1953 Multimonica II. Image: Reverb Music Auction 2019. www.reverb.com
The Multimonica I, originally named the Mager-Straube-Kleinorgel (or sometimes Multimonica System Mager) designed in Germany the late 1940s and commercially available sometime around 1951, was one of the first mass-produced portable electronic musical instruments. The Multimonica was designed by Siegfried Mager, the son of the famous self styled ‘Father of German Electronic Music’, Jörg Mager and manufactured by the Straube Harmonium Company in Lich, Germany. 1Heyde, Herbert.(1994) Musical instrument making in Prussia. Hans Schneider, 221.
The factory of the Straube Harmonium Company, Lich, Germany circa 1950 where the Multimonica I ( Mager-Straube-Kleinorgel) was manufactured. Image: Wirtualnym Muzeum Zabytkowych Instrumentów Muzycznych – https://zabytkoweinstrumenty.wordpress.com/
The Multimonica II, based on Mager’s original design was later (1952?) licensed and manufactured by the German company Matthias Hohner AG in Trossingen, Germany, well known at the time for their acoustic harmoniums and mouth-organs.
1953 Multimonica II. Image: Reverb Music Auction 2019. www.reverb.com
The Multimonica was a portable hybrid electronic/acoustic instrument with two keyboards; the lower one a 41 note wind-blown reed harmonium instrument, and the upper, an electronic monophonic sawtooth synthesiser. Housed in a modernist, streamlined black and white Bakelite casing, the instrument features a loudspeaker, tube-generated electromechanical vibrato, (The circuits were based on the Philips 13204 X, Philips EL41, Telefunken EF41 tubes in the Multimonica I, and EL41; ECC40; EF40 tubes for the Multimonica II ) 6 pre-set synth sounds, 2 switches for harmonic filtering, and 3 switches for the vibrato speed and amplitude, as well as a knee lever for volume control. Some versions of the Multimonica I had a medium wave radio built in to allow the owner to play along to broadcast music. The Multimonica II released in 1953 featured one loudspeaker and provided more types of harmonics filtering than the earlier Multimonica I, and the electro-mechanical vibrato was changed to a more sophisticated neon-gas-tube-based design.2 Davies, Hugh.(2014) The Multimonica, The Grove dictionary of musical instruments, New York : Oxford University Press, 529.
The Multimonica System Mager is a portable instrument that is placed on the table while playing. It has two manuals with 41 keys each. The lower one is operated, similar to an accordion i.e. vibrating tines excited by wind pressure for full-fledged polyphonic playing. The air is supplied by an electric operated fan. With a register arrangement you can set seven different tones.
The second manual above is used for purely electronic sound generation. By pressing the buttons, capacitors are connected in parallel to a constantly oscillating feedback tube generator, so that the individual tone frequencies are created. They are played back by speakers in the device. This manual enables unison playing. The sound colour can be changed electrically using conveniently arranged tilt registers and by switching the built-in speakers on and off. Vibrato tones can also be generated through frequency modulation. Each manual has a knee lever as a volume control. — In addition to these two playing options, the device contains a built-in radio receiver for the local or district station, with the electronic registers being used as sound panels..
