Timeline of Synthesis, Part 1

In 1896, inventor Thaddeus Cahill began constructing the largest musical instrument ever, the Telharmonium, also called the Dynamophone. Containing enormous electrical alternators that produced sine waves from alternating currents, it was the world’s first electromechanical instrument. Performers operated the Telharmonium using a modified organ console, and telephone receivers converted its electrical signals to sound through large paper cones. The public lost interest by 1914 and the project fizzled. By 1962 the four models that were built had been sold for scrap.

The only instrument you play without any contact became history’s first electronic instrument that was popular worldwide. Playing the theremin requires skill and precision. It responds to the proximity of the player’s hands to its antennas, one for controlling pitch and one for controlling volume. Russian physicist and inventor Lev Termen whose name was Gallicized to Leon Theremin, built his vacuum tube-based model and distributed it in the U.S. by RCA. Clara Rockmore is considered one of the 20th century’s best players, and well-known thereminists now include Lydia Kavina, Pamelia Kurstin, and Carolina Eyck.

A theremin renaissance took place in the mid-1950s, spurred on by Bob Moog, who began making his own line of theremins through his first company, R.A. Moog, Co. Moog Music has been building Etherwave theremins since 2002.

French cellist Maurice Martenot took Leon Theremin’s invention a step further with the Ondes Martenot. On the player’s right hand is a ring attached to a wire strung across a keyboard, which is used only for visual reference. The player’s left hand manipulates buttons and keys to control timbre, envelope, and articulation. Since the Ondes Martenot debuted at the Paris Opera in 1928, it has been played in numerous classical compositions, movie scores, and on select tracks by Radiohead and others.

In 1929, German engineer Friedrich Trautwein invented the first electronic instrument to produce a sawtooth wave whose tone could be modified using filters and resonators. The player applies pressure to a wire stretched over a metal plate while manipulating front-panel knobs to adjust various sound parameters and controlling volume with a foot pedal. This instrument has gone through many design changes over the years, most notably leading to composer and physicist Oskar Sala’s Mixtur-Trautonium in 1952. The Trautonium’s sound was most famously displayed on Sala’s sound effects for the Alfred Hitchcock film, The Birds.

Considered the world’s first analog synthesizer, the Novachord was designed by Laurens Hammond, John Hanert, and Charles Williams. It contained 169 vacuum tubes and over 1,000 custom capacitors, beautifully housed in a walnut enclosure. This polyphonic keyboard also featured sustain and expression pedals, two 12-inch speakers, and an internal preamp. Over 1,000 Novachords were built from its introduction at the 1939 World’s Fair until Hammond discontinued production in 1942.

One of the first electronic instruments to feature a touch-sensitive keyboard was the Melodium, created by Harold Bode and designed in collaboration with Oskar Vielring in 1938. Each key had a center pivot point that allowed the player more direct control over loudness and articulation than on previous instruments. Sadly, Bode disassembled his one-of-a-kind instrument in 1941 for its electronic components, which were in short supply during World War II.

In 1942, French musician Georges Jenny invented the Ondioline, a portable, monophonic instrument with a pressure-sensitive 37-note keyboard, a built-in speaker, and a knee-controlled volume lever. The Ondioline is considered remarkable for its ability to imitate other instruments. Performers such as Jean-Jacques Perrey helped popularize the instrument in the ‘50s and into the ‘60s. His performance with the Ondioline as the featured instrument on Kai Winding’s “More” propelled that song up to #8 on the Billboard Top 100 in the fall of 1963.

In the mid-’50s, RCA engineers Harry Olson and Herbert Belar teamed up to create the Electronic Music Synthesizer, a collection of tube-based modules connected by patch cords and filling an entire room. Named the Mark I, it had 12 oscillators and used a mechanical keyboard to punch holes in a paper roll, which stored binary information specifying frequency, timbre, and envelope. The Mark II, completed in 1957, had 24 oscillators, high and lowpass filters, noise generation, vibrato, glissando, and eventually a tape recorder for capturing its output. This synthesizer currently resides at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center in New York City.

In 1959, the man who invented the Clavivox and the Circle Machine unveiled his newest invention, the Electronium. Bandleader and composer Raymond Scott described his instrument as a Music Structure Generator, a synthesizer that could compose and perform music automatically while allowing for real-time human interaction. It could devise its own melodies, chords, and rhythms via a control panel that features over a thousand knobs and buttons. At Berry Gordy’s request in 1970, Scott built an Electronium for Motown Records and was the company’s Director of Electronic Music Research and Development until 1977.

What started as a request from Hofstra University music professor Herb Deutsch to build electronic devices for his experimental compositions turned into the beginning of Bob Moog’s association with the synthesizer. By linking different electronic modules together controlled by two keyboards, he created the first widely recognized synthesizer. Even after a display at the Monterey Pop Festival attracted bands such as The Byrds, The Doors, and The Monkees, it was the success of Wendy Carlos’ Switched-On Bach that made this synth a must-have instrument for any prog-rock band or experimental musician. From the Beatles’ “Here Comes the Sun” to Dick Hyman’s Top 40 hit “The Minotaur,” the Moog modular’s popularity cast a vast shadow of influence on everything that came after.

In the early ‘60s, composer Morton Subotnick approached engineer Don Buchla to build an electronic instrument without a traditional keyboard interface. Assembling his voltage-controlled oscillators, filters, envelope generators, sequencers, and other modules, Buchla installed them as one unit into Subotnick’s recording studio, the San Francisco Tape Music Center, in 1965. Instead of using filters to remove harmonics, the Buchla 100 emphasizes harmonic generation using dynamic waveshaping and frequency and amplitude modulation. Artists such as Suzanne Ciani have used this instrument for their compositions for decades.Companies such as Asheville, NC’s, Make Noise Music now build newer modules that carry on the tradition.

David Cockerell, an electronics designer for Peter Zinovieff’s Electronic Music Studios in London, created the prototype Voltage Controlled Studio 1 for Australian composer Don Banks. Teaming up with Zinovieff and another EMS engineer, Tristam Cary, they built the Voltage Controlled Studio 3, or VCS3, in 1969. It was the only portable modular synthesizer you could buy at the time. Performers connect the VCS3’s circuits by placing pins at their intersection in a matrix, with the joystick controlling two parameters at the same time. The instrument also features ring modulation, a spring reverb, and a built-in stereo amplifier with two speakers.

Widely recognized as the most iconic analog synthesizer of all times, the Minimoog Model D is the synthesizer by which all others are measured. When it became the first mass-produced electronic instrument sold in stores, its portability, ease of use, and price helped it become the synthesizer of choice for keyboardists. It has three voltage-controlled oscillators, a 24db-per-octave lowpass ladder filter, and jacks to connect external audio and control sources, as well as wheels for controlling pitch and modulation. A total of 12,269 Minimoogs were built and sold. From Yes’ Roundabout—the first U.S. Top 40 hit to feature a Minimoog—through current artists such as Steven Wilson and St. Vincent, its popularity remains even today.