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I just think the theramin is an underutilized instrument
Here’s some theramin covers that are Nice
Debussy’s Clair de lune
ave Maria
space oddity!!!
this is a thread about the theramin now
the first movie to feature the Theremin was in the russian film 1930 Odna, scored by a famed neoclassical composer Dmitri Shostakovich, and its wailing ethereal sound was used to mimic the winds in a snowstorm
However it was invented in 1920 by russian physicist Léon Theremin, and was seen as a cool novelty and toured around the world, but never really embraced as a serious instrument. Its played by combining theremin's two passions, electronics and physics.
The player does not touch the instrument, but instead makes motions with their hands between the two antenne, and the electronics within create an electromagnetic wave, or a radio wave. Heres a video of Léon Theremin demonstrating the theremin
the theremin didnt start appearing in hollywood till the mid 1940s, starting with the 1944 musical "Lady in the Dark" scored by Robert E Dolen, and later in Spellbound (1945) and The Lost Weekend (1945)
None of these films were really "horror" as the genre had been established so far, these were more psychological thrillers, and the theremin was used to show instability or some other mental break the character might be going through, not the wail of wind but more moaning.
The first use of theremin in a scifi was in Ferde Grofé's score for Rocketship X-M, where the theremin was used to show the more unearthly nature of an alien world as the explorers step out of the ship, but I cant find a good clip of that soundtrack
HOWEVER, the best use of theremin in this era of space movies was 1951's The Day The Earth Stood Still, scored by Bernard Herrmann, and it has not one but Two theremins,, as well as brass, vibraphone, organ, harps, pianos and electrified strings
the theremin isnt used for peak drama in that score but it is used spectacularly well
the theremin's never been able to escape the scifi association and is mostly stuck as a quirky instrument not worthy of serious study, but some composers will still bring out its strengths given a cool enough platform, like Marco Beltrami in Hellboy(2004)
that link doesnt work heres a video that does
