Entry level theremin?

Sorry, I'm yet another theremin newbie with those pesky what theremin
to buy questions. I've done a bit of research so I hope I'm not
asking anything too obvious.

I'm a long time amateur synthesiser/keyboard player.
I haven't been playing much in recent years due to a degenerative
condition that causes calcium lumps in fingers, making it painful
to play.

I'm looking to get a cheaper theremin to evalutate if I can
play music with it rather than just making noise.
Ideally I'd like to have some way to control other synthesisers,
CV out or MIDI, but I'm not exactly going to try and purchase an
EtherVox at this point in time. Getting something more expensive
in the future isn't out of the question.

Exactly how bad is that cheap Gakken Premium ?
I'm guessing it has a smallish pitch field, cramping up
the note spacing (or limiting octave range?)
making it harder to play? How is it for linearity?

Here is someone coaxing a reasonable performance out a Gakken:
Gakken Premium (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjZhpUrhsZI&feature=related)


The obvious reasonably priced theremin is the Etherwave plus
with CV outs. Does anyone have any experience with CV to MIDI
devices that would work well with a theremin?

The Burns B3 Deluxe looks attractive for the price, but as
a synth player it kind of rankles being restricted to a single
timbre.
Is a pitch to MIDI device a suitable substitute for lack of CV out
on a B3? I have heard of people using Sonuus G2M Guitar-To-MIDI
device with theremin.

After the guitar demo a bit of non-musical theremin GM2 demo here:

GM2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWaNlcXuGmI)

Gakken + Sonuss G2M would be a pretty cheap MIDI theremin.

Wavefront make a fancier Pitch to MIDI/CV box.

B3 Deluxe versus Etherwave Plus pitch linearity, which one
is more linear? Old postings seem to indicate that the B3 has
improved over it's original model and that the Etherwave
can be also be "tweaked" to make it more linear.

Besides the Gakken Premium, B3 Deluxe and Etherwave Plus
is there anything else at the lower end of the 2 antenna
pre-built theremin market that I might consider?

Are these Subscope theremins currently available?

Subscope (http://www.subscope.de/theremin/sites/tube.html)

Greg O.

Hi Greg, welcome to TW!

What follows are merely my opinions - I primarily design Theremins, not play them (but that is changing! ;)

You say:

[i]"I'm a long time amateur synthesiser/keyboard player.
I haven't been playing much in recent years due to a degenerative condition that causes calcium lumps in fingers, making it painful to play."[/i]

Sorry to hear that.. I think there is a possibility this condition could limit your potential for playing the Theremin.. Moving the fingers is essential for anything approaching accurate playing, I think.

[i]"I'm looking to get a cheaper theremin to evalutate if I can play music with it rather than just making noise."[/i]

Here is the problem.. "Cheaper" Theremins tend to be far more difficult to play.. Personally, I would advise that you dont get anything less playable than the Burns.

[i]"Ideally I'd like to have some way to control other synthesisers"[/i]

If you are looking to control a synth, and accept a limitation that when controlling a synth you dont have Theremin and Synth pitches tracking each other (i.e. dont use the Theremin's sound) then almost any pitch-CV or pitch-MIDI converter will be ok.. just tune the Theremin to give a higher frequency at its bass end. The problem with pitch-control converters is that they dont work acceptably below about 200Hz.

Get a Burns, link up a pitch-MIDI.. Use the Burns audio out when you want to play the Theremin, use the Synths audio out when you are controlling it from the Theremin.. Or..

[i]"The obvious reasonably priced theremin is the Etherwave plus with CV outs"..."Does anyone have any experience with CV to MIDI devices that would work well with a theremin?"[/i]

Do you want CV - or are you really after MIDI? - If the latter only, get a Theremin without CV and put the saving towards a Pitch - Midi.

[i]"The Burns B3 Deluxe looks attractive for the price, but as a synth player it kind of rankles being restricted to a single timbre."[/i]

I agree - But as a synth player, you will find that every Theremin has greatly limited timbre control compared to even the most basic synth.. Want a synth? Use a synth! - want to control a synth with gestural control? Use the Theremin as a controller! - This way you have two "seperate" instruments - and the timbre 'limitations' of the Theremin become less important.

[i]"Is a pitch to MIDI device a suitable substitute for lack of CV out on a B3?"[/i]

I would say yes.. As long as you dont want to play CV controlled analogue synths..

And this is a "problem" - MIDI is poorly equipped to deal with the signals coming from a Theremin.. CV is ideally suited!

My advice? Forget MIDI! Buy a EW+ and a nice old analogue mono synth with lots of CV insert points / patching.. Minimum you need are inputs for pitch CV and volume CV.

