Progress Reports

Hi,

I thought a forum page devoted to people wanting to post their progress might be interesting. I just received my Etherwave Plus at he beginning of August and have had maybe 10-12 hours of practice (so I really don't know what I'm doing yet). Just trying to play in tune.

Did up a simple synthezier pad arrangement of the initial melody from Dvorak's Largo (9th Symphony). Played about 20 takes. This was the best - not worth trying to do any more as obviously this is my current level of proficiency. Sorry for all the tuning issues - but for 10 hours I assume it could be worse. 

Multitracked it in Cubase. The initial intro is one take and the melody is another complete take (so I didn't try to cut and paste a better performance - as the goal is to keep a record of my progress). 

I posted it on Soundcloud here: https://soundcloud.com/rk53-1/largo

Largo - Theremin & Kurzweil PC3x Synthesizer

I did add some processing to the Etherwave (but no pitch correction):

1. A tad of Moogerfooger delay (very tough getting a good setting that doesn't throw the sound off too much)

2. Hall of Fame - Hall reverb

3. Run through an Aural Exciter C (I find it adds a bit of character to the Etherwave which to me is very sterile sounding). I'm doing a lot of experimentation here.

4. A smidge of Waves C1 compression to let it sit better.

5. The final mix has Waves J37 tape emulation on it (smooths everything out a bit).

Didn't add any reverb to the final mix. Obivously I'm interesting in how the theremin can be mixed in the studio. I have no desire any time soon to perform in public (something tells me nerves and the theremin don't go too well together).

Well, maybe I'll do up another progress report in a month or so.

Rich

hello rkram53,

your mama did a good job pointing you to the theremin! wow, regarding the short time your into it. i'm not the classical one really  so i can't judge. and when i'm practicing it's more like "hits on 45" with melodies i like. but from my humble shortsighted ,-3.5, point of view, i would say "you're on the right tracks".

regarding the sterile sound: i guess you read allready about the great extensionability of sound by the ready made espe-board or the yaewsbm ? all mentioned on TW. and you can solder i hope.

btw.: the really cool thing about theremins: you don't get blisters! 

also ps.: my favorite is pachelbels canon. with loop pedal! my ugly duckling never turned into a swan.

whack whack

dani

Dani,

Thanks. This thing has me possessed. Yea I've read about the add-on boards. I assume I'll go for one of them soon. For now I just want to see what I can do with the base instrument.

Maybe I'll do up a Pachelbel canon version one day soon, though I'm not sure that piece is a great one for the theremin. I'll have to do some contrapuntal surgery on it (good thing I'm a Baroque music nut).

That image link info worked fine. Thanks Again.

Rich

thats tw, helping somebody somehow if possible. but maybe i'm suffering some sort of stendhal-syndrome about the theremin  anyway...

;-)

I look forward to following your progress ;^)

8/24/14

Perhaps I should also log a few words about my process as I progress  (what I do may in fact be contrary to established or accepted recommendations for beginnings but I'm going to go with the flow on this instrument for a while).

On first setting up the Etherwave and connecting it to my amp - my initial thought was - Holy Cow, IMPOSSIBLE!

So then I looked at all the web sites showing you hand positions and playing intervals, etc. - my initial thought there was - no way, I can't seem to get any repeatability no matter what I do. I'm not ready for process yet.

So I thought, lets start by just trying to match pitches. Don't care about hand positions. I'll let my ear guide where my hand has to go. So I connected an iPod to the amp's second input and started playing along to slow music. To my surprise, once I had this tonal pinning in place it was much easier to find pitches. I found the easiest way to find them was to treat the theremin as a virtual ribbon controller. I played with the music with my hand in front of me running horizontally from antenna to antenna. Of course the volume antenna at some point started interfering with my plan as my right hand approached it. But still, for the higher register this seemed to work well. I even see some people on the internet playing acceptably this way. Vibrato came without thinking - it was just a natural byproduct of trying to match any sustained pitch to try and keep it in tune.

Next I started trying to use the volume hand to articulate pitches as best I could. Still a long way to go there. I find it's actually more comfortable using my left palm up and approaching the antenna from beneath (but I gave that up for now as it does seem there is more control from above). I'm short and I wish that volume antenna was offset more in front of the theremin so you don't have to reach uncomfortably with that left hand. I wonder if I can get some metal tubing and create my own antenna plumbing to move that volume antenna to a better positions for me. Maybe I'll give that a shot down the road.

I'm now moving my hand more and more on an angle from the horizontal playing position I started with to increase the range and also it seems to affect the tone a bit in a positive way. 

Next I opened the thing up and connected the pitch preview. Frankly I don't like that buzzing as it interferes with my ability to hear the pitch (my ears unfortunately were damaged by too much loud ear-phone use so I'm not crazy about sticking ear-buds in them). But it is a godsend for finding starting pitches of phrases that begin with large disjunct motion. I need to figure out a better way to deal with that pitch preview function.

Now its time to start looking into getting myself some repeatable technique. I'm moving my hand way too much right now. I see a number of hand positions on the web videos and I'll try a few of them to see what is most comfortable and what works best for me.

Rich

hi rich,

i'm also still a searcher on his path, (so please any more advanced one, feel free to interfere.)

did you watch kip rosser's videos? he also shows some freer approaches. specially the ones on the volume hand were interesting to me. did you played stringed instruments? i did. but had to stop all tactile more challenging instruments of medical reasons, so i'm somewhat stick to the theremin. what  has one more to wish? i played bass and guitar since teen.  so my "thing" is more the plucked , walking bass style of interest. with a smaller yolume field i have a quicker respond of the volume.and  i'm still the bassplayer in the band,  so pamelia kurstin and randy george  have good "insight" videos on yt  to learn into that direction. sure it looks easy....

my handicap is more the quick right hand. but that's rheumathematicly meaown mystery to solve.

but i guess there are many good teachers out there in your greater aerea. if you need one. some real good thereministers also offer skype lessons. if so, they all have it on their websites.

that would have spoiled my own privat party as per se. but i'm just a passing byer.

         and like the old say: speed comes with time. 

all the best

Thanks - I'll check out the videos. Can't recall if I looked at those. I play keyboard (also used to play recorder and trumpet). So pretty much all the instruments I've ever played are fixed pitch. I'm a self learner so I'm going to see how far I can get on my own for a while. I'm really a composer so I'm very interested in writing music for the theremin.

Rich

rich,

as an also autodidact, aaaa, i would say: yes check them out. part from good bad and ugly. you'r on your way and get familiar with that mostextraordinary force fielded lovelty. and its included madnessery. but most of all

 MAY THE FORCES BE WITH YOU

even if it's just real good mangled voltage

ps.: regarding your previouser post: i know why i'm a barock type. ;-)

rich,

some last foolish thoughts by me :  if you wanna go pro: this is some real good reading from head to toes:

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/levnet/XMOnKrbTqds  

these people there have experience. and as you can see : it might get snappy.! love that to read.

dani