[LAU] Synthfest Uk 2018

[Will Godfrey]

I've posted about this various places, but seem to have forgotten here :(
However, it's all good 'cos I keep remembering bits I'd forgotten about :)

Some time ago I was again delighted to get an invite to set up a free stand
for Yoshimi at Synthfest UK (now in it's 3rd year). This took place in
Sheffield Saturday, 6th October.

The event went very well. Better I think that last year. It was certainly
bigger, and I think the visitors more clued up about what to expect. Our stand
was well placed and also got more attention that last year. I'm sure the
posters helped - you really couldn't miss them :)

The posters were designed by one of Yoshimi's Little Band of Helpers, and a
musician friend who was also attending the event has contacts with a digital
printing company. They produced them at no cost - along with some flyers.

As well as the main laptop on speakers, I had a netbook set up with a two
octave mini-keyboard and a pair of phones. The people who tried it were really
impressed with the performance on such a small setup.

There was also some discussion about running Yoshimi on a Raspberry Pi - all
housed in a small box with a minimal touch screen - Interesting idea.

People are definitely less 'scared' of Linux these days, which is good,
although again, there was some discussion about porting Yoshimi to the Mac. My
attitude has always been that I'm fine with that and will help where I can, but
know nothing about the architecture so wouldn't be able to do any of the work
myself - especially as I'm still up to my eyeballs with work already :(

I was surprised that nobody at all mooted the idea of a port to Windows.

Another of YLBoH produced a pretty sophisticated backing track, playing on
parts 18-28 while parts 1-16 were on Solo-TwoWay. It certainly got people's
attention, as did the fact the whole lot was pulled in with just a Rosegarden
file and a Yoshimi State file, so ideal for gigging.

There were no blind people there this year, but one guy, who remembered the
command line feature from last year, really liked the new extensions into the
synth engines.

The greatest, most pleasant surprise was the (fairly elderly) wife of a friend
who was quite interested in the actual sound banks, and impressed with the
reproduction quality. She is actually a folk musician and has always used real
instruments, but seemed quite comfortable using the keyboard to play some of
the piano-like sounds.

Below are links to some photos I quickly took just as the event was about to
open. I'll leave them on my website for a week or two.

www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_01.jpg
www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_02.jpg
www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_03.jpg
www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_04.jpg
www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_05.jpg
www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_06.jpg
www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_07.jpg
www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_08.jpg
www.musically.me.uk/Photos/Synthfest2018/Synthfest2018_09.jpg


-- 
Will J Godfrey
http://www.musically.me.uk
Say you have a poem and I have a tune.
Exchange them and we can both have a poem, a tune, and a song.