[sdiy-interim] MIDI guitar, the hard way

[Gorka Garcia]

So... Now for a crazy idea that hopefully I will be able to work on whenever I finish the other 20 projects in the list:

I have this korean made Les Paul style guitar which I want to become something useful. I thought about different artistic ways of using it and finally I realized it was born to be a MIDI guitar controler, but not the usual MIDI guitar with expensive Roland pitch to midi hardware. My thought was to connect every fret and every string to an AVR/PIC microprocessor, creating a matrix of switches between strings and frets. That by it self will make of my guitar a pretty cool synth controler (I know, no string bending... oh well) however, I will also like to be able to sense individual string strumming. I though about it and the only solution I found is using an Hex pickup (magnetic or piezo). Can you guys think of another solution for detecting individual string strumming? hopefully something DIY and cheap? Once the guitar/controler is finished, it does not necesary have to sound right when the strings are strummed.

Would something like this work (from Dave_B in the diystompboxes forum):
http://davebales.com/me/stompboxStuff/hex_pickup.jpg

Notes from Dave_B:
"Could it look something like this?  I left out the wires and guitar strings for clarity.  The white and gold part is the cut piezo, the black part underneath is foam rubber or something similar.  I've seen articles about glueing whole peizos to guitars for pickups (and tried with some success a long time ago).  If you put these close to the strings would it be enough to keep them from triggering notes from adjacent strings?"


Have in mind that I am not expecting to capture sound out of the piezos, only the amplitude of the strumming.

Thanks,

Gorka

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