EVENING PRAYER on THEREMIN

http://www.thomasgrillo.com

Enjoy a rendition of Engelbert Humperdinck's Evening Prayer, from the opera, Hansel and Gretel.

This piece is performed by thereminist Thomas Grillo on a Burns B3 Pro theremin which was modified to produce a slightly different tonal charactor which is currently being evaluated by Daniel Burns of http://www.soundslikeburns.com for possible inclusion in future models of his theremins.

This video features a green screen effect which called for an evening sunset at a beach as the video backdrop. Youtube user http://www.youtube.com/trumpets777 was kind enough to grant permission to use his video for this production. Many thanks.

The piano accompaniment was produced by http://www.youraccompanist.com

The sounds of waves, and birds were produced by http://www.freesound.org, and are used under creative commons license.

See more videos at http://www.youtube.com/thomasgrillo

See my web site for my DVD, Theremin Lessons, music, booking, and more.

Copyright 2009 Thomas Grillo

Category:

Music

Tags:

• opera
• Evening
• Prayer
• Engelbert
• Humperdinck
• thereminist
• theremin
• Thomas
• Grillo
• Burns
• music
• greenscreen
• green
• screen
• dusk
• sunset
• beach
• ocean
• waves
• relaxing
• Abendsegen
• classical
• HD
• entertainment
• Hansel
• and
• Gretel
• B3
• Pro

[Synthesized13]

The theremin has been helping my relative, and perfect pitch very much...which i hope to achieve both bery soon. Can't wait for your lessons at Christmas. Do the lessons apply to the B3 theremin, and what is included in the lessons?

[ThomasGrillo]

@Synthesized13 Hello. I'm glad to hear that the theremin is indeed helping with pitch. :)

My lessons DVD is designed to be used by anyone with a modern theremin, regardless of model, or manufacture, with the exception of those rare theremins which have volume antennas that get louder when a hand is closer, ect. Most theremins such as Burns, Moog, PAiA, Wavefront, ect, will be fine.

I wish you all the best with your endeavours with the theremin. :)

[ThomasGrillo]

@ThomasGrillo Included in the lessons are techniques for setting up, controlling, and playing the instrument. I use a unique head mounted camera for first person perspective to give students a unique vantage point for seeing exactly what things should look like when playing the theremin. I cover a couple of different techniques for areal fingering, as well as volume hand work, and a bit of how the instrument works.

[insx]

Did the mod end up in the B3?

[ThomasGrillo]

@insx No it did not. However, other little enhancements were made to the B3 Deluxe and Pro which you don't see, but certainly improved the way the instrument behaves. :)

We decided that even though the tonal charactor heard here was nice, we still liked the original tonal charactor. Kind of a tough decision really. :)

[nedak]

You should grow a beard.

[ThomasGrillo]

Been there, done that. Messed it up because of my low vision. Just had to give it up. Had a cool interconnecting mustache-goatee for a while. :)

[trumpets777]

That was put together very well!

The first time I saw one of your videos (a couple days ago) I thought you might be making the music with your voice because I have never seen a theremin. I play several instruments but some how never heard of a theremin so I looked it up online and realized that it wasn't your voice but you playing an instrument! It is a very interesting instrument :)

[ThomasGrillo]

The mod gave my B3 Pro a bit more of a classic RCA like tone. I can't go into details on the actual mod as it's now the proprietary property of Burns, and is being evaluated for production.

The Jazz concert did use an amp, and I used an Etherwave Standard for that performance. In that performance, I set the Etherwave so the tone would sound less harsh, more string like.

I also used the EQ on the amp to soften the tone as well.

[fluidcuriosity]

ah ok. So you modded the actual theramin? if you dont mind, in what ways? The tone in your jazz performance is also really nice, and im assuming you had to use an amp in that situation, seeing it was live.

[ThomasGrillo]

Thanks for the kind words.

A lot has to do with the instrument used. In this case, I used the Burns B3 Pro. I did make a modification to it which affected it's tone a good bit. I did not use an amp in this video. The theremin's audio went directly to the recording device.

My playing technique, and the octave I play in (given the piece used), also play an important roll in the overall quality of the performance.