An isomorphic multitouch keyboard instrument for touchscreens featuring a triangular key layout.
▶ Live demo https://barjak-keyboard.netlify.app
▶ GitHub Pages demo https://lbarjak.github.io/barjak-keyboard/
▶ Video demo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAFolFpNNH0&lc=
- Multitouch, multitimbral instrument for touchscreens (also playable with a mouse).
- Any number of voices can be played simultaneously.
- Each row acts as a separate instrument, allowing multiple instances of the same sound.
- The triangular keys are less sensitive near their vertices, allowing smooth whole-note glissandos without lifting the finger.
- Works immediately with USB MIDI devices (MIDI input).
Barjak keyboard is an isomorphic musical keyboard layout designed by András Barják.
Instead of square or hexagonal keys, the layout uses triangular keys, forming a triangular grid across the surface.
In an isomorphic keyboard, every musical interval corresponds to the same geometric displacement on the playing surface. This means that chord shapes, scales, and fingering patterns remain identical in every key.
The triangular key arrangement forms a triangular lattice, a natural two-dimensional grid that represents musical intervals in a compact and ergonomic way.
Notes repeat along straight lattice directions, making interval relationships visually apparent and easy to learn.
András Barják has been fascinated by the possibilities of isomorphic keyboards since childhood.
He owns an Axis 49 MIDI controller and has mostly played the Wicki-Hayden layout (also known as the Jammer layout). As a young pianist he was interested in the Jankó keyboard, and as a guitar player he experimented with several isomorphic tunings such as tritone tuning.
The Hexiano app, which mapped both layouts onto a hexagonal grid on Android, also provided inspiration.
The Wicki-Hayden layout offers excellent improvisational possibilities for diatonic music (folk, pop, rock, modal jazz), while the Jankó layout is particularly convenient for chromatic music (jazz and contemporary classical).
However, their advantages and disadvantages are almost mutually exclusive: the ergonomic modal playability of the Wicki-Hayden layout comes at the cost of reduced chromatic accessibility, while conventional tonal music can be harder to approach on the Jankó layout.
The Barjak layout was created as an attempt to combine the strengths of both systems into a single layout.
- Fingering patterns are consistent and easy to transpose.
- Ergonomic access to fourths, fifths, and octaves.
- Diatonic scales are accessible on triangles of similar orientation without moving the hand horizontally.
- Chromatic ornamentations and passing tones are easily available.
- Chromatic playing remains easier than on a traditional piano keyboard.
- More complex than the Wicki-Hayden layout.
- Mistakes may sound more dissonant compared to other layouts.
Code: László Barják (2020)