Both hands are busy playing a guitar phrase. You want a harmony to enter on the next chord and disappear before the melody returns. A footswitch puts that change within reach without interrupting the part.
That is what interests us about bringing musical tools into physical hardware. Their form changes the actions available to a player. A pedal can give your feet a role in the arrangement and let a sound become something you perform.
The switch is part of the musical idea
Imagine a pedal that captures a harmony and holds it beneath a new phrase. One design could keep the harmony sounding while you hold the switch down. Another could let one press capture it and a second press release it.
Those choices create different ways to play. Holding a switch gives the action a physical duration; pressing again frees your foot between changes, but asks you to remember the state. Before choosing the electronics, there is already an instrument-design decision to make.
A level knob would introduce another choice. Do you set the harmony quietly before the song, or bring it forward during a gap? The same sound can play a different role depending on which action is available at the right moment.
Our take: begin with a small number of controls that earn their place in a song. A detailed interface makes sense when exploring settings is itself part of the performance. For a change you need under your foot, being able to find it matters more than having every setting nearby.
A small box asks you to choose
A screen gives you room to see connections, compare settings, and reshape an idea. A pedal asks which decisions deserve a physical control. That constraint can give an instrument a clearer purpose.
It also raises questions that a promising sound at a desk cannot answer. Can you find the switch while looking at another player? Does turning the knob produce a change you can use throughout its travel? Can you return to the starting sound between phrases?
For the harmony idea, a short performance tells you more than a feature list: play a phrase, capture a chord, bring the harmony forward, release it, and continue. Each step reveals something the controls need to support.
Two kinds of pedal, two kinds of playing
Our early experiments include a MIDI chord controller and an audio harmonizer. The first sends note instructions to another instrument; the second adds voices to the sound you play into it. Our MIDI guide explains the difference between those messages and audio.
For a player, the distinction is practical. A chord controller needs to stop its notes when you release them. A harmonizer needs to follow a phrase without making its response feel late. Similar-looking boxes can ask very different things of the musician and the hardware.
The October 2 experiments used software simulations. Physical playing tests come next. We want to hear how the harmony responds to a quick phrase and find out whether the switches and controls remain comfortable through a song.
If you are building a device yourself, the hardware platforms guide covers our experimental board targets and their current limits. Those choices follow the musical job the device needs to do.
Our hardware direction is to explore which ideas benefit from becoming instruments you can reach for without a screen. Think of one change you wish you could make while both hands keep playing. That action is a good place for a pedal design to begin.
