Moog Music Theremini Reviews

As soon as i have my Theremini i'll post my impressions, i hope this happens on the next two weeks, i've keept my hands without playing Theremin just to wait that moment, a little more of patience    

Hi, Randy et al,

Thanks for your post and thorough evaluation of the prototype. About two and a half weeks ago, I received the commercial version of the Theremini as an early birthday present from my wife.

Long story short, I was extremely disappointed and returned the Theremini the very next day. Here's why:

The first problem that I encountered was the mic stand screw on the underside of the Theremini was supposed to be compatible with a camera screw or a mic stand screw. This is simply not true. The screw hole was too small for a mic stand and too large for a camera stand. I drove all over town searching for the right size adaptor. Finally, at a Guitar Center there was a knowledgeable Brit on staff. He told me that the screw hole was probably the size of a European mic stand screw. After searching the back room for about 20 minutes he found an adaptor that he said was, 'laying around', on the floor. He also informed me that none were available for sale in the store.

This mic stand/camera stand issue should have, at the very least, been mentioned in the Quick Setup information. In reality, an adaptor should have been included for U.S. customers. 

So, I finally got the Theremini home and mounted on a mic stand.

Before I tried the "bells and whistles" of the instrument, I wanted to see if it could be played as a traditional theremin. I carefully went through the "Tuning and Setup Procedure". No matter how many times I went through the "Procedure", the spacing of the Theremini was never the same twice in a row. After each procedure, the same octave's spacing was either stretched, compressed or something  in-between. There were wild fluctuations at each end of the pitch range as well. For those reasons, there was no chance for any consistency or melodic playability.

I then set the pitch quantization as low as it could go. Unfortunately, there seemed to be residual quantization even though I tried to turn it completely off. I could not play vibrato or even hold a note steady.

I went to the Moog Music site and read the manual, thinking that I had done something wrong. In the manual, there was mention of a possible grounding issue, so I tried almost every plug in the house. In each case, even though the Theremini was the only thing plugged into the circuit the problem persisted. (FYI, my E-Pro played fine on these circuits. Also, my E-Pro hadn't been turned on or plugged in for at least a week, so, I was confident that there was no residual interference from it.) 

I finally determined that this was either a faulty instrument or faulty design, ultimately useless to me and not worth any more of my time.

So, like I said, I returned it to the dealer.

Roger Ballenger

I had actually set the pitch quantization to off before the "Tuning and Setup Procedure" attempts.

Roger

Roger, I also know of another player on FB that purchased the Theremini and returned it the very same day! yikes.

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Rogmusic wrote: "So, like I said, I returned it to the dealer."

Roger Ballenger

"Before I tried the "bells and whistles" of the instrument, I wanted to see if it could be played as a traditional theremin. I carefully went through the "Tuning and Setup Procedure". No matter how many times I went through the "Procedure", the spacing of the Theremini was never the same twice in a row. After each procedure, the same octave's spacing was either stretched, compressed or something  in-between. There were wild fluctuations at each end of the pitch range as well. For those reasons, there was no chance for any consistency or melodic playability."  - rogmusic

IMO there really needs to be some kind of easily user tweakable adjustment here.  Use auto-cal to get you close, then tweak it to get the response you want / compensate for drift during playing.  You shouldn't have to fart around, majorly changing any setting during a performance, when a small tweak could do the job as well or better.

It's this kind of detail that will make or break a digital Theremin.  The analog needs to be highly integrated into the digital, and the UI needs to be highly integrated into the result.  The standard corporate approach is to get an analog guy to do the oscillators (likely a "cut and paste" from previous EWs - not my first choice but I suppose you could do worse) then throw it over the wall to the coders, which, in a highly nuanced instrument like the Theremin, is a recipe for disaster.

"I then set the pitch quantization as low as it could go. Unfortunately, there seemed to be residual quantization even though I tried to turn it completely off. I could not play vibrato or even hold a note steady."

All quantization needs to be watched like a hawk in a digital Theremin as it can creep in all over the place.  Any intentional quantization should be fully disable-able.

Most modern corporate electronic musical instruments seem to be designed in a vacuum.  This used to be more or less OK when the engineers were in charge, but now that the lunatics (committees of bean counters, style boys, and product tiering experts) are running the asylum this usually produces a notably sub-optimal result, particularly for the enthusiast who is looking for (and willing to pay for) a certain level of quality and design.

Very sorry about your bad experience Roger, particularly in association with your birthday and all.

As I understand from the Theremini user manual, the calibration of pitch and volume is very similar to that of the Open Theremin although the latter is much easier but less comprehensive in-so-far as the Theremini seems to give the potential of setting the pitch/volume at both ends of responsiveness (highest/lowest note, max/min volume level) for each antenna.
When setting the playing distances for the Open Theremin, I found that it was fairly simple to get reproducibility to within (say) three or four inches each time but not much more. Reproducibility was better on the volume antenna.
Possibly the same thing is happening here?

Sorry to hear of your not so happy theremini experience Roger. Hope you made up for it in other ways!

Theremini manual:

http://www.moogmusic.com/sites/default/files/Theremini_Manual_6_16.pdf

So there is an overall "calibrate" where you stand away from the Theremini and wait a bit.  The "highest note position" and "lowest note position" are similar, where the pitch hand is placed near and far from the pitch antenna and one waits a bit.

Whereas the high and low "note range" settings are via the preset knob.

I think it might be better to link the note positions and the note ranges, and then have relative adjustments for pitch offset and pitch sensitivity.  I don't think most players are all that concerned with the absolute pitch of the end points, but more with what pitch is in the mid-field and how sensitive it plays there.

I think it might be better to link the note positions and the note ranges, and then have relative adjustments for pitch offset and pitch sensitivity.  I don't think most players are all that concerned with the absolute pitch of the end points, but more with what pitch is in the mid-field and how sensitive it plays there.-dewster

Aye, that sounds about right.

Thinking about this a bit more, they should perhaps allow just one auto calibration (with manual tweak) - and this would be for the far hand position.  Any reduced sensitivity due to nearby objects etc. could be compensated for by tweaking up the sensitivity (were there such a control). 

It probably looked good on paper / sounded like a winner in the meetings, but the Theremini calibration seems too hands-off / automatic / open ended / ambitious.  IFF (a big "if and only if") it can be made simple and straightforward, then I believe you're much better off with a human in the calibration loop.

And all my blathering is sans any contact whatsoever with the Theremini, so massive grain of salt.

When I posted last night, I forgot to say that I didn't just try the Theremini a couple of times, throw my hands in the air an give up. I spent hours pouring over the online manual, trying every setting's iteration that I could think of and experimenting with many stance variables, to no avail. 

Moog Music's contribution to the world of theremins and theremin players cannot be measured. Considering their record of 'home runs', 'triples and doubles', the Theremini appears to be a 'foul ball' in need of a batting coach.