The demonstration [that we saw] showed that a very versatile style of playing is possible on this instrument, whose particular strength comes into its own through harmonious and organ-like handling. The instrument can therefore be used on its own or as an orchestral instrument, whereby the reed manual can serve as an accompanying and filling instrument, while the electronic arrangement takes over solo parts. Price of the Multimonica: 1080 DM,
TV Newsreel of the Multimonica II at the Frankfurt Spring Fair 1952
Images of the Multimonica II
‘Multimonica’ II
References:
1
Heyde, Herbert.(1994) Musical instrument making in Prussia. Hans Schneider, 221. ↩︎
2
Davies, Hugh.(2014) The Multimonica, The Grove dictionary of musical instruments, New York : Oxford University Press, 529. ↩︎
3
Neue elektronische Musikinstrumente, FUNKSCHAU
1953/Heft, 18. ↩︎
Bruno Helberger playing the two-voice version of the Hellertion
The Hellertion (1929)
The Hellertion, (sometimes Helertion ) christened after the combination of the inventor’s names, was a monophonic vacuum tube instrument developed collaboratively by Peter Lertes, an electrical engineer in Leipzig and Bruno Helberger from Frankfurt, a well-known pianist of his time. Helberger was inspired to build the instrument after witnessing Termen’s Theremin– possibly at the Neue Frankfurt exhibition in 1927. 1 Donhauser, Peter, Elektrische Klangmaschinen. Die Pionierzeit in Deutschland und Österreich, Böhlau, Wien, 2007, 46. Several variants of the instrument were constructed and promoted through a licensing arrangement with the Schneider-Opel AG radio company in Frankfurt, who positioned the new instrument as ‘a portable, multi-voice instrument that can be connected to any radio with record amplification’. Although the deal eventually fell through with the collapse of Schneider-Opel in 1932, the Hellertion can be seen as the world’s first commercially produced electronic musical instrument.
Bruno Helberger with an early version of a single voice the Hellertion designed as a grand piano attachment.
The Hellertion was the first electronic instruments to use a fingerboard / continuous controller instead of a keyboard manual a feature that was to influence the design of later electronic instruments particularly Trautwein’s Trautonium (essentially a licensed derivation of the Hellertion, a fact confirmed by the backplate of the 1930 version of the Trautonium recognising Lertes & Helberger’s patent) and the soviet instrument called the Sonar.
The Helberger-Lertes patent acknowledgment on the back of the Trautonium ELA T42
The fingerboard consisted of a flat metal resistance strip covered in leather which when pressed completed a circuit. Depending on where the strip is pressed, a different resistance in the circuit is created altering the voltage sent to the oscillator and thereby producing different pitches. The force of the pressure controlled the volume of the output signal. The fingerboard was marked to help the performer find the correct pitch on the strip and had a range of approximately five octaves.
The wire manual of the Hellertion with an added key reference guide. (image; Radio Wien. 1932)
Helberger and Lertes at the 4 voice version of the Hellertion 1932. (image; Radio Wien. 1932)
The original instrument had just one fingerboard strip which was gradually increased to four and then on the later models, six aligned in parallel horizontally at the height of a piano keyboard. The four and six strip models allowed four and six voice polyphony when the strip could be played simultaneously with fingers and thumbs. The Hellertion was occasionally used in concerts as a piano addition, the melody being played with one hand on the Hellertion and the accompaniment being played with the other hand on the piano. A version of the Hellertion was produced in 1931 microtonally tuned to 10 divisions of an octave.
Diagram showing the sliding control of an early model of the Hellertion.
Peter Lertes’ book on Electronic Music “Elektrische Musik. Eine gemeinverständliche Darstellung ihrer Grundlagen, des heutigen Standes der Technik und ihrer Zukunftsmöglichkeiten, etc” 1933.2“Elektrische Musik: Ein gemeinverständliche Darstellung ihrer Grundlagen, des heutigen Standes der Technik und ihre Zukunftsmöglickkeiten”, Theodor-Steinkopff-Verlag, Dresden & Leipzig, 1933
The Hellertion premiered at a broadcast at Südwestdeutsche Rundfunk (SDR) on 20 November 1930 with where it was described as a new electro-acoustic instrument could be used ‘not just for Hausmusik (domestic music ensembles) but also for soundtracks for films’ and ‘a serious competitor to the cinema organ’.3 “Das Hellertion, ein neues electrisches Musikinstrument,” Funkbastler, July 3, (1931). However the tone quality of the instrument was criticised especially the tone-slip of the player on the wire-controller ‘could be tormenting for the ear’.4 Donhauser, Peter, Elektrische Klangmaschinen. Die Pionierzeit in Deutschland und Österreich, Böhlau, Wien, 2007, 49.
