO scale. To allow the computer to register the two units as separate devices, one keyboard is connected via USB-C.
Instrumentation extensions
- Toy piano insides
- Finger cymbals
- Spring drum, 4" × 10"
- Angklung, 2 tones
Image notes
Frames from the demonstration, arranged as a visual inventory of the instrument system and its preparations.
Finished work
Dream Recorder: Waking
The PVC experiments developed into the contrabass recorder work Dream Recorder: Waking, where the instrument becomes a hybrid body of breath, object-resonance, microtonal electronic control and tactile performance.
Captions have been lightly corrected for spelling, punctuation and consistency, while keeping the original meaning of the on-screen text.