MUSIC...WITH BALLS

Amazing, innit?

There’s an e-mailed Urban Legend floating around the Inter-Webby-Net to the effect that the video above is of an actual machine. To wit:

Please open this one - AMAZING (for real!)

This incredible machine was built as a collaborative effort between The Robert M. Trammell Music Conservatory and the Sharon Wick School of Engineering at the University of Iowa. Amazingly, 97% of the machines components came from John Deere Industries and Irrigation Equipment of Bancroft Iowa - yes, farm equipment!

It took the team a combined 13,029 hours of set-up, alignment, calibration, and tuning before filming this video but as you can see it was WELL worth the effort...

It is now on display in the Matthew Gerhard Alumni Hall at the University and is already slated to be donated to the Smithsonian.

As I often do when I get items like this in the old e-mail bag, I checked it out at snopes.com, and, as I expected, it is not what it is advertised to be. There are just a few small problems:

1. There is no Robert M. Trammell Music Conservatory.
   
2. There is no Sharon Wick School of Engineering at the University of Iowa.
3. There is also no Matthew Gerhard Alumni Hall at the University of Iowa.
4. It’s pretty obvious to the casual observer that the video is a brilliant piece of computer animation...but animation nonetheless.

Simply scrape the Internet Bullshit Frosting off; you are still left with an entertaining video confection.

[Tip o’ the’ Elisson fedora to Auntie Zelda for the link.]