Patent documents of the Hellertion
The Heliophon (1936)
Bruno Helberger’s ‘Heliophon’
At the outbreak of war where around 1940 began constructing an enhanced version of the Hellertion he called the Heliophon. Helberger continued the development of the Hellertion creating an enhanced keyboard version of the Hellertion he called the Heliophon. The first version of the Heliophon was completed in Berlin, 1936, but destroyed during WW2. Helberger moved to Hörzendorf in Austria where he constructed a second model Heliophon in 1947 and continued the development of the instrument until his death in Vienna in 1951 (subsequent development was taken over by Wolfgang Wehrmann).
A later 1950s (?) version of the Heliophon From the collection of Technisches Museum Wien. Image: (c) Technisches Museum Wien
The sound of Heliophon was produced, as with the Hellertion, by heterodyning vacuum tube oscillators but with the Heliophon the sound was controlled by two 58 note pressure sensitive keyboard manuals instead of a series of fingerboard strips. Each keyboard had the ability to be split into three different pitches and timbres simultaneously, the output volume being controlled by foot pedals with a knee lever to add vibrato. Each keyboard had a Hellertion style fingerboard to add glissando and timbre variations which gave the instrument a remarkable versatility, apparently capable of producing realistic imitations of orchestral instruments as well as imitate human vocal sounds. The Heliophon was used by Helberger throughout the 1940s and ’50s for theatrical, film and musical productions.
The Heliophon on the soundtrack to Leopold Rudolf’s Der Rabe 1951
Helberger’s patent documents for the Heliophon
Sources:
1
Donhauser, Peter, Elektrische Klangmaschinen. Die Pionierzeit in Deutschland und Österreich, Böhlau, Wien, 2007, 46. ↩︎
2
“Elektrische Musik: Ein gemeinverständliche Darstellung ihrer Grundlagen, des heutigen Standes der Technik und ihre Zukunftsmöglickkeiten”, Theodor-Steinkopff-Verlag, Dresden & Leipzig, 1933 ↩︎
3
“Das Hellertion, ein neues electrisches Musikinstrument,” Funkbastler, July 3, (1931). ↩︎
4
Donhauser, Peter, Elektrische Klangmaschinen. Die Pionierzeit in Deutschland und Österreich, Böhlau, Wien, 2007, 49. ↩︎
L-R Edwin Welte, technical consultant Wilhelm Faass and the Organist Richard Neumann at a Telefunken press presentation of the “Welte Licht-Ton Orgel” in 1936. Image: Augustinermuseum Freiburg.
The Welte Licht-Ton-Orgel (Welte Light-Tone organ) was one of the last instruments designed by Edwin Welte (1876-1958), the famous founder of the Welte-Mignon mechanical instrument manufacturer. Welte had become fascinated with the possibility of using optical disks since 1925 and produced a number of prototypes using clay optical disks before completing the glass-disk-based production version of the Licht-Ton-Orgel. The sounds of the Licht-Ton-Orgel consisted of photographically drawn ‘recordings’ of different models of famous organs of the day, but in theory could play back any recording of any instrument.
Welte working on an early prototype of the disc reading mechanism of the Light-ton orgel. Image:Donhauser, Peter (2007) Elektrische Klangmaschine, Die Pionierzeit in Deutschland und Österreich, Böhlau Verlag, 171.
The organ premiered on November 6th 1936 at the Berlin philharmonic played by the virtuoso German organist Kurt Grosse and received enthusiastic review from the National Socialist newspaper the Völkische Beobachter (9. November 1936) “ A unique miracle, perfection in the entire realm of concert instruments” and speculated that it would be a perfect instrument for National Socialist rallies – on the strength of this endorsment, The German Telefunken comany negotiated a production deal. Any potential the instrument had was destroyed by the Nazi’s discovery of Welte’s marriage to a German Jew and Telefunken’s immediate withdrawal of their contract. After the war, Welte continued to try to make the instrument a commercial success, but eventually foundered due to the complexity of the photoelectric system and increasing competition from cheaper, more efficient instruments such as the Hammond Organ. Welte. Only three production models of the Licht-Ton-Orgel were completed.
A detail of one of the Light Tone Organ’s glass disks. Image: Edwin Welte schuf die ideale Orgel. Funkshau, 1936, Nr. 48, S. 377-378.
