Toetkuip
Toetkuip was originaly built for outdoor use. Imagine a bunch of horns that belonged to a dozens of cars, police-cars, fire-engines and huge trucks all honking, sometimes orchestrated, other times chaotic. This sound is still relatively easy to picture, but when they all ride into the sea and while drowning they continue playing their little concert, can you imagine? It sounds like screaming pigs...
This is how our Toetkuip sounds. The "instrument" is built onto a triangular frame and consists of a galvanised steel bathtub, 24 hooters, a strong compressor, a midi controllable PIC microprocessor, heavy duty fork-lift batteries (they allow 4 hours of uninterrupted playing) and of course a lot of water.
The whole construction ought to be mobile and is build upon a triangular, 3-wheeled vehicle. The tricycle offers 4 places: the driver who sits in front, uses the break and is steering with the foot-steering wheel; the player behind the control panel who commands the musical programs and 2 persons on the step behind who drive it like a scooter. The trike weighs roughly 170 kg. (without water & performers)
So we have all the ingredients to make the music move, not only on the streets, but also the turning and breaking, the pushing and shaking, the height of the water, even the condition of the road is moving the sounds of the 24 underwater horns.
A recording of Toetkuip can be found here: www.logosfoundation.org/waves/toetkuip.wav
The original webpage of this project can be found here: www.logosfoundation.org/instrum_gwr/toetkuip_eng.html
