NEWID

[tauzero]

Christmas Day featured me giving an interesting gift to Mrs Zero - a Vangoa EWI-100, which is an electronic wind instrument which can also be used as a MIDI controller. Can be set to flute or sax fingering (Mrs Zero doesn't play either but has messed around with a recorder, a penny whistle, and an ocarina) and has ten internal sounds which are more or less recognisable facsimiles of the instruments that they're supposed to be emulating. It's a similar concept to the Akai EWI but £40 instead of £400 (and not as sophisticated and probably somewhat flimsier). We had a quick play with the MIDI side of things and it works fine.

 

[Bassassin]

Interesting! Got a link for a UK retailer? My other half/musical co-conspirator would be into this - and it's her birthday in March...

[PaulThePlug]

Nice... Got the Son a Melodica a while back... got a link?

[bass_dinger]

Here's a link to a review from Team Recorder  - a YouTube channel so good that I watch it, even though I don't play the recorder. 

 

 

Edited January 1, 2024 by bass_dinger
The link - include the link!

[tauzero]

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/315056807149 and others - just search for "electronic wind instrument", filter on location and sort on price.

[Bassassin]

On 02/01/2024 at 12:46, tauzero said:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/315056807149 and others - just search for "electronic wind instrument", filter on location and sort on price.

 

Cheers, sorry for the late response, only just seen your post. 👍

[police squad]

can this trigger sounds from a keyboard then?

[BigRedX]

48 minutes ago, police squad said:

can this trigger sounds from a keyboard then?

 

AFAICS any MIDI capability is MIDI over USB, which will require a host device to work rather than traditional MIDI via 5-pin DIN sockets which is a peer-to-peer protocol.

 

That means you can plug the EWI into your computer and use it to play a plug-in instrument via your DAW. If you want to use it to play sounds from keyboard or other device that has MIDI DIN sockets you'll need a MIDI host box to go between the two. There are cheap host boxes, but all the decent ones cost at least as much as the EWI.

[police squad]

10 hours ago, BigRedX said:

 

AFAICS any MIDI capability is MIDI over USB, which will require a host device to work rather than traditional MIDI via 5-pin DIN sockets which is a peer-to-peer protocol.

 

That means you can plug the EWI into your computer and use it to play a plug-in instrument via your DAW. If you want to use it to play sounds from keyboard or other device that has MIDI DIN sockets you'll need a MIDI host box to go between the two. There are cheap host boxes, but all the decent ones cost at least as much as the EWI.

a bit out of my depth here, perhaps my keyboard playing genius chap can help.

it's a cool bit of kit

[tauzero]

17 hours ago, police squad said:

can this trigger sounds from a keyboard then?

 

It can trigger sounds off USB synth modules (for instance, at the cheaper end, https://www.midiplus.com.tw/en/product-detail/miniEngineUSB/ [1]), and off standard MIDI modules/keyboards if you have a MIDI host to USB interface (I built one for about £20).

 

[1] Taiwanese, so if you find it on AliExpress, the invasion has happened