The instrument’s sound-generating unit consisted of 12 glass disks, each printed with 18 different looped waveforms arranged in concentric rings. These glass “tone wheel” disks rotated over a series of photoelectric cells, which filtered a light beam to control the sound’s timbre and pitch. The resulting combinations of tones yielded three different timbres across all octave registers for each note on the keyboard. Unfortunately, the German branch of the Welte-Mignon company in Freiburg was completely destroyed by Allied bombing in 1944, resulting in the permanent loss of all the company’s closely guarded secret designs.1 Donhauser, Peter (2007) Elektrische Klangmaschine. Die PIonierzeit in Deutschland und Österreich, Böhlau Verlag, 169–184.
Light beam disk of the Licht-ton OrgelThe disc reading mechanism of the Licht-ton Orgel
Promotional brochure of Welte’s Licht-Ton-Orgel
Edwin Welte. March 28 1876 in Freiburg im Breisgau , † January 4 1958 in Freiburg im Breisgau
Biographical Information
Edwin Welte (1876-1958) and his brother-in-law, Karl Bockish, developed the Welte-Mignon reproducing piano in 1904 for M. Welte & Söhne of Freiburg, Germany. Music roll recording began in 1905. The recording piano and the reproducing system were entirely new inventions that astonished musicians and fans across Europe. In 1906, Welte established “The Welte Artistic Player Piano Company” in a showroom in New York, where he soon began producing pianos and music rolls for American customers.
The Welte Company
The Welte Company was a German organ manufacturer founded in 1832 in Vörenbach, located in the Black Forest, by automata designer Michael Welte (1807-1880). In 1865, he relocated the company to Freiburg/Breisgau, where it was registered under the name M. Welte & Söhne. Throughout the remainder of the 19th century, the company expanded significantly and became particularly renowned for its orchestrions.
Welte’s “Cabinet Player,” a reproducing piano without a keyboard that carried the Mignon label, was patented in 1904 while Edwin Welte (1876-1958), the founder’s grandson, was in charge. The prototype was showcased in Leipzig in late 1904 and became commercially available by early 1905. The Vorsetzer, another innovation, was introduced in 1908.
In 1909, the Mignon technology was integrated into their upright pianos, and in 1913, it was incorporated into their grand pianos. In 1908, the technology was also adapted for the Welte “Philharmonic Autograph Organ,” which served as a precursor to the “Welte-Philharmonie Organ.” This organ was first publicly displayed at the Turin Exhibition of 1911. The company successfully marketed player organs, cinema organs, and, in response to a contracting market during the 1930s, church organs.
Simultaneously, they produced rolls of performances by some of the era’s greatest organists and sold them with significant commercial success. From 1865 to 1917, they also operated a branch in New York called M. Welte & Sons, led by Emil Welte (1841-1923), the founder’s eldest son. However, this branch was closed during World War I as it was considered an “alien enterprise.”
Welte factory in Freiburg, Germany
Welte’s instruments became status symbols and represented the pinnacle of entertainment during their time. They were installed in grand residences, palaces, schools, department stores (including Harrods in London), yachts, and ships—one instrument was even manufactured justtoo late to be aboard the Titanic. Additionally, they found their way into a “house of pleasure,” specifically the Atlantic Garden orchestrion. Welte’s creations were distributed globally, with a market that extended beyond Europe and the USA to Istanbul, Russia, China, and Sumatra.
