The conductive fabric drumsticks, aptly named iSticks, were developed by David Ayman Shamma for a music hacking event in San Francisco. His winning entry is available online as a tutorial on Instructables. The iSticks use a custom designed iPad application iSteelPan and custom drum sticks made using pure copper polyester taffeta fabric (its conductive), a metal rod, string, and cotton pads. The conductive fabric along with the metal rod are the key elements that allows you to trigger the capacitive touchscreen panel on the iPad.
Adrian Freed demoing experimental drum at Maker Faire 2010
This fun project reminds me of the amazing work in experimental musical interfaces by Adrian Freed. Explore CNMAT website, especially their resource library, for loads of information on novel applications for conductive fabrics and threads. via OpenMaterials
