Musical Instruments, Electric
Perhaps the most highly developed musical instrument is the human voice. It requires no special apparatus to use and can be carried anywhere. But beyond the voice, other musical instruments have been developed over the millennia because of a desire to extend the range of sounds that are possible for the listener to hear. Musical instruments are probably as old as the human race. Drums, flutes, and all manner of stringed instruments can be found among the artifacts of virtually every civilization that has ever existed. People have always used whatever materials and technology were available at the time to design and construct musical instruments. Therefore, it is only natural that as the use of electricity became increasingly widespread in the late nineteenth century, it was quickly applied to musical instruments.
One of the first successful instruments featuring an all-electric design was produced in Europe in 1920 by Lev Termin, a Russian radio engineer. The Aetherphon, later known as the theremin generated a sound whose pitch was controlled by two precisely positioned antennae and create a melody using carefully rehearsed movements. So startling was the effect of the instrument in its day, that it inspired numerous composers, such as Edgard Varèse, Percy Aldridge Grainger, Charles Edward Ives, and Stuart Copeland, to include the theremin in some of their compositions. The general public is probably most familiar with the theremin from science fiction films of the 1950s in which the eerie sounds of the instrument were used to evoke a mood of other-worldliness. Robert Moog, who later produced one of the first publicly marketed synthesizers, began his business career as a manufacturer of theremins.
France saw the invention of an electric, keyboard-based instrument in 1928 called the ondes martenot, named for its inventor Maurice Martenot. Similar in sound to the theremin, the ondes martenot has had more success in the concert hall than its rival instrument. The compositions of Darius Milhaud, Arthur Honegger, Florent Schmitt, Jacques-François Antoine Ibert, and others have featured the use of the ondes martenot. Even today, music students in some French and Canadian conservatories can receive performance instruction on the ondes martenot, just as if it were any another conventional instrument.
As interesting as the new sounds of the theremin and the ondes martenot were, there existed an unfulfilled need to create electric instruments that duplicated the sounds of traditional acoustic instruments. This need was met in 1935 with Laurens Hammond's invention of an all-electric organ. Hammond designed a clever combination of signal-generating electronic modules that could be linked together in different combinations to produce the rich "registration" that normally required mechanical organ technology. Since their invention, Hammond organs have been one of the staple instruments in musical settings from Broadway pit bands to church ensembles.
The rise of radio broadcasting and sound recording also led to the creation of new electric instruments. The impetus that led to their invention was the need for amplification, which became acute during the 1940s and 1950s when conventional acoustic instruments were found to be incapable of competing with the din of dance hall and night club audiences. One of the first attempts to add an amplifier to a guitar was made in 1929 in Los Angeles by two Czech immigrants, the Dopyera brothers. Their invention consisted of a mechanical resonator placed on the guitar, which provided a modest acoustical boost. Later the Dopyera brothers succeeded in designing an all-electric device that could pick up guitar vibrations and amplify them. But it wasn't until 1956, when Clarence Fender received a U.S. patent for his "tremolo device for stringed instruments," that the modern electric guitar came into its own. The Fender Stratocaster was marketed to representatives of almost every stylistic genre of the music recording industry, resulting in a major change in popular music.
The conversion of the guitar to an all-electric instrument led to the creation of new guitar designs. The function of the guitar body as a resonator was no longer necessary, which made it possible to fashion guitar shapes of any size or configuration. The highly mechanized pedal steel guitar of country music does not hang from a shoulder strap, but sits flat like a piano keyboard. And the space-age body designs of guitars played by such performers as Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton have made the instrument into a stage prop is critical to defining the unique "image" sought by all rock 'n roll bands.
Any source of physical energy can be transformed into sound, either mechanically or electrically. One can only assume that as new sources of energy are discovered, the possibilities for the creation of new musical instruments will continue to increase.
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