Theremin Harness?

...but for experimentation purposes...by all means, use the B3! Whatever you think would work best for tinkering and logistics mapping is what you should use. :)

Ah, yes, you would need something wide like a standard if you go with a wide two octave range.

It will take some experimentation, you never know, one might, over time be able to gradually learn how to play a tighter field while moving around as one gains experience with this kind of playing.

I'm imagining a marching band of thereminists or mayotrimin players. The band could call themselves "The Lemmings", because I'm sure they'd blindly walk off a cliff if you lead them to it.

carport888 wrote:
>I'm thinking a new Theremin may be very beneficial to create
>for this purpose. It should have the following features:
>
>Wide Linear Note Spacing

Yes, we'd all like that. So far nobody has been able to do it in a mass produced Theremin. (I'm not counting the Ethervox as mass produced, since there were only, what, 48 of them?) If even Bob Moog couldn't do it for less than $5000, I don't think this is going to come easily.

> Multiple Timbre Control Options: I think a lot of cool things
> can happen here! Imagine 50-100 Theremins on the field
> playing, with no other instruments, but you hear Trumpets,
> Tubas, Clarinets, Violins, Cellos, women singing...all you
> would need would be right there! If a Tuba timbre dude is out
> sick, give their sheet music to someone else in an
> overpopulated timbre group. Violin dude is now Tuba dude.

Yes, that's precisely what the musicians' guild was worried about in the 20's. It hasn't caught on. The amount of space a Thereminist needs around them makes playing with orchestras full of Theremins prohibitive because they'd need a football field just to stand in. I don't think anybody has ever actually exceeded 10 Theremins in a group.

This is, of course, not to mention the sheer impossibility of finding large numbers of precision Thereminists all available to come to the same place at the same time.

If you want a bunch of people with portable instruments that can interchangably sound like different acoustic instruments, get a bunch of keyboard players and strap yamaha digital synthesizers to them.

> Percussion may be tricky, though...unless MIDI is introduced
> somehow...

Even if it is, you don't want to do percussion in the air. Trust me, I've done it, I have an instrument that can handle that. You have to not only apply the muscle energy required to get the hand moving quickly, but also to stop it quickly and precisely in air so you don't hit the sensor. It looks cool as heck but it's *very* draining. 10 minutes of that and your arms will feel like you've done a couple hours of heavy labor.

There's a great portable instrument that can be used for percussion. It's called a "drum".

> Wireless Signal Emitters:

Tends to either get screwed up by the Theremin's fields or screw the Theremin up.

> Anything I'm forgetting?

That all of these things have been thought of before?

It's fun to dream, though. Obviously, this will not be a commonplace activity ANY time soon. However, it would be pretty cool to eventually see at a big Theremin event.

[b]*There's a great portable instrument that can be used for percussion. It's called a "drum".*[/b]

What's the fun in that? All a marching band would need is one deep drum sound built into the Theremin. A simple on/off would suffice. I'm not talking about drumline solos. If the field is covered in theremins doing all sorts of sounds and styles, anything being played other than a Theremin would be a sore thumb and almost act as a slap in the face to the limitations of one's imagination with the Theremin, as if said instrument would say, "Ha! I'm the only one you CAN'T mimick! I'm better than you in this way, Theremin!"

[b]*The amount of space a Thereminist needs around them makes playing with orchestras full of Theremins prohibitive because they'd need a football field just to stand in.*[/b]

Isn't this what a marching band does? I'm not expecting a lot of fancy weaving formations...just something to get the Theremin-loving crowd engaged.

[b]*If even Bob Moog couldn't do it for less than $5000, I don't think this is going to come easily.*[/b]

Since when do things have to come easily? I said a 'new Theremin would be beneficial' because we are obviously not there now. From what I understand, Bob Moog revolutionized Theremins by creating transistorized versions. Technology is always advancing. Who's to say that in 10, 20, maybe 50 years, there won't be a new Theremin building revolution that will do away with transistors as outdated technology. We're already able to fit a decent sounding Theremin into a Matryoshka doll. Perhaps theremins will simply be a long telescoping rod of some sort that bends in the middle to form a 90 degree angle (or whatever shape you want). The tip on one half will control volume, while the other half will control pitch. Computer companies predicted that one day computers would be able to fit into a single room! The date they gave for this to happen by instead saw computers that fit into people's lap, let alone barely fit into a single room! They also said they didn't know why anyone would ever want to own a computer.

Yes, I'm WELL aware of the physical and monetary constraints something like this would be bogged down by. I'm simply providing my vision of a fun event that is theoretically possible. Theremins still have a LONG way to go. There are MANY improvements that can still be made. Obviously, we're not to the marching band stage now, but to write it off so easily is just not visionary. Obviously, better pitch, timbre, wireless control(...) has all been thought of and dreamed about before; but if we don't keep that vision alive, it will most likely be swept under a rug or forgotten altogether. I'm NOT saying that I think you DON'T want these things, I'm just saying that you don't seem very enthused by some of them. Then again, I could be the one daydreaming away my practice time with silly thoughts of a future that will never bother to exist. :)

[b]*> Anything I'm forgetting?

That all of these things have been thought of before?*[/b]

I didn't claim these were new ideas. They are simply ideas that I think would work well in a situation such as a marching band. They are the 'current limitations', if you will, that I believe would need to be overcome should a decent Theremin marching band ever come to fruition.

I'm not really interested in seeing a bunch of high school students crap up their halftime show with a poor Theremin marching debacle, but in 50 years, sure, I'd love to go to a massive Theremin gathering and see the excitement alive and mobile! But for now, all I really want is a way to get my Theremin to sway WITH me during practice! :)

I don't think I'd be able to concentrate on walking along, keeping time with everyone else and playing the theremin *accurately* at the same time. Besides which, would it really look that great? Why couldn't they just sit down? And the interference between the theremins would be so bad. As if the pitching wouldn't be bad enough, there'd be loads of distortion and ring modulation.