At the top of Welte’s orchestrion and player-organ range was the Welte-Philharmonie. Very few of the full-sized models were ever manufactured. However, starting around 1926, Welte began to face threats from the rapidly growing radio and recording industry. This led to a significant decline in business, and by 1932, the company narrowly avoided bankruptcy. During this period, Welte also collaborated with the Telefunken Company to develop electronic organs. This partnership was ultimately terminated due to the circumstances surrounding Edwin Welte’s first wife, Betty Dreyfuss, who was Jewish.2 The History of M. Welte & Sons, Freiburg and New York, https://www.welte-mignon.de/ retrieved: 22-02-2026]
The stalled collaboration aimed to create electronic organs using (analogue) sampling and photo-cells—truly innovative concepts for that time. Had Welte succeeded, they might have eliminated the Hammond organ from history. However, it was World War II that ultimately led to the company’s downfall. In November 1944, the British bombing annihilated the Freiburg premises, including all stock, instruments, and historical documents. The bombed-out factory remained a landmark near the Freiburg railway station for almost a decade, until the mid-1950s. 3 https://www.musikautomaten.ch/ retrieved 02/22/2026
Sources
1
Donhauser, Peter (2007) Elektrische Klangmaschine. Die PIonierzeit in Deutschland und Österreich, Böhlau Verlag, 169–184. ↩︎
2
The History of M. Welte & Sons, Freiburg and New York, https://www.welte-mignon.de/ retrieved: 22-02-2026] ↩︎
Harald Bode was an important figure in the development of electronic musical instruments in Germany during the late 1930s and later in the USA in the post WWII era. He had a major role in the designs of polyphonic electronic organs and after moving to the USA, went on to influence the designs of commercial synthesisers with his concepts of modular synthesis and one volt per octave controls adopted by Robert Moog and Donald Buchla in the 1960s.
Bode’s second instrument built with the help of Oskar Vierling and Fekko von Ompteda after his studies at the Hienrich Herz Institut Berlin, was a simplified version of the 1937 Warbo Formant Orgel which dispensed with the complexities and cost of the original instruments four note polyphony and replaced it with a monophonic capability that focussed on timbre and sound shape:
“Its monophonic design arose from a technical liability of the Warbo Formant Organ. [He] realized that a monophonic instrument would present far fewer tuning problems than the radical Formant Organ.” (1 Rhea, Thomas L. (1980) Electronic Perspectives: Bode’s Melodium and Melochord, Contemporary Keyboard , January 1980), 68.
Launched in 1938 the instrument was used extensively for film music and ‘light music’ during the 1940’s.
Bode had designed oscillators with good pitch stability given the technology of the time, but he realized that a monophonic instrument would present far fewer tuning problems than his radical Warbo Organ. Like all good designers, Bode understood the necessity for providing increased nuance capability in a solo instrument; hence, touch sensitivity. The Melodium had a 49-note keyboard (low-note priority). But unlike traditional keyboards, each key had a fulcrum, or pivot point, not at the rear of the key, but at its midpoint. Each key was an individual little teeter-totter; when the performer depressed any key, he or she could seesaw a long aluminium rail located at the rear of all keys up and down. This rail made contact with a strip of felt soaked in glycerine — a so-called “liquid potentiometer.” Depression of the felt altered the electrical resistance between two electrodes, providing loudness control. This was a direct keying system that should not be confused with modern force-sensitive keyboards found on certain synthesizers. On the Melodium, the actual onset of sound was begun like it is on most acoustic instruments: as a function of the performer’s continuously variable mechanical effort. This is unlike most of today’s synthesizers; they have electronic envelope generators with fixed time constants for attack and release. Even when a synthesizer is force-sensitive, this sensitivity is usually in conjunction with the unvarying envelope generator attack and release. 2Rhea, Thomas L. (1980) Contemporary Keyboard magazine, January 1980, 68.
The articulation on the Melodium has been likened to that of Franklin’s Glass Harmonica, an instrument having rotating glass disks that are played with moistened fingers. This characteristic singing (slow) attack, and the tone colours produced by formant filters borrowed from the earlier four-note Warbo Formant Orgel, made the Melodium an expressive and colourful instrument that found public acceptance. Bode said:
.”[.. ]It was a very responsive instrument to the playing of the artist, although it didn’t have these automatic — or maybe because it didn’t have these automatic [envelope] — controls.” 3Rhea, Thomas L. (1980) Contemporary Keyboard magazine, January 1980, 68.
Due to its unorthodox design, the Melodium was not suitable for mass production, however, it enjoyed a considerable vogue with German film score composers and was used in stage plays and on German radio. The brief career of the Melodium ended in 1941 due to the war and eventually Bode cannibalized the instrument due to the scarcity of electronic components for his new instrument the Melochord.
