Kit Kat MIDI Keyboard

Michael Kohn has decided to give a whole new meaning to "sweet music" by creating an edible MIDI keyboard. While some might say "give me a break" to such an idea, to those of us who are constantly inundated by potential builds, a candy themed keyboard probably sounds delicious.

Plus, Kohn's setup doesn’t look particularly difficult to construct, and thus wouldn't be a huge time commitment. The interface of the device is made from eight white and five brown Kit Kat bars, forming an alternating arrangement of keys in a small keyboard setup. These choc-o-keys are situated in cardboard cutout holders and arranged so they each push down on a button to trigger the proper note.

The pushbuttons are wired up to an ATtiny2313, which sends a note-on MIDI command when depressed, then a note-off command when the button is released. An M5Stack Unit MIDI plays the actual sound, though it could, in theory, be used with other electronic instruments too.

Lots more info can be found in Kohn’s writeup, and source code is available on GitHub. The short video below outlines the build and gives a demo of it playing a rather familiar — and appropriate — song. Of course, the confectionery configuration could be applied to any number of candies, and if you wanted a more permanent and/or less messy keyboard, non-food materials could be used with the same electronics.