Imagine seeing music converted into lightening. That's what you'll witness at a performance by Case Western Reserve University's
Tesla Orchestra. The group has the world's largest twin musical tesla coils. They're 13 feet tall and generate 13-to-18-feet-long lightening streaks to music that includes the theme from the movie "2001:A Space Odyssey" and songs by Lady Gaga, the B-52s and Girl Talk.
Ian Charnas, who received undergraduate degrees in computer engineering and mechanical engineering from Case in 2005, started the Tesla Orchestra in 2008.
"At schools offering engineering degrees, civil engineering students typically design a bridge, and mechanical engineering students design a car," he explains. "There wasn't a standard project for electrical engineering students. I thought this would be a cool electrical project with lots of facets and challenges to it that could also include mechanical engineering students."
Twenty undergraduate and graduate electrical and mechanical engineering students are involved in the Tesla Orchestra, as well as some alumni and staff.
Ed Burwell, the Sears Undergraduate Design Laboratory Director in Case's
School of Engineering, provides guidance to the students.
Having both electrical engineering students and mechanical engineering students collaborate on this is important," he explains. "It gives electrical engineering students something unusual to work on with a lot of challenges they wouldn't experience with more mundane projects, and mechanical engineering students are solving problems that contribute to the form and function of the tesla coils. Students in both disciplines are getting valuable insights into real-world design."
The Tesla Orchestra performed in Croatia and the Netherlands last summer and recently entertained more than 600 fans at Cleveland's Masonic Auditorium. Through its new Open Spark Project, the Tesla Orchestra is inviting musicians everywhere to submit their songs to be performed.
Although Charnas has graduated from Case and runs a company that develops websites and i-phone apps, he is still very much involved in the Tesla Orchestra. "I interact and dance with the lightening in a full-body chain-mail suit during our concerts," he says, noting that the electricity goes through the chain mail suit and not through him. "Everyone needs a hobby," he remarks. "This is mine."
Sources: Ian Charnas, founder Tesla Orchestra, and Ed Burwell, Case Western Reserve University
Writer: Lynne Meyer