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The First Medieval Electronic Instrument Plays Sounds of Lutes and More

At this time of the year, the Swedish island of Gotland puts on Medeltidsveckan, or 'Medieval Week,' the country's largest historical festival.

At this time of the year, the Swedish island of Got­land puts on Medeltidsveck­an, or “Medieval Week,” the coun­try’s largest his­tor­i­cal fes­ti­val. Accord­ing to its offi­cial About page, it offers its vis­i­tors the chance to “watch knights on horse­back, drink some­thing cold, take a craft­ing course, prac­tice archery, lis­ten to a con­cert or pic­nic along the beach, while wait­ing for some ruin show or per­for­mance in some moat!” If next year’s Medeltidsveck­an incor­po­rates elec­tron­ic-music ses­sions as well, it will sure­ly be thanks to inspi­ra­tion from the EP-1320 sam­pler, or instru­men­tal­is elec­tron­icum, just released by Swedish elec­tron­ics com­pa­ny Teenage Engi­neer­ing. “The elec­tron­ic instru­ment is portable too, and the design team includes a quilt­ed hard­cov­er case, t‑shirt, key­chain, and a vinyl record fea­tur­ing songs and sam­ples.” Clear­ly, the EP-1320 isn’t just a piece of nov­el­ty stu­dio gear, but a sym­bol of its own­er’s appre­ci­a­tion for the trans­po­si­tion of all things medieval into our mod­ern dig­i­tal world.

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