This year’s NIME festival welcome the Reactable team back, giving a concert on the opening night by expert Carles López, and a keynote presentation by Sergi Jordà on the history, inspiration and evolution of the Reactable series of products.
The Reactable was originally developed in 2003 at the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, as one of the first fully integrated modular systems for making music, with a versatile multi-touch interface with visual feedback on how the modules are linked and the parameters available for control. The novel interface for the reactable uses a series of blocks, each with their own function in the signal generation chain (oscillators, samplers, filters, sequencers etc.) which the user can then arrange on the table to create an instrument. Moving, rotating and twisting the blocks then changes the signal flow, groups modules together, and manipulates parameters which can be selected by the user.
The multi-touch interface with its visual feedback not only speeds up the work flow of the musician, by allowing them instant access to the sound generators and their parameters, but also offers new ways of interacting with sound and technology. Particularly exciting is the potential for group performance and the opening up of music technology through an easy to understand system of modules with simple graphic feedback.
So far the Reactable has received a number of awards for innovation in technology and user interaction, including the Prix Ars Electronica, and appeared on Bjork’s Volta world tour. To date the Reactable range has expanded to include the traditional performance version of the instrument, alongside a more robust version for installations in museums, and a software version for iPad. Personally I would love to see them progress further with research into potential for this technology to be used as a pedagogical tool to engage people in music, performance and interaction, as well as its potential for multi-user scenarios.
Have a look at the video below of Carles López performing on the Reactable at the NIME 2011 opening concert.
For more info check out reactable.com.
