MusicMachine 1 is the first music box of a trilogy that looks and sounds out of this world. It contains all the traditional, time-honoured elements of a superlative high-end music box, but designed and configured in a totally unconventional way.
Each of the cylinders on MusicMachine 1 plays three tunes. On the left, may the Force be with you with the ‘Star Wars’ theme, the ‘Imperial March’ from ‘The Empire Strikes Back’, and the theme from ‘Star Trek’. Back on earth, the right cylinder plays Pink Floyd’s ‘Another Brick in the Wall’, Deep Purple’s ‘Smoke on the Water’ and John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’.
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The two vertical combs look like air vent grilles on either side of the vessel’s body. Each comb contains the bespoke selection of 72 notes chosen by the Reuge musician in accordance with the three melodies that cylinder will play.
The beautiful hand-finished cylinders gleam like a pair of imposing reactors atop MusicMachine’s main hull. The cylinders contain ‘the scores’ of the melodies, with as many as 1,400 precision-placed pins that pluck the teeth of the comb as the cylinder revolves.
A Reuge musician identifies the most recognisable passages from each melody, then sets about recreating these passages for the music box, keeping in mind that one cylinder contains 3 melodies and each cylinder’s pins would pluck one 72-note comb.
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© Xin WangWith its dual propellers and twin silver cylinders mounted on sleek outrigger landing gear, MusicMachine 1 looks like a spaceship hailing from a galaxy far, far away. MusicMachine doesn't just look like something from a science fiction film; three of the melodies have been beamed directly from sci-fi classics. “Like many kids, saving the world was my full time job when I was a boy,” says Maximilian Büsser. “For MusicMachine 1, I delved into my childhood dreams and fantasies inspired by heroes such as Luke Skywalker and Captain James T. Kirk.”
Based in Sainte-Croix (Switzerland) with more than 150 years of expertise and experience, Reuge is positioned as the only premier producer of music boxes in the world today, creating mechanical music boxes that are technically, acoustically and aesthetically superlative. While Reuge has a comprehensive collection of both classical and contemporary music boxes, the brand also prides itself on its ability to create bespoke pieces or limited series (like the MusicMachines).
Reuge is a master of music boxes thriving on ‘thinking outside the box’; the Reuge mentality is to respect tradition, but at the same time move forward with beautiful contemporary music boxes for the 21st century.
www.reuge.chMusicMachine 1 is the first limited edition of a trilogy of MusicMachines created with music box specialist Reuge. Discover the other editions, MusicMachine 2 and MusicMachine 3
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