About GRADIENT
GRADIENT makes devices that explore peculiar hidden corners of electronic music-making. Ranging from Eurorack modular synthesizer utilities to self-contained instruments, our designs focus on extending and twisting the relationship between musicians and sound.
Inspired by chaotic forms in nature, GRADIENT creates handmade sound objects that combine elements of the natural world with electronic augmentation. Using a combination of sustainably-sourced wood and lab-grown electronic components, our devices teeter on the balance between procedural execution and a chaotic awareness of their own surroundings and interactions. We pursue designs that combine predictability and unpredictability—instruments that can surprise you, and that can give back something different from what you give to them.
MIGSI Trumpet Prototype with Serge Modular Synthesizer
GRADIENT Bio
GRADIENT is a joint venture between musicians Sarah Belle Reid and Ryan Gaston. Our work began in 2014 with the design of MIGSI (Minimally Invasive Gesture Sensing Interface), an apparatus developed to electronically augment the acoustic trumpet. After initial hardware development, MIGSI's focus turned toward software, where were began to explore the various implications of gestural controller development...discovering countless ways in which the relationship between a performer and their instrument could be bent, twisted, and otherwise obscured by giving the instrument itself sensory awareness and some level of autonomy.
Simultaneously, we were working extensively with other chaotic instruments, such as Rob Hordijk's Blippoo Box, Serge and Buchla modular synthesizers, daxophones, and other sonic oddities—developing aesthetic sensibilities that favor careful listening and that value curiosity and surprise. These sensibilities extended deeply into MIGSI's development, and eventually into the development of our other instruments.
Safe explorations to you, with plenty of scratches, squeaks, groans, sputters, screeches, and howls along the way,
-Sarah + Ryan