SHOCK!

Gosh, I'm totally new at the theremin and I was shocked to find out in the buy/sell/trade section how SO MANY people are getting rid of their theremins!!.

Must be VERY hard to play...I guess. would there be another "good' reson?

Mario

I'm sorry, HOW do I get to see the reply someone sent me to my post?!...doesn't work like other forums.

UPDATE: OK, I got it, 2 replies had been supposedly posted after my posting...but I guess it just took more time than usual to appear.

Thanks

Mario

I don't think there's be an unusual rash of theremins up for sale here. What is unusual is who are selling their theremins.

To see a reply, you simply come back here to see any replies. Of course, there's no way to know when that will be.

I suppose you can use that RSS thing to be notified when there is a response, but I don't know anything about it myself.

Oh...BTW...you're mario1. ;-)

Seeing replies:

You can click on the "subscribe" link at the bottom of the thread. I have heard that some people have mixed results from this - probably spam filters trapping the email notification.

You can subscribe to the forum RSS feed.

feed://feeds.feedburner.com/ThereminWorldForums

It tracks all the forums except [i]Other, Off-Topic, and Misc.[/i]and [i]Suggestion Box[/i].

If you want someone to reply privately you will need to post your email address or facebook/myspace/youtube/etc profile or something. The email address listed on your thereminworld profile is not visible to other users.

Playing the theremin well can take more dedication than people suspect. Also in these financially interesting times selling a rare theremin can realise some useful capital.

callmemario1 wrote:

I was shocked to find out in the buy/sell/trade section how SO MANY people are getting rid of their theremins!!.

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

After the initial enthusiasm for the theremin wears off and the new owner realizes how difficult the instrument is to play accurately, a lot of theremins end up in the garage (or on ebay). This has been true since RCA distributed the first theremins in the early 1930's.

The picture is a little different today because there are so many relatively cheap toy theremins on the market. If you buy one of those pitch-only novelties, the chances are you will get tired of it pretty fast.

If you know nothing at all about the theremin and you see a skilled thereminist play, it looks deceptively easy. The people who are most liable to stay with the instrument over the long haul are often those with the poorest sense of pitch. They do not have the ears to know how bad they are and they derive a great deal of pleasure from the instrument (while others giggle discreetly behind their backs). This has been true of the instrument ever since Leon Theremin's wealthy patroness, Lucie Bigelow Rosen, graced the concert stages of the world with her custom made instruments in the 1930's and 40's.

I suspect that the drop-out rate for the theremin is well over 80%. When I look back at the musicians who were actively playing the instrument in the mid 90's, only a tiny handful of them are still playing today.

Should you be discouraged by all this? Not at all! If you have the aptitude for it, and if you invest in a professional level instrument and not some piece of mini-junk, you will get tremendous satisfaction from playing and, yes, YOU WILL AMAZE AND DELIGHT YOUR FRIENDS.

Hi Jeff S!

(quote): "Oh...BTW...you're mario1. ;-)"

That's a good one!! ;-)


Mario1
PS: Actually, what really happened is when I registered under the address I wanted to...my membership was never activated by this site, it wasn't working somehow...so I re-registered under on my Yahoo address instead...but the computer would not allow me to enter "callmemario" anymore. So there you go: "callmemario1" was born! ;-)

Gordon C wrote:
"Playing the theremin well can take more dedication than people suspect. Also in these financially interesting times selling a rare theremin can realise some useful capital".

Point taken!. Afterall, money is money, and if one is not going to play the instrument...
Besides the money aspect, I kinda figured that if lots of theremins are being sold...they must be REALLY hard to play.

Thanks for the tech tips Gordon;-)

Mario

COALPORT WROTE:

"If you know nothing at all about the theremin and you see a skilled thereminist play, it looks deceptively easy". AU CONTRAIRE, IT LOOKS VERY HARD TO PLAY.

"The people who are most liable to stay with the instrument over the long haul are often those with the poorest sense of pitch. They do not have the ears to know how bad they are and they derive a great deal of pleasure from the instrument (while others giggle discreetly behind their backs)".
AH MAN THAT'S PRETTY FUNNY IN A SAD KIND OF WAY! ;-) BUT EVEN THE PROS WHO HAVE THEIR OWN CDS OUT, THERE ARE ALWAYS SOME PARTS OF THE SONG BEING PLAYED THAT IS OFF PITCH. MUST BE PRACTICALLY IMPOSSIBLE WITH THIS INSTRUMENT TO DO OTHERWISE...

"This has been true of the instrument ever since Leon Theremin's wealthy patroness, Lucie Bigelow Rosen, graced the concert stages of the world with her custom made instruments in the 1930's and 40's". I suspect that the drop-out rate for the theremin is well over 80%. When I look back at the musicians who were actively playing the instrument in the mid 90's, only a tiny handful of them are still playing today".

"Should you be discouraged by all this? Not at all! If you have the aptitude for it,"
YEAH, LIKE BEING TONE DEAF?! ;-)
"and if you invest in a professional level instrument and not some piece of mini-junk, you will get tremendous satisfaction from playing and, yes, YOU WILL AMAZE AND DELIGHT YOUR FRIENDS".

I FULLY AGREE!