This is something I want to have in a theremin, that hasn't been done. A frequency selector, to prevent interference between like instruments onstage.

I wouldn't want a theremin with reduced range. I honestly don't think it would make things that much easier, it would reduce the range you can encompass with aerial fingering, and deplete the instrument's potential.

Yes, the Theremin would DEFINATELY need to be completely redesigned to ever work in a marching band type role. I know I would never want to deal with marching WHILE playing either! :)

At the very least, a harness could get a theremin into a sci-fi convention parade for some other-worldly effects. "...and here's the cast of 'The Day the Earth Stood Still 2' riding on a giant Gort head. Oh, look, they even have a Theremin player walking alongside making some spoooo-oooooky sounds...nice touch!"

A suggestion...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8666613@N04/1412216696/


[i]This is something I want to have in a theremin, that hasn't been done. A frequency selector, to prevent interference between like instruments onstage.[/i]

http://www.no1derland.com/web05/009.htm

"12. The Tune control is used to tune the Pitch antenna. This is useful if you are using more than one Theremin, because you can use it to tune them apart so that they don't interfere with one another. You can also use it to deliberately make them interfere with each other for strange sound-effects."

:-)

...But what about the matryomins?

http://youtube.com/watch?v=T4tEUHnj8A8

There's at least 10 matryoninists in a very confined space in this video, with less than a foot or so of space between some of the instruments, and no adverse interactions going on between them.

Perhaps a modified version of the matryomin is what's needed for a true mobile theremin playing group.

Mind you, there's not a whole lot of movement going on with the performers, and I'm sure there would be intonation challenges which I feel could be overcome with time, and practice.

They said the sound barrier couldn't be broken, but it was.

>> There's a great portable instrument that can be used for
>>percussion. It's called a "drum".
>
>What's the fun in that?

The fun is in the fact that you don't feel like your arms are going to fall off after you've been playing a drum for 10 minutes.

I wasn't kidding when I said I've done it. Half an hour of air drumming, and my arms ached for a full day.

>>The amount of space a Thereminist needs around them
>>makes playing with orchestras full of Theremins prohibitive
>>because they'd need a football field just to stand in.*
>
> Isn't this what a marching band does?

No, a marching band doesn't need a 10 foot radius empty space around each player. A marching band doesn't have to worry that if the glockenspiel gets to close to the drum it will start to emit loud screeching noises. A marching band's members are generally capable of paying attention to both playing their instrument and walking at the same time: most Thereminists don't have enough attention left over from playing their instrument to be able to smile while they play it.

>> If even Bob Moog couldn't do it for less than $5000, I don't
>> think this is going to come easily.*
>
>Since when do things have to come easily? I said a 'new
>Theremin would be beneficial' because we are obviously not
>there now.

My point is that when you say things like this:

> I created this thread to brainstorm fun alternatives for the
> Theremin. After all, it's one of the only instruments that I
> know of that truly IS only limited by our own imagination. I
> think I understand what you are saying, though,
> teslatheremin. It sounds like you would rather the Theremin
> be doomed to oblivion by the general population than flourish
> as a punchline.

...and go on lobbing concepts that sound an awful lot like "let's just invent the magical dream theremin that everyone has been trying to make for 88 years" as if they're novel ideas, you've entered the realm of being... hmm, how to put it? Offensively obvious. Yeah, we know a more linear Theremin would be useful. Duh. It comes off like you're chastising us for not fulfilling these blindingly obvious goals that are simply not that easy to achieve.

>From what I understand, Bob Moog revolutionized Theremins
>by creating transistorized versions. Technology is always
>advancing. Who's to say that in 10, 20, maybe 50 years, there
>won't be a new Theremin building revolution that will do away
>with transistors as outdated technology.

The principles of electronics have been pretty much worked out for a long time now: it's just a matter of coming up with new combinations of the same old parts. Tubes too big? Use a transistor. Transistors too big? Use a microchip. But, they each have advantages and disadvantages, and are not exactly interchangeable in all circumstances. There are ways in which the tubes and giant air coils of Lev Termin's time surpass the abilities of contemporary transistorized design, and if you want those features, the only way to get them is to go back to old fashioned parts. This is not for lack of the discovery of some new part, this is simple physics.

> We're already able to fit a decent sounding Theremin into a
> Matryoshka doll.

It's not really a theremin, it's more of an aetherphon, but that's not the point. Miniaturization does not equal progress. I'm sure that if I had a few good technicians to do some design work and the resources of a large electronics company to perform the manufacture, we could make a Theremin the size of a ball point pen... but why would we want to? What good would it do?

There are simple limits to Theremin technology that you will find you can't really break without creating an essentially different instrument. It can be small, or it can be more easily playable. Pick one.

> Perhaps theremins will simply be a long telesc

Thomas Grillo writes:
>There's at least 10 matryoninists in a very confined space in
> this video, with less than a foot or so of space between some
> of the instruments, and no adverse interactions going on
> between them.

Yes. Some factors to consider:

1) They're battery powered. They don't have much power to interfere with each other.
2) They only have pitch fields, no volume fields, so they have fewer fields to interfere.
3) They may be individually tuned not to interfere with each other. Hard to say.
4) They have very small pitch fields, requiring fairly precise movements. That's fine for the maytrominists, who sit down while they play, but I suspect it'd make it all the harder if they were trying to walk and play. The small pitch fields reduce the space required around the player, but are precisely opposite of what has been discussed here as being desirable for mobile play.