The “Melodium” (1938)
Harald Bode. Biographical notes
Harald Bode; October 19, 1909 Hamburg Germany – January 15, 1987 New York USA.
Harald Bode (Born: Hamburg October 19, 1909 – Died: New York, January 15, 1987) studied mathematics, physics and natural philosophy at Hamburg University, graduating in 1934. In 1937, with funding support provided by the composer and band-leader, Christian Warnke, Bode produced his first instrument the Warbo-Formant Orgel (‘Warbo’ being a combination of the names Warnke and Bode). Bode moved to Berlin in 1938 to complete a postgraduate course at the Heinrich Hertz Institute where he collaborated with Oskar Vierling and the light music composer, organist and Trautonium virtuoso, Fekko von Ompteda. During this period Bode developed the Melodium ; a unique monophonic touch-sensitive, multi-timbral instrument used extensively in film scores of the period.
When WWII started in 1939 Bode worked on military submarine sound and wireless communication projects “…We had the only choice in Germany, to go to military service or do work for the government. I praise myself lucky, that I was able to go to the electronic industry” 4Finch, James. (1980) Interview with Harald Bode, Syne Magazine, International Electronic Music Association (IEMA). and moved to the small village Neubeuern in southern Germany, where in 1947 Bode built the first European post-war electronic instrument, the Melochord. In 1949 Bode joined the AWB company where he created the Polychorda simpler, polyphonic version of the Melochordwhich was followed by the Polychord III in 1951 and the Bode Organ, a commercial organ which became the prototype for the famous Estey Electronic Organ. After leaving AWB, Bode’s designs included the Tuttivox, a miniature electronic organ and collaborated on a version of George Jenny’s Clavioline, both big sellers throughout Europe.
In 1954 Bode moved to the USA, settling in Brattleboro, Vermont where he lead the development team (and later, became Vice President) at the Estey Organ Corporation. In 1958, while still working at Estey, Bode set up the Bode Electronics Company where in March 1960 he created another unique instrument; a modular synthesiser “A New Tool for the Exploration of Unknown Electronic Music Instrument Performances” known as the ‘Audio System Synthesiser’ which Robert Moog used as the basis for his line of new Moog synthesisers.
After the Estey Organ Company foundered in 1960, Bode joined the Wurlitzer Organ Co and moved to Buffalo, New York where he was one of the first engineers to recognise the significance of transistor based technology in electronic music. Bode’s concepts of modular and miniature self-contained transistor based machines was taken up and developed in the early 1960’s by Robert Moog and Donald Buchla amongst others. 1962 saw the beginning of a long collaboration between Bode and the composer Vladimir Ussachevsky at the Columbia Princeton Center for Electronic Music which lead to the development of innovative studio equipment designs such as the ‘Bode Ring Modulator’ and ‘Bode Frequency Shifter’. The commercial versions of these inventions were produced under the Bode Sound Co and under license Moog Synthesisers.
Harald Bode retired in 1974 but continued to pursue his own research. In 1977 he created the ‘Bode Vocoder’ (licensed as the ‘Moog Vocoder’). In 1981 he developed his last instrument, the ‘Bode Barber Pole Phaser’.
References
1
Rhea, Thomas L. (1980) Electronic Perspectives: Bode’s Melodium and Melochord, Contemporary Keyboard , January 1980), 68. ↩︎
2
Rhea, Thomas L. (1980) Contemporary Keyboard magazine, January 1980, 68. ↩︎
3
Rhea, Thomas L. (1980) Contemporary Keyboard magazine, January 1980, 68. ↩︎
4
Finch, James. (1980) Interview with Harald Bode, Syne Magazine, International Electronic Music Association (IEMA). ↩︎
Jörg (Georg Adam) Eichstätt Mager born November 6, 1880 Aschaffenburg, Bavaria, Died Aschaffenburg 1939
Little information survives of Jörg Mager’s last instrument the ‘Kaleidophon’ which he completed in 1939. The instrument was probably destroyed by allied bombing of Mager’s Darmstadt headquarters. The only references survives as notess “…a monophonic electronic instrument with kaleidoscopic sound mixtures following the tonal precepts of Arnold Schoenberg and Ferruccio Busoni.”
