Music

Teenage Engineering gets choral with ensemble of singing wooden dolls

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Each of the eight members of the choir has a Bluetooth speaker inside to output classic songs as a solo performer or as part of a melodic ensemble
Teenage Engineering
Each of the eight members of the choir has a Bluetooth speaker inside to output classic songs as a solo performer or as part of a melodic ensemble
Teenage Engineering
The Choir was inspired by an art installation created by Teenage Engineering in 2007
Teenage Engineering
The "Russian Doll" member of the Choir has been programmed with a contralto voice
Teenage Engineering
An accelerometer allows for playback control with a tap, and volume adjustment by tilting left or right
Teenage Engineering
The Choir comes with 22 "choral classics" already installed, but users can create original tunes with any Bluetooth MIDI keyboard (such as the OP-1 field shown)
Teenage Engineering
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The first project from Sweden's Teenage Engineering was an art installation in 2007 comprising 22 wooden dolls that formed a singing ensemble. The absolut choir has now inspired the creation of a smaller collection that can voice a bunch of classic songs or original creations with the help of MIDI hardware.

The Teenage Engineering Choir features eight shapely members fashioned from polished beech, each with a Bluetooth-enabled speaker module inside and a four-hour per-charge battery, though if users only have one 10-minute concert per day, it could last a month between top-ups.

The group is designed to represent "cultures and characters from across the world" and every member of the choir has its own voicing. There's an Italian-flavored baritone, mezzo sopranos given German and Egyptian styling, a bass Cossack, an alto from the Netherlands, a Japanese tenor, a kind of Matryoshka doll contralto, and a soprano from Palestine.

The Choir comes with 22 "choral classics" already installed, but users can create original tunes with any Bluetooth MIDI keyboard (such as the OP-1 field shown)
Teenage Engineering

The overall effect is similar to Google's marvelous Blob Opera from 2020, though with real-world objects instead of browser-based visuals. The choir is sure to be a conversation piece at parties but at US$249 for each member you're looking at almost $2,000 for a complete set (though some members are already shown as sold out).

Teenage Engineering has preloaded the dolls with a collection of 22 "choral classics" across a "repertoire spanning baroque to folk" to serenade the owner as a solo act or as a melodic ensemble – when two or more dolls are placed near each other, they wirelessly communicate and automatically adjust the performance accordingly. A built-in accelerometer allows for playback control with a tap, and volume adjustment by tilting a doll left or right.

Should the listener get bored with the limited number of songs programmed in, the choir can be made to sing original compositions via the company's OP-1 field or OP-Z synthesizers, or via any Bluetooth MIDI keyboard. The video below has more.

Product page: Teenage Engineering Choir

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