Nashville's Circuit Benders' Ball

"...looks amazing!"

- John Baichtal, MAKE: Magazine

Saturday, September 29th, 2012
Workshops, 10:00 AM - 7:00 PM, The Skillery
Performances, 8:00 PM - 1:00 AM, The Brick Factory

Chicago's circuit bent duo, ROTH MOBOT will be continuing their mission of spreading the word of "easy electronics" by headlining this year's Circuit Benders' Ball in Nashville Tennessee. In addition to performing their unique music on circuit bent toys and home made electronics, Tommy and Patrick will be directly involving more people in this fast-growing area of the acquired technology arts by heading up a series of hands-on workshops at Nashville's Skillery.

WORKSHOPS
Chip to be Square: Build Your Own Synthesizer
With Josh Gumiela
10:00AM - 1:00PM
This workshop will teach you how to build your own square wave synthesizer. A synthesizer is an electronic musical instrument capable of producing a wide range of frequencies (notes) to make melodies. Square waves are one of the most commonly used waveforms in all synthesizers. They sound somewhat rough to our ears and might remind you of old 8-bit video game systems such as the Atari 2600 or Nintendo Entertainment System.

Introduction to Circuit Bending
With Tommy Stephenson & Patrick McCarthy of ROTH MOBOT
2:00PM - 5:00PM
In this workshop, you can take apart an old toy and make a brand new musical instrument! You'll be able to identify and explore the basic components of a typical circuit board, the basics of soldering, install output jacks, switches, body contacts (and more!), and control a world of new sounds.

Build a Buckawatt "Bend-a-Boost" Modular Boost Kit
With Zach Adam
5:30PM - 7:00PM
The Bend-a-Boost is a transistor-based boost kit that is easily configured on modular sockets. It is a single stage amplifier used to boost an audio signal, which works as an active volume control.

PERFORMANCES
This year's event has a HUGE lineup of well established as well as up and coming artists in the field:

• ROTH MOBOT – Chicago, IL
• Blight Side of Life – Nashville, TN
• Brain Lesion – Murfreesboro, TN
• Elegant Bassterds – Nashville, TN
  (Ben Marcantel and Derek Schartung) 
• Josh Gumiela, Kelli Shay Hix, Lucas McCallister – Nashville, TN
• Hadals – Nashville / Montgomery, AL
• Joey Molinaro – New York City, NY
• Nashville Robotic Philharmonic – Benton, KY
  (Zack Adams of CMKT4) 
• Pimpdaddysupreme – Nashville, TN
• Pineapple Explode – Nashville, TN
• Posttaste – Nashville, TN
  (Tommy Stangroom of Square People)
• Teletron Orchestra – Nashville/Murfreesboro, TN
  (Dylan Simon and Ken Soper)