Pitch preview: Do you think it is somewhat cheating?

I have pitch preview on all my theremins.
I don't use it much any more, especially on the two that seem to have the best volume field: the EWPRo+Thierry-Mod and the Wavefront-Classic.

There are situations, like when I record with a heavy metal rock band, that I always use it, it is the only way I can hear myself *at all*.

Basically I think the professional attitude is to make music happen as accurately as you can. If for you that involves a pitch preview, then it is a good thing. You are still not touching
anything!

no matter what:
KEEP ON PLAYING!

A pitch preview can also be a valuable tool in the recording studio. Several years ago, a CD was released of "out takes" from Bernard Herrmann's recording session with Samuel Hoffman for the soundtrack of THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL. There was one false start after another because the theremin had to come in "cold" on exactly the right note, and in the recording studios at that time "pitch fishing" was out of the question because all the mikes were open.

At one point, Herrmann says on tape, "This isn't linoleum!" A reference to the difficulty of playing the theremin. The remark came from an old vaudeville one-liner in which someone says, "I got so much musical talent that when I was only two months old I could already play on the linoleum."

Ka-Boom!

In any case, if Dr. Hoffman had had a pitch preview he could have saved everybody a good deal of time and money.

Paul Tanner, the inventor of the "tannerin", once said that the reason he devised the instrument in the first place was because he had seen first hand how difficult it was to get a useable take on the theremin in the recording studio. A pitch preview could have changed all that.

Yeah... I would imagine it would be hard to start cold and on pitch...

That reminds me when I got to do vocals on an Indie film, I NEVER did any studio work previously, so being in a vocal booth felt so strange, and the feed back was so low that I had a hard time hearing myself and start singing on pitch at first... so I can only imagine how long it took to do the recording with a theremin with NO pitch preview!!!

Amethyste, did you know that Gene Segal can add a pitch preview to his wavefront theremins?

Thierry -

Yes :) I know - I have one on my Wavefront ;)

For singers, coming in "cold" and ON KEY can be tricky. Are you able to imagine a note, or play a note on a pitch pipe, and then sing that note perfectly on pitch without "scooping" or faking it in any way? Each note has its own feeling in the throat. It is the physical sensation that accompanies the exact amount of tension in the vocal cords required to produce the desired frequency. What you have to do is HEAR the tone, FIND the feeling, and then SING the note.

The thing is, the feeling is not necessarily always the same and can change with the condition of the vocal cords and other parts of the vocal apparatus. The late Australian soprano, Joan Sutherland, used to have quite a challenge at "that time of the month" because hormonal changes would cause her to retain water. This would thicken the vocal cords and change the dynamics and the sound of her vocal instrument.

There have been plenty of singers, both men and women, whose sound has depended on their weight. Pop singers have a much easier time than classical singers because of the difference in vocal technique and the amount of tension that has to be applied to the voicebox in order to do what they do.

Could you imagine playing a theremin whose configuration changed daily?

I am actually able to hear a note and sing it on pitch without scooping or modifying it most of the time. THe only time I have a hard time is when I am in my upper register, then I might need to scoop it cause to sing dead on pitch really high is taxing on the cords.

I think it might be easier for singers to do that, is partly due to the direct contact with their instrument, as for the theremin, your hands are the middle men and not as direct line...

But yes, I know about "the time of the month", cause it not only affects my cords, but also my playing :) (mostly because I am a witch (just kidding))

coalport wrote: [i]Could you imagine playing a theremin whose configuration changed daily?[/i]

My question is: Can you imagine a Theremin whose configuration does NOT change daily?

Thierry wrote:

"coalport wrote: Could you imagine playing a theremin whose configuration changed daily?

My question is: Can you imagine a Theremin whose configuration does NOT change daily?"

TOUCHE!

The configuration of my theremin changes daily because every day I play a different one.

Clara Rockmore once said in an interview that the reason she did not do more teaching was because of the difficulty for students of lugging a heavy instrument (presumably an RCA) to every lesson and having to set it up. Teaching on her own instrument was out of the question because its linearity would have been different from the theremin the student had practiced on at home.

With the piano, the concert harp, etc., the teacher generally has two instruments in the teaching studio and since the spacing of the notes is standard throughout the world, the student can play whatever instrument is available.

When smaller, portable, solid state theremins came along, Clara considered them toys. I pissed Bob Moog off one time because I said that the Etherwave theremin was not a "professional" instrument. Bob insisted that there were many people who were playing Etherwaves professionally on the stage, and that made it a professional instrument. I disagreed (big surprise there....) and said that what made a theremin an instrument of professional quality was not what the player tried to do with it, but what the instrument itself was capable of doing.

Many years later, Bob created the Etherwave Pro theremin. Also, many important improvements have been made to the standard Etherwave over the years and the instruments being made today are vastly superior to the ones Big Briar made 20 years ago.