Untouchable

Beautiful instrument! Had no idea about the "whammy bar". I love that turtle shell design you reproduced too. No where is the saying "a picture is worth a thousand words" more relevant than in trying to recreate ancient instruments.

I'm a medieval/renaissance instrument lover from way back in my days playing in the music school's camerata - recorders, crumhorns and cornetto  (started out as a trumpet player). I'm learning the duduk now. Great instrument! That's a couple thousand years old or more I think - known to make grown Armenian men cry (especially when I play it). 

You going do up a performance? Do up a piece for that lyre and theremin and you'll be right back on topic.

As for the theremin sample library. I can control the modulation amount better - I was too tame in how I was drawing the CC controls. I think this is better - but not perfect as I can't seem to change the modulation rate under CC control. Could add a bit more dynamic phrasing too. But I think it's fine for my goal of giving someone an idea so they may want to play it.

Untouchable - Better Vibrato

Have you considered getting a Haken Continuum? It has the advantage of 3-way “X-Y-Z” control (left/right, backward/forward, up/down) so you can control timbre as well as volume, portamento, vibrato, etc. with one hand (which frees your other hand for a completely different task, such as playing a standard keyboard). 

The duduk is a wonderful instrument. I tried it a few years ago but I did not take to it naturally so it was going to require more time than I had hoped in order to acquire the skill to play it. There are some instruments that I can play (at a roughly intermediate level) without ever having to practice at all. I just DO IT. It all depends on “transferrable skills” from the various instruments I have played over the years. 

Your third version of UNTOUCHABLE does seem to have a narrower vibrato but if you had a half-size Continuum you could control every aspect of it down to the most subtle level, just as you can on a theremin. 

Apologies if you have heard the following (Continuum, voice & Triton) I was having a kind of Tibetan day when I did this.

https://youtu.be/stMm9YEMSd0

Yea I heard that. It's what turned me on to it! I really want that 1/2 Haken. I've ruled out the Seaboard. I'm really interested in that natural vibrato and inflection it can create and how I can apply that to all my instrument samples to get a more natural sounding performance.

Therevox ET-4.3 is also interesting, but the Haken is my top priority. Kid in college is the problem. After that, I really want to learn Le Cristal Baschet (but that may not be in the cards). 

I weave in and out of musical styles myself. Whatever the muse dictates on any particular day goes.  Part of why early instruments are so interesting to me is that playing and studying them conjures up sounds and images of the past and sparks your brain into perhaps fresh musical areas - at least for today's ears.

Back to the Tibetan mood - I like the concept of composing like eating food.  "What will you write today? I don't know. I think I'll go Laotian". Come to think of it, I have absolutely no idea what Laotian music sounds like. Off to YouTube I go...

Holy cow - the Khaen. That's the ticket! I gots to get me one of these! Some kind of weird Laotian bamboo harmonica-like contraption. Like blowing into a pipe organ.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hasL_6i7kHg

There is such a wonderful world of music to be discovered out there for us stodgy westerners by looking to old ethnic instruments.

The Wot is interesting too. I've heard of that one but never looked into it. Kind of a cross of a pan pipe and a Gatling gun!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyDIBnPmhpM

A theremin duet with a Khaen could be interesting.

Actually I have an idea for a Duduk and Theremin duet. Because the Duduk is traditionaly played in pairs - melody on one and drone on the other, I was thinking of a piece where Duduk would have a melody against a lower theremin drone and then they would switch off with higher Duduk drone against lower theremin melodic material and continue like that in various ways. When I get a little better on Duduk I'll do something up.

Beautiful!  Really liking "v1", would love to give it a try.

Thanks. I agree the more sine-like tone of the first version is better suited to the piece - even with the sample library's artifacts (I removed a number of them by slurring things more - which is really more the way the piece is notated anyway).

https://soundcloud.com/rk53-1/untouchable-for-theremin-guitar-viola-and-cello

I think it will sound good on my Etherwave.

OK. If anyone wants to give it a shot, I put the complete score, theremin part and an accompaniment you can play along to on my IMSLP page - link below. I'm rather liking the theremin and acoustic guitar combination (I always like theremin and strings).

Untouchable Score, Theremin Part and Accompaniment

Looks like IMSLP already opened it up for those that are interested. Let's try Jason's new just type a link and it's active:

http://imslp.org/wiki/Untouchable_(Kram,_Richard)

Nice!