I had the idea that I could play bass notes with my feet, so the first thing I did was to check that my brain would be able to cope with this – I didn’t want to spend ages making an instrument if I wasn’t going to be able to play it. So to check this out I got a toy floor piano (£5 on Facebook marketplace!) and tested whether I could play it. Here is the test. I’m playing Robin’s Waltz! I sounds reasonable actually, but the sound is very quiet and not in tune (semi-tone out so I had to tune my fiddle out by a long way). So having tested the idea, I got to work on my real one.
After some extensive googling, I decided that I might be able to make what I wanted using a Teensy board.
So I bought my Teensy board and a few buttons and started trying.
The Teensy board connects to the computer via a USB cable. To program it, you have to install something called Arduino on your computer. There are lots of examples of code available on the PJRC website. My first program was called Blink, which just makes the LED on the teensy blink. Initially it didn’t work, but I realised that my USB cable was only powering the Teensy, but was not passing any data. So I bought a new cable from the PI-Hut – the first of many purchases that I had to make to get the project done.
To be continued…..
- Children’s activities galore and a Ceilidh Barn Dance for all the family at East Quay Cultural Centre Watchet Early May Bank Holiday Monday 2026
Lovely to see Judy’s Ceilidh Class members joining in! - Free May Day Bank Holiday 2026 events in Watchet West Somerset – fantastic free open air ceilidh barn dance today at East Quay
From 1pm lots going on, including maypole dancing and then the free ceilidh barn dance at 3.15pm
Barnbuskers 