EARLY ELECTRONIC INSTRUMENTS

To present the musical soul of the masses, of the great factories, of the railways, transatlantic liners, of the battleships, automobiles and airplanes. To add to the great central theme of the musical poem the domain of the machine and the victorious kingdom of electricity.

Audio Excerpt from Russolo’s “Esempi Sonori” (Sound Examples)

Art of Noises, Luigi Russolo (1913)

The Art of Noise

The period from 1820 to 1900 saw the widespread industrialization of cities. The Italian Futurists, especially Luigi Russolo with his manifesto “The Art of Noise” (1913) set the stage for art that was noisy and confrontational.

“In antiquity, life was nothing but silence. Noise was really not born before the 19th century, with the advent of machinery. Today noise reigns supreme over human sensibility.”

“we are approaching noise-sound. This revolution of music is paralleled by the increasing proliferation of machinery sharing in human labor.”

Electricity

Recording systems Electronic Instruments

TELHARMONIUM (~1897)5

Thaddeus Cahill weighed 200 Tons and cost $200,000 to make in 1897

Telharmonium

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rheotomes (later tone-wheels)

Telharmonium

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Thaddeus Cahill

Additive Synthesis

Telharmonium

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Music transmitted over wires

Rudimentary Loudspeakers

First use of the term “Synthesizing”

670 KW of power (a lot!)

Telharmonious Timeline

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1898 First prototype built from 1898-1901

1901 Demonstrated in Baltimore at the Maryland Club, with sounds generated in Washington D.C.

1903 Moved Telharmonium to New York City on 30 railroad cars

1905 New York Electric Music Company established - Telharmonic Hall at 39th St and Broadway, NYC

1906 NYC premier: 26 September, later up to four public performances a day

1908 New York Electric Music Company collapsed - Problems with volume, power consumption, and crosstalk

1909 Third Telharmonium completed

1910 The New York Cahill Telharmonic Company

1911 installed new Telharmonium at 535 West 56th Street, NYC

1912 demonstrated at Carnegie hall

1914 Company bankrupt

1916 Operation Ceased :(

Polyphonic vs. Monophonic

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Lee De Forrest’s developments of Ambrose Fleming’s vacuum tube (1906), allowed for amplification of electronic signals.

The device, called an Audion, enabled a new generation of electronic instruments.

The Vacuum Tube

Theremin (1919)

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Léon Theremin

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1896 - born

1922 - theremin demonstrated in Russia for Lenin

1927 - moved to NY

1928 - played theremin at Carnegie Hall

1929 - RCA manufactures 500 theremins

1938 - returned to the Russia, mysterious circumstances.

1947 - worked on espionage technologies

1954 - Bob Moog begins making theremin kits

1966 - taught Theremin at Moscow Conservatory.

1991 - Travelled to the US at age 95.

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Theremin’s Other Inventions:

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Burglar alarm, or "Signaling Apparatus" (1920s)

Electromechanical television, invented interlaced video (1926)

Theremin cello – an electronic cello with no strings and no bow (1930)

Theremin keyboard (1930)

Rhythmicon – first drum machine (1931)

Terpsitone – platform that converts dance movements into tones (1932)

The “Thing” - the first bug (1945)

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Theremin (2012)

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Clara Rockmore

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ONDES MARTENOT (1928)

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Maurice Martenot

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Fêtes des belles eaux (1937)

by Olivier Messiaen

Polytone (1920)

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Arthur Fickenscher

• First Chair of UVA Music

Department.

• featured a 60-note equal

tempered microtonal keyboard.

• He left UVA in 1940 to create a

startup company in Palo Alto

Trautonium (1929)

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Friedrich Trautwein Oskar Sala

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2012 Trautonium

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Hammond Organ (1935)

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Jimmy Smith

Hammond Organ

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Originally sold as an alternative to expensive pipe organs, the Hammond B3 became a standard in the 60’s and 70’s for rock, blues and jazz.

Laurens Hammond

Tonewheels

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Drawbars

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Drawbars control amplitude of harmonics

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Ethel Smith

Her Tico Tico EP sold millions of copies worldwide and helped popularize the Hammond Organ

She was also featured in musical numbers within films.

Clip from Easy to Wed (1946)

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Jimmy Smith

came to prominence in the late 50s

influenced both rock and jazz organists.

often sampled and quoted (Beastie Boys)

called the father of acid jazz

1972 album Root Down, big influence on funk and hip-hop

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Raymond Scott

Manhattan Research

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Raymond Scott in his New York Studio (1955)

Audio Excerpt from Baltimore Gas and Electric Commercial

http://www.indiana.edu/%7eemusic/etext/toc.shtmlhttp://www.indiana.edu/%7eemusic/etext/toc.shtml

Over 6 feet high and covering 30 feet of wall space, the sequencer consisted of hundreds of switches controlling stepping relays, timing solenoids, tone circuits and 16 individual oscillators.

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Clavivox and the Circle Machine

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ELECTRONIUM (1958-1972)

Beginning in the 1950s, Raymond Scott designed and built the first of many versions of The Electronium, a keyboard-less, automatic composition and performance machine. This invention caught the attention of Berry Gordy, who hired Scott as Motown's Director of Electronic Research and Development, 1971-77.

Mark Mothersbaugh

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Lightworks (1950s)

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J Dilla - Lightworks (2006)