[i]"Gakken + Sonuss G2M would be a pretty cheap MIDI theremin."[/i]

LOL! ;-) .. NO!

My conclusions when looking at the options for my Theremin designs, was to forget about MIDI.. I know of no MIDI expander which can take a continuous MIDI stream from a Theremin and accurately follow this over the whole Theremin range.. MIDI control messages are ill suited for the data anyway - Most Midi stuff works with running status note on messages, and has limited acceptance for continuous control messages such as pitch and volume..
MIDI is great for keyboards and other tempered controllers - it is HOPELESS for Theremins!

In my humble opinion ;-)

Fred.

Greg,

The Sonuss G2M does look quite impressive.. 16 to 30ms latency is a lot longer than I would accept in a pitch-Midi or pitch-CV converter.. (10ms is the limit of what I would deem acceptable, and < 5ms is the target)

Bass tracking (for fundamental scientific reasons) is limited - as demonstrated in this clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5UwgjxPbfU&feature=related

The Theremin example in your posting ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWaNlcXuGmI)
to me clearly demonstrates the limitations of MIDI with Theremins.. Sure, one could make music with it.. but you cannot play anything resembling a Theremin, or track the nuances of the gestural control.

It all, I suppose, depends on what you want.. I was probably quite close to where you seem to be right now, about 3 years ago.. I was in love with the Synthesiser, and was focussed on using a capacitive device to control it..
I now love the Theremin more than the Synthesiser - And anything which causes loss of the subtleties one can 'capture' with a Theremin is, in my opinion now, too great a loss.

But - for the price, that G2M does look good!
Fred.

Thanks for the detailed reply Fred.

My fingers still move okay, it's the pressure of pressing the keys with fingers that have calcium lumps near the tips that causes discomfort.

I no longer have any analog synths with CV/gate
inputs, the only older synth I've held onto is my
Roland Juno 6 which has no inputs and well it has digital oscillators anyway LOL.

It seems pitch to MIDI would be
just as good as CV to MIDI for my purposes except
CV to MIDI would probably have lower latency.

Wavefront have a MIDI-wave pitch to MIDI box
Midi-wave (http://www.theremin.ws/index.php?page=showcase&item=midi)
It seems more complex than the Sonuss G2M
I wonder how it is for latency?
It looks like it might be a re-labeled MCV1a
MCV1a (http://www.technomage.freeserve.co.uk/tmin.htm#mcv1a)

Looks like the B3 with some kind of pitch to MIDI
would be the best starting point for me.

Is the EW+ easier to play than a B3?
I would be happy to pay the extra money
if the EW+ was more linear than the B3.

The B3 has a wired in plug pack power supply?
Would it be okay to use it with 240v to 117v step
down transformer?

Hi Greg,

Here's what happens when a good melodic thereminist plays two successive notes - say an interval of a fifth apart. Firstly he does not mute the volume in between the notes - that would separate them audibly as well as making the second note harder to locate - audio feedback is everything when playing a theremin. To acheive two apparently connected notes he moves his pitch hand very quickly from one note to the next. The effect of this is to modulate the frequency and, as with FM Synthesis, this affects the timbre of the sound - specifically it momentarily creates sidebands, enriching the sound and more significantly, spreading the energy over a wider spectrum than the simple waveform of a theremin typically occupies, causing a momentary drop in perceptual volume.

When the player reaches the target note it is unlikely he will hit the exact centre of the note first time - an experienced player will be very close, but really want to home in on the exact intonation both to sound "in tune" and to be ready for the next interval jump - vibrato is beneficial in disguising this process as well as giving more character to the sound (FM synthesis again.)

The exact opposite will happen with the Sonuss GM2 connected - as he glisses across the interval it will trigger note-on events for every semitone he passes through, emphasising rather than downplaying the gliss. Like running your finger along a keyboard.

At the end he will hit the note exactly - or so it seems - in reality he is somewhere within 50 cents above or below the note, and has no idea if he is near the middle, or resting on the cusp of the next note up or down. A tiny tremble could inadvertently trigger a semitone trill and if he overshoots the mark twice in a row he could easily hit the wrong note on the next jump.

Probably the best attempt at a theremin to MIDI solution was the Moog Ethervox - on the rare occasions that a second hand one appears for sale they get high prices - not for the MIDI capabilities! but for it's characteristics as a conventional theremin.

Here is Peter Pringle demonstrating its MIDI capabilities.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPLNEw6KH4E

Peter is an excellent thereminist, and he uses it in an appropriate context here, but really this is about the limit of what can be achieved with it. I have had opportunity to play with an MCV1a a while ago (I agree it is uncannily similar in spec to the Wavefront product - probably very similar inside) and while it offers a variety of options vis-à-vis pitch bend and so on it suffers from the same fundamental problem of triggering unwanted note-on events. Not that it isn't fun. Bendy-bells are [i]mad[/i]! But really, if that's what you want then a laser harp is a better solution - at least you can see where the darned notes are!

