120 Years of Electronic Music

The "Sonar" (1930)

The "Sonar" was a monophonic heterodyning vacuum tube instrument developed by N.Anan'yev in the USSR from 1930. The instrument had a fingerboard/continuous controller to vary the pitch of the oscilator. The Sonar was said to have been able to reproduce simple speech phrases such as "mama", "papa" as well as conventional instrumental sounds.

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