Re: playing a theremin with a mini-vibrator in your hand

: : : when a harmonically rich chord is sustained on a controller KB & pitchbending from other KBs in the MIDI chain can result in a form of FM in which the waves have little in common with the original source. i.e. 2 tonalities can produce a third systen of waves whose components were not present in the original pair. most PBs will struggle for control of the sustaining chord, altho i had best & serendipitous results using a korg wavestation PB vs a kurzweil EG 20 that made clusters of waves not present in the 2 MIDI-connected soiund sources.

try this: suppose you have 2 controller KBs at right angles. let's take what i had: a KURZWEIL PC2X on the left & an ALESIS QS7. on my right hand.
first of all, my favorite interval is a minor third up & down. do both PBs at a minor third up & down.
let's say you end a song on a cadence that is held for as long as posible.
several things are fun. suppose you're ending on a big c chord, but with just the rich low C on the Kurzy, & a higher up voicing on the QS.
one way is to bring the lower c down a minor third, as the other is bent up.
what do you think happens? do they cancel each other out & leave a fading C? you'll find out.

another way is for both PBs to go up a minor third. maybe you think you'll end up a tritone, adding the minor thirds.
no, both machines try their best to get that chord up a minor third, but sometimes one instrument gains, then the other; most always there is a crazy carrier wave with lots of extra sounds that aren't part of the pad or whatever sustained sound you have.

another way is to have the PB on you left hand go up (&down ) a full octave, while the QS goes its regular minor third. then you have, starting from a bare C, an Eb on your QS with a high C on the Kurzy.

depending on the richness of the sustained chord, the most fun is if each PB does its best to get the whole constellation up a minor third, each one holdingthe other back, should it get too anxious to go up.

another thing i'm trying now is to put a minor third down on my left of three controller pedals, a minor third up on the middle pedal, & using the regular sustaining pedal. if you have 2 or more black boxes in the MIDI chain, you can be playing with both hands & using the 2 left pedals to move the whole keyboard up & down. you conservative guys might have more fun just having the PBs go up & down a semitone.

next posting i'm going to discuss how to bring poignancy to a single note of a melody where the lyrical thought being expressed calls for a melancholia that is similar to the sound of distuning a single string of a trichord; only here it lasts for but a few milleseconds.
OK, i gotta go practice now, just in case some sarcastic little snotnose loser calls my bluff.
yours, in random happy accidental propinquity.

tandy