Gibson Maestro theremin

Hello Mike,

Thank you for your wonderful website. I think your  Maestro sounds like the circuitry I see. If I were to change something to improve the sound I would reduce the two 100pf capacitors to a 47pf or smaller. One secret in theremin design is the two oscillators should not know the other one exists. Sort of like tall fences make for good neighbors.

Observing your sound in Audacity the signal is overdriven which clips the bottom of the audio wave peak and to much pulling or fighting between the oscillators on the low end. Enjoy

PS: My Harmonic Exciter boards could make this have the sound of Clara. Then you would have to call it Maestra, not Maestro. 

Christopher

Thanks, Christopher.

I will pass your comment onto Andrew, the co-creator of our website. We do consider it to be a joint effort and are glad that people are getting use out of it. Stay tuned for some updates in the following months, we've got some exciting content we're finalizing.

I might try your suggestion about reducing the caps (odd that one of them didn't get numbered on the schematic!). I'll let you know what I come up with.

Up to a certain point on the volume pot, the Maestro doesn't distort. It's kind of like the old "Doctor, it hurts when I do this." "Then don't do that." routine. the signal at TL5 is clean, so something must be happening after R19. Such an odd theremin.

Mike