Newsday, August 2005

Imagine, if you will, a musical instrument played without the touch of human hand—in a dimension not only of sight and of sound but of mind, uniting techno-geeks and eminent artists galaxy-wide.

Your next stop: The Theremin Zone.

Invented in 1919 by Leon Theremin, a professor at the Physicotechnical Institute of Leningrad, the instrument that bears his name is played by manipulating the electromagnetic field near two antennae.

Although pushing 90, the theremin still sounds mighty cool. Its unearthly tones warble their way through Bernard Hermann's original music for the sci-fi thriller "The Day the Earth Stood Still," Miklós Rózsa's score for Hitchcock's "Spellbound" and Howard Shore's loopy soundtrack for "Ed Wood," which features Lydia Kavina, the professor's grandniece and a theremin virtuoso.

Kavina plays Joseph Schillinger's First Airphonic Suite for theremin and orchestra on Aug. 13, closing night of the Caramoor Festival. Broadway's radiant Audra McDonald sings selections by George Gershwin, one of Schillinger's pupils. (Information at caramoor.org or 914-232-1252.)

If you can't get enough of that theremin stuff, the New York International Fringe Festival offers "Unholy Secrets of the Theremin," Aug. 13-27. The revue promises a "philosophical-tabloid-sensationalist" journey through the colorful life of Theremin, a musical visionary and KGB abductee. (Information at fringenyc.org or 212-279-4488.)

Predictably, theremin sites pop up like magic mushrooms on the Internet. At thereminworld.com, you’ll find audio samples, discographies and information on build-your-own kits. "Spellbound," a weekly theremin show, is webcast on cygnusradio.com and available as a podcast at spellbound.purplenote.com.

Schillinger proclaimed that "music plus electricity equals the sound of
the twentieth century." Cue those trippy tones: In the twenty-first century, the theremin lives on.