ETC AethErphonE

In June of 2003 I was floored to receive the following e-mail from Don Marinelli, head of the Entertainment Technology Center at Carnegie Mellon University:

"Joe, I'd like to talk to you about building a Theremin for the ETC, if that is something you'd find of interest. Take Care, Don "

I'm not sure what prompted Don to think of me to build ETC a theremin; he had no way of knowing I was in process of collecting all the on-line documents regarding theremin construction I could find. I had wanted to build a theremin since Electronic Musician began hinting Robert Moog was designing a project for them, which was probably sometime in the early 1990s. When the project was published in February 1996, I was thrilled and planned to build it at the first opportunity my work schedule would allow. It was now six years later and I was still waiting for that opportunity.

During those six years I had become interested in woodworking, especially small boxes, so I was no longer thinking of anything, especially something as dear as a theremin, living in a plain enclosure. Don encouraged me to design the instrument I wanted to build, so, after looking at numerous 1920's "design" books (industrial and commercial design) I settled on a simple retro shape. Based roughly on a Bakelite radio enclosure I found in a book, but in mahogany, the front is a beveled sunburst panel in clear maple to give it a vague art-deco look.

I'm not sure that's the impression given by the final product, but that was the intention.

Next I set about sifting through the pile of theremin plans I'd downloaded. They ranged from very simple to moderately difficult but most of them were pitch-only designs. I was confident Don wanted a "real" theremin with both pitch and volume so eventually it became apparent that the 1996 Moog design was the best documented design to fit that bill. Further investigation conducted at the Big Briar web site revealed that Moog's Etherwave is a refined version of this same design. Well, if it's good enough for Mr. Moog to sell, it's good enough for me to build.

Don approved all the plans and by July, I was ordering parts. To make a long story short, even the best documented designs are only as good as the person constructing them and I encountered a number of problems which held up completion. In the meantime, classes began and my free time evaporated, making the last stages annoyingly protracted. At one point I struggled for two days trying to figure out why there was suddenly no sound output until some online help led me to the solution: I was calibrating the machine in a work room on a metal framed table next to a metal filing cabinet, which were interfering with the volume antenna and muting the instrument. Now I know....

The component layout is pretty much exactly as described in the original project design though I built the circuit board into the top of the cabinet instead of on the base. This was to facilitate a "no metal screws" construction - I used some nylon screws from the base threaded into nylon sleeves which are epoxy-ed to the enclosure. Thus the circuit board is actually attached to the top of the box and has to be upended when doing fine calibrations on the components.

I had planned on doing nifty wooden knobs of maple with mahogany inlays but as I started calibrating I realized the fine adjustments needed to be accessible by a screw driver (a nylon screwdriver, I discovered after much frustration) so I only did knobs on the volume and pitch controls.

Oh, and what antenna is truly complete without an antenna ball...? Sorry the picture is not so good - it's a Jack-In-The-Box antenna ball wearing a batting helmet and blowing a bubble - Don's a pretty rabid Pirate fan so it seemed appropriate.

The theremin was completed in October 2003 and presented to ETC where it currently resides. It looks great, sounds great and made me excited to build another, this one for me.