Project

# Title Team Members TA Documents Sponsor
9 Electric traditional Chinese musical instrument - Xun
Chi Zhang
Hongyi Li
Yujie Zhou
Zhen Qin design_document0.pdf
design_document0.pdf
final_paper0.pdf
presentation0.pptx
proposal0.pdf
video0.mp4
Xun is one of the oldest musical instruments in China and was invented 7000 years ago. It used to be made out of clay or bones and now ceramic. However, as a living fossil, the instrument is faced with two general problems. First, unlike other musical instruments, it does not have an electric version with which one can practice without making loud sound and disturbing neighbors. Second, since the population that play Xun is very small, there are not many teachers available and new players may find it hard to learn how to play this instrument without an efficient learning method.
To get more people familiar with Xun, we aim to make an electric instrument based on techniques like sensor system and DSP. Our device will be designed to take inputs from sensor system composed of pressure sensors and barometric pressure sensors, process inputs in a hardware system with Arduino and PCB, and play out the sound with an audio system. Our device will be unique for 3 reasons. First, there are not electric musical instruments that are capable of making sound quality of a ceramic or clay wind instrument. Second, the EWI wind controller on the market cannot provide a mode of Xun for its unique shape. Third, our device will be much cheaper than the EWI wind controller, which costs 700 dollars. Moreover, we may develop an LED system that provides instructional signals to guide players during performance if time allows.
(This idea comes from Yujie's initial post.)

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