Champagne corks may or may not be flying over at the headquarters of local tech company Artiphon — it is, after all, only lunchtime — but they have plenty to celebrate. The Kickstarter campaign for their Instrument 1, a touch-sensitive controller for digital instruments, went live this morning, and has already surpassed its $75,000 goal. At press time, they've secured over $82,000, with 40 days to go.

Mike Butera and his team designed the Instrument 1 to be reconfigurable for just about any performance style you can imagine — bow it, strum it, beat on it, play it like a piano. Last we heard, it went into beta testing last February. As the project has progressed, there have been some cool changes in response to evolving technology, like compatibility with software beyond iOS (MIDI implementation over USB!), responsiveness to the NFC chips in some Samsung and Apple handsets (the tech that enables Google Wallet and Apple Pay) and more.

"We can make these by hand," Butera told the Scene in 2013. "They're very expensive. ... If we could make it in Nashville, and it [only] cost $5 more, would we do it? Yes. But is anyone stepping up to provide those services to us? Would the investors support that? Do people care about that enough? It's just an ongoing question."

It appears they now have an answer.

The capital raised will fund a pilot production run and a final round of testing before the Instrument 1 goes into mass production, and Instrument 1s are expected to ship to Kickstarter backers in January 2016. If you want to get your hands on the base model, you can do so at the early-bird price of $299. Once the early-birds are gone (which won't be long), you can still get one for $350, get one for yourself and donate one to a school for $599, or step up to the Nashville Edition, which boasts a wooden base and premium speakers (which most resembles the original version) for $899.