Interesting orchestration.
Charlie Chaplin on Neocons:
This is one of my pages.
Here's a link to several more.
I saw "Lil' Rev" at the White Crow conservatory in Saginaw a while back and still can't get this tune out of my head. Check him out below:
While you're at it, here's a link about the White Crow. It's my favorite place in Saginaw. If you live anywhere nearby , stop in some time. It's a great alternative to movies and bars.
GO CLICK
..Above is a hero of mine.
the Reverend Horton Heat!
Theremin!
Along with tenor ukulele, rockabilly standup bass, Cajon, accordion and hammer dulcimer, the latest instrument I'm attempting to teach myself is the "Theremin".
The theremin is one of the earliest fully electronic musical instruments. Invented in 1919 by Russian scientist and trained cellist, Léon Theremin, the theremin is unusual in that it requires no physical contact in order to produce music and was, in fact, the first musical instrument designed to be played without being touched.The instrument consists of an array of circuitry including two antennas around which the user moves his or her hands to play. The closer your hand is to one antenna, the higher the pitch. The closer your hand is to the other, the lower the volume.
Sounds simple. It isn't!
When it was first invented, it was actually embraced by the "legitimate" music community and many composers were writing orchestral pieces for it but that all changed when it began being used to make strange noises in science fiction movies. After that, it was considered more of a novelty or gimmick.Today, many musicians and composers (including me) are taking a new look at this odd instrument. There's something kinda cool about making music just by waving your hands in thin air. It takes an incredible amount of concentration to play even simple melodies with accuracy but I'm working on it.Dr. Robert Moog, (pronounced Moge), the inventor of the first really practical synthesizer, built his first Theremin in 1949 and began selling them in kit form. It was his experimentation with the Theremin that eventually caused him to find new ways of generating new musical sounds through electronics.My Theremin is a Moog "Etherwave" model. It's lightweight and mounts on a standard mic stand without too much wobble. It has a nice tone and can be easily transported so I'm pretty happy with the purchase.To hear a master Thereminist at work, check out the clip below of Yoko Onishi. She's playing the Moog "Etherwave Pro" model which is basically like mine but in a nicer cabinet.One thing that attracts me to this instrument is the way it sort of mimics the phrasing of the human voice yet has a tonality closer to a musical saw for creating a very dreamlike mood.This is demonstrated beautifully by one of my favorite Theremin performers, Masami Takeuchi below. Notice the care he puts into controlling the volume with his left hand.It's not just hitting the right notes (which is hard enough). Without the correct attack and decay, you end up sounding like a slide-whistle rather than the song of some mysterious angel.
