Artists including Tom Richards, James Bulley, Shiva Feshareki and Sarah Angliss will construct visual scores using a Mini Oramics machine; a drawn-sound synthesiser designed by Daphne Oram (1925-2003) circa 1976.
Through his PhD research into Oram and her Oramics machines, Richards has built this unique and previously unfinished synthesiser from her notes and diagrams. A series of public programme events will take place alongside this project, where the artists will perform their scores. During February 2018, artists will work with and construct visual scores using Mini Oramics, a drawn-sound synthesiser designed by Daphne Oram (1925–2003) circa 1976. Oram was an electronic music pioneer, one of the founding members of the BBC Radiophonic workshop and the creator of Oramics – a drawn sound technique in which drawings made directly onto 35mm film stock are read by photo-electric cells and turned into sounds. Besides being a musical innovator, Oram was the first woman to direct an electronic music studio, the first woman to set up a personal electronic music studio and the first woman to design and construct an electronic musical instrument.