One of the The greatest musical instruments I’ve played this year need a little history lesson: In 1949, in a small house in Queens, New York, a 14-year-old boy named Robert Moog assembled musical instruments. his first. little bird. He was obsessed with antenna-controlled electronics, an electromagnetic induction device invented by accident just two decades earlier in a Soviet laboratory. Theremin, now squealing at us with the nostalgic sounds of the space age, brought unheard sounds of the future to that boy.
By 1953, Moog had developed his own improved version of theremin, selling them as mail-in kits when he finished college. After graduation, Moog became interested in obscure electronic sounds and the means of making them, using the knowledge he acquired first at Queens University, then Columbia and Cornell University— where he earned a master’s degree in electrical engineering and a doctorate in engineering physics—to create some The most iconic synthesizer and keyboard of our age. But people never really get over those.
crazy word Small table concert to science demonstrations in the classroom, the world’s first electronic device, which you can’t touch but simply operate with your hand in an invisible electromagnetic field, has a way of excite everyone both those who came across it and Moog created the most famous model in history.
Riding Etherwave
Nearly a hundred years after its invention and 60 years of Moog’s own version, we now have the all-new Etherwave Theremin, a modern reinvention of the toolkits Moog has created. It remains the instrument that has garnered the most attention in my life. “You have a Theremin!?!?” has been a common exclamation in my backyard studio over the past six months since I got it for testing. “Rad!”
And so musicians and amateurs, children and adults, experimented, moving their left hand up and down to adjust the volume, the right hand trying to achieve whatever pitch they were trying to achieve. try—a feat that is by no means easy. sound. Like Famous Theremin player Clara Rockmore Roughly speaking, this is an instrument that “you have to play with butterfly wings.” The lack of physical feedback can make it difficult to dial in the perfect tone, so many people try specific hand shapes for more accuracy.
While much of the sound that comes out of the Etherwave in my studio… is less than perfect… I can’t think of a device that has brought more musical enthusiasm into my life this year. This thing can also be a laughing machine, with people finding the noises hilarious and creative as they surf electromagnetic waves through the air. It even has an “easy mode”—you can use the control voltage output on the synth to make controlling other synths and sound modules more handy.
Just as you’ve almost certainly heard one of those sounds beckoning to aliens on screen, you’ve certainly heard these sounds sending you off into space. When Moog, the company—which still exists and is known for making some of the best keyboards on the planet—sets its mind on a new Theremin, you know you’re getting the best. And the best will cost you around $750.
