Dutch musician Wouter van Veldhoven creates music using recycled materials.

Van Veldhoven breathes new life into items such as old cans, tape recorders, cigar boxes, broken radios, toy pianos, antique televisions and walkmans, reworking these objects into experimental, often automated musical instruments and recording devices.

The resulting sound lays somewhere between “dusty, lo-fi experimental electronics, installation art and jangly ambient” according to the musician, who has released collaborative works with experimental artists such as Sima Kim and Machinefabriek in the past.

Van Veldhoven’s latest synth project has involved building a monophonic cassette mellotron and automated zithers. The Dutchman created the mellotron (originally a tape sampler from the 1960s) out of a used cassette walkman, playing the tape at varying speeds to create different notes.

Another instrument included in his latest project is an automated zither, described by van Veldhoven as “just an old zither that I saved from the junkyard with a couple of solenoids and electro-motors attached to it (and some minor John Cage-like preparations to create extra harmonics).”

These machines were then connected using a Doepfer A100 system and a home cooked relay board, also connecting an automated toy piano and tape recorder. The result is the composition below. [via Synthtopia]

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