Best love songs to play on theremin?

@Coalport:  I'm curious to know how your pups responded when you were playing the theremin...Did you have a puppy chorus singing along?  You promised to post a video if they did...( I know this is a little off topic, but I suppose it could be classified as  a"puppy love" song)  :-)

The pups have never heard a theremin. Ever since I adopted the little things I have played the theremin using headphones. They are now four months old and are several times the size they were when I got them before Xmas. In order to avoid the personality and behavioral problems associated with "littermate syndrome" the pups are separated most of the time. 

When I play the theremin with headphones the pups still hear the tones quite clearly. Their ears perk right up and they stare wide-eyed in the direction of the sound but they don't bark. They loved the JINGLE DOGS CD which I played for them at Christmas time. 

Both these dogs are very bright, responsive and well behaved but I still don't trust them not to chew on the leg of a theremin if they were given the chance. They are in their teething phase right now and they will chew on anything and everything they can get their jaws around!

How are you faring with the headphones?

I have considered suggesting to newcomers that they might start with headphones before purchasing an amp, but have refrained from doing so as I got the impression that from a classical perspective this was not a good idea.

coalport...Try Bitter Apple Spray. It works for deterring my dog from chewing on stuff... What "kind" of dogs do you have? I adopted an english bullog female... She is my little world :)

Gordon,

The headphone arrangement I use is a full studio setup. It is what singers use for recording final vocals. The sound is fully ALIVE, clear as a bell and in glorious STEREO. Every aspect of the mix with the accompaniment tracks can be controlled.

By comparison, just plugging your headphones into your theremin will give you a sound with all the dimension and excitement of a cheap door buzzer. You will have no way of including your accompaniment and the result could be so disappointing that it might turn a newbie off the theremin completely. 

A theremin needs an amplifier. This is a leap that any theremin newbie has to take. I don't think there is any way to "test the waters" and bypass such an essential element, and still get a true idea of what a theremin is. 

The same thing applies to people who want to play the theremin but decide to buy a pitch-only toy to see if they really want to splurge for a more expensive instrument later on.

It's like buying a piano in the toy department of Walmart before deciding whether to get a Steinway. 

Clara Rockmore said in her Gift Tape interviews that the most important thing for any newcomers to the theremin is to know exactly where they want to go with the instrument BEFORE they begin. 

IMNSHO ya hafta take the leap!

So the issue isn't really headphones v. loudspeakers, it's sound quality.

That makes sense; I have heard some arguments that the millisecond delay between the loudspeaker and your ear is significant and can throw you off when you lose it by wearing headphones, but they struck me as rather silly arguments - a millisecond of latency is undetectable by humans as far as I know. 

So, (thinking out loud here and considering my own circumstances) to use headphones, the challenge would be to get a headphone set-up that is of acceptable quality within available budget. My reason for considering this is that I carry my amps (plural, I recently added a bass bin to the rig to get the best out of Thierry's wonderful bass extension) to gigs as the sorts of places I play are often not well equipped, and it would be prudent to have a backup solution in case my amp dies.

So, I have a pair of Sennheisers which are of comparable quality to my combi-amp's speakers. (They sound pretty much as good to me when I drive them through the mixer and amplifier in the combi. I chose them based on budget after seeing that they were the headphones used by a BBC sound engineer for field work. I figured if they're good enough for the BBC, they're good enough for me.)

The weak links at the moment are the tiny novelty amplifier with a headphone output that I picked up for £20 and the lack of a mixer. When I use the tiny amp the sound quality is not so good on the headphones - useable in a pinch but I wouldn't want to depend on it. (And atrocious through it's stupid little loudspeaker, but I don't care about that.)

A mixer is absolutely essential - the Senheisers very effectively damp external sound sources, so there is no useful bleedthrough at all. I'm thinking that I could either take a feed back from the main mixing desk for the accompaniment or use a mike to capture the other sounds going on around me. (Not that this happens often - I am usually solo, but I find myself playing in a group once or twice a year.)  I have a mike I am happy with.

IF this makes sense so far, then my next question is - do you have any suggestions for tiny little headphone amps and mixers that I can sling in my kit bag and forget about until circumstances force me to use them? As you know I took your advice for a DI Box and was impressed - well within budget and a splendid sound too.

I believe I saw a posting on this site (though I couldn't find it with a cursory search) that suggested that the amplifier is helpful in providing stable grounding to the circuit, and for that reason was preferable to using headphones alone (plugged straight in to the instrument).  Even though my EW plus came with a headphone out, I still bought a Fender Blues Junior practice amp...I have done the ESPE01 mod and I plan on changing my headphone out to a pitch preview mode in the near future..

@ Gordon...I think you are on the right track with the small amp for your phones, but should go ahead and invest in some kind of higher quality "more me" box so that you can take a mix off the main house mix and combine it with your own channel in the event you should blow up your main rig (heaven forbid..)

The bottom line here for everyone, regardless of the level they're playing at or what sort of music they are interested in, is ARE YOU HAPPY WITH YOUR SETUP? If you are, then that's the right setup for you. 

If you have fallen in love with the theremin but think your sound doesn't match the sound that originally inspired you to take up the instrument in the first place, then you have to upgrade. It's all a matter of personal taste and what you can afford. 

As for my recommendations in regard to mixers, I have found that the Mackie products are excellent. They are rugged, dependable and versatile. Check out the following:

http://www.mackie.com/products/402vlz3/index.html

There are several of these currently on ebay under $100.00 (U.S.)

Agreed that it boils down to personal taste, but the range of choice is so wide it is difficult to know where to start. For me it is like staring blankly at a restaurant menu for an unfamiliar cuisine - it helps when someone knowledgeable points at an item and says "I think you might like that one."

Thank you for the suggestion. It fits my usual buying pattern of going for the low end of a professional range, is affordable and has some excellent reviews. Hopefully at some point in the foreseeable future I will be able to say that I bought one of these along with my reasons for doing so, and that I was pleased with the outcome. 

Amey asked: What "kind" of dogs do you have?

Mum was a collie and dad a black lab. I got them at the end of November when they were only six weeks old (one male and one female from the same litter). When I brought them home, they both fitted quite nicely into a single "Kitty Cab". They are now about 40 lbs each and have taken over my studio, my house & my life! 

"Happiness is a warm puppy"