Another option is the dreaded pitch correction à la T-Pain. Here is John Armstrong - master of the pitch enhanced theremin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-33ebtbGH4

How cool is that!

And it segues neatly into my own humble attempt. This uses pitch correction as provided by Apple's Garageband software. As well as overdubbing and a lot of effects to shape the waveform and so on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_SWL_MV5SA

It is played on a Gakken Mini - the funky little red thing.

The point of my mentioning this is to underline that you don't need CV or MIDI to alter the sound of your theremin. The Mini has a pretty horrible square wave output, but with treatment a square wave can be shaped pretty much as you want. It was good enough for Bob Moog to do with the Etherwave Pro after all!

From a modular synthesist's point of view it is not unreasonable to consider the theremin as a single module in a modular synth. Not just a CV controller, but an oscillator and amp with an unusual facility - that the performers hands function as frequency and amplitude modulators, or seq

[i]Is the EW+ easier to play than a B3?
I would be happy to pay the extra money
if the EW+ was more linear than the B3.[/i]

Yes it is. Do so! You get more linearity and a extended pitch range.

[i]The B3 has a wired in plug pack power supply?
Would it be okay to use it with 240v to 117v step
down transformer?[/i]

No, the step down transformer will give weird effects. Grounding of the B3 is done through capacitive coupling between the windings of the original transformer. The insertion of a second transformer will give worse grounding an thus a instable pitch field and higher sensitivity to external radiation. I once saw a B3 in France transforming into an AM receiver due to that.

You should buy a power supply with 2430-240V AC input and 14 to 18V DC output. The current rating is not so important since the B3 draws only about 30mA. Make sure that the power supply which you buy has a "real" transformer inside and not a SPS module. And make sure that its free run output voltage (without any charge connected) does not exceed 20V.

If you are not experienced and thus fear for your B3 there is a "theremingénieur" in France who could do the modification for you. ;-)

http://theremin.tfrenkel.com

I normally install a power jack on the B3 in order to allow either playing on the new 230V power supply or with the (optionally available) battery adapter.

Greg,

I personally think you would be far better off getting a Theremin with CV, and buying an analogue synth! Even the cheapest analogue synth (you do not need to worry about oscillator / filter tracking being exactly 1V/Octave.. Thith a Theremin you control where the 'keys' are! ;)

With regard to latency - All pitch to MIDI converters have one big problem.. They need to resolve the incoming signal and covert this to analogue or digital..

The fastest possible (theoretical) limit is the time of one complete cycle of the input waveform.. For 100Hz, this is 10ms - but usually 2 or more cycles are required .. This latency (>10ms for ability to resolve frequencies above 100Hz) can only be decreased by raising the minimum frequency which can be resolved.. So, for a theoritical minimum latency of 5ms, the lowest frequency which could be resolved is 200Hz.. in practice the best you can get is about 20ms@100Hz 10ms@200Hz etc.
[i]-oh - this is if one uses audio frequencies - I have developed a CV converter for Theremins which overcomes the above limitations entirely - but this only works with specially built or modified Theremins and is not let in production.[/i]

Gordons comments regarding MIDI are also accurate and probably a more inportant issue than latency.

Fred.

from the specifications,Sonuus tracks E2 to E6.. Assuming E2 is 82.407Hz, its period is 12.2ms, 2 cycles is therefore 24.4ms.. Its spec states maximum latency as 30ms (16ms to 30ms)

Accounting for MIDI message latency and other latencies, I think one can conclude that the G2M requires 2 cycles of the incoming signal to determine its pitch.. this is the same latency as the Moog pitch-CV converter in the EW+

I strongly suspect that the G2M is as fast as any of the other pitch-MIDI converters mentioned.

Fred.

EW+ power supply, is the 220V model suitable for Australia? What is the pin size / layout like?

.....
/...\
..|..
.....

Ours are like that. I've got a simple multiple
socket type to Aus. plug adapter kicking around
somewhere.

Gordon wrote:

Peter is an excellent thereminist, and he uses it in an appropriate context here, but really this is about the limit of what can be achieved with it......

*******************

Gordon,

That is about the extent of what can be achieved with the Moog MIDI Ethervox in its CHROMATIC MODE. The instrument has three other MIDI modes that you do not see in the video demonstration:

PITCH MOVE
PITCH SMART
CONTROLLERS

Unfortunately, the MIDI Ethervox is able to do things that no MIDI module or receiver is sophisticated enough to follow because most such devices are made to be triggered by a keyboard.