13 Jun 2021

Hail the Funklet

Funklet is 10 years old.

Developed from a booklet by Jack Stratton, who wrote the articles, this was an early Web Audio API experiment, one of the first web-tech-based drum machines available.

— Rob Stenson (designer & developer)

2011

I want to make a book about drumming that looks good. A funky beat is a great design.

Some great designers:

Bernard Purdie

James Gadson

Herman Roscoe Ernerst III

Zigaboo

Roger Hawkins

Clyde Stubblefield

— Jack Stratton, The Funklet: Graphic notations of twenty classic funk beats. June 2011.

funklet booklet (facebook)

2012

One of the best Kickstarter projects I contributed towards in 2011 … was Jack Stratton’s “Funklet: Graphic notations of twenty classic funk beats.”

While the Funklet is now out of print, Stratton has encouraged his backers to pass around the PDF version, and a website presenting interactive versions of roughly half of the beats has been launched at Funklet.com.

— Adam Kemper. January 2012

funklet booklet (kempa.com)

Rob Stenson called and said we should make a website with a sequencer that plays Funklet beats. I, in a stroke of genius, agreed.

Behold: funklet.com (in chrome)

— Jack Stratton, March 2012

funklet sequencer