The Melochord was a post-war development of Bodes’ earlier Melodium, which, due to it’s complexity and unorthodox design wasn’t suitable for mass production. After the war, Bode cannibalised parts from the Melodium to build the Melochord, a monophonic keyboard instrument based on vacuum tube technology. The keyboard used pitches derived from the traditional equal-tempered 12 note scale with switches extending the 37 note range from three octaves to seven. A foot pedal allowed overall control of the volume and a novel electronically operated envelope shaper could be triggered for each key.
“…So from 1939 to 1945 I didn’t do anything other than writing a few publications on the field of electronic music. In 1947, when we finally got out of the mess of the post-war period, I created the Melochord. It was originally intended as an instrument which combined melody and chord capability all in one manual, but I then decided to use two voices on this one manual and split up a five-octave keyboard in such a way that the upper three octaves were assigned to one generator and the lower two octaves assigned to another generator. It was designed so that those two portions of the keyboard were independent, so they went to separate tone shaping means and to separate expression pedals, and the voices were arranged to allow for voice crossings. It was used on the German Broadcasting System, especially in Munich. It was not a production instrument (commercial product, that is), it was built and used by myself and was leased out to movie companies and for use in recordings with bands. It was also featured in a band I travelled with (as well as recorded with) in Germany. A second Melochord was commissioned by the Bonn University through Meyer-Eppler, who also initiated the work of Dr. Enkel at the Cologne Electronic Music Studio. This is how the Melochord was commissioned by the Cologne Electronic Music Studio. It was used by Karlheinz Stockhausen thereafter. Also, a Melochord was built for use by the NWDR in Hamburg and for a theatre in Munich, and a few others but it was not a mass production item.”
Interview with Harald Bode, 1980 by SYNE magazine
Later version Melochord
A later version incorporated two keyboards the second keyboard being able to control the timbre of the other, a technique used in later modular type synthesizers.The Melochord was used extensively in the early days of the electronic studio at Bonn University by Dr Werner Meyer-Eppler and was later installed at North West German Radio studios in Köln (alongside a Monochord and a simple oscillator and filter system) where it was used by the Elektronische Musik group throughout the 1950’s. Artists who used the Melochord and Monochord at the studio included Herbert Eimert, Robert Beyer, Karel Goeyvarts, György Ligeti, Henri Posseur, Karlheinz Stockhausen and others.
Bode playing the Melochord
Despite the instruments technical drawbacks, the Melochord was destined to play a historic role in the future of electronic music, Meyer-Eppler’s visionary and influential work “Klangmodelle” and lectures at Darmstadt New Music School were all based on the Melochord and in 1961 Harald Bode, recognizing the significance of transistor based technology over valve based synthesis, wrote a paper that was to revolutionise electronic musical instruments. Bode’s ideas of modular and miniature self contained transistor based machines was taken up and developed in the early 1960’s by Robert Moog and Donald Buchla amongst others.
Biographical notes
Harald Bode; October 19, 1909 Hamburg Germany – January 15, 1987 New York USA.
Bode Studied mathematics, physics and natural philosophy at Hamburg University, graduating in 1934. In 1937, with funding support provided by the composer and band-leader, Christian Warnke, Bode produced his first instrument the ‘Warbo-Formant Orgel’ (‘Warbo’ being a combination of the names Warnke and Bode). Bode moved to Berlin in 1938 to complete a postgraduate course at the Heinrich Hertz Institute where he collaborated with Oskar Vierling and Fekko von Ompteda. During this period Bode developed the ‘Melodium’ ; a unique monophonic touch-sensitive, multi-timbral instrument used extensively in film scores of the period.
When WWII started in 1939 Bode worked on military submarine sound and wireless communication projects “…We had the only choice in Germany, to go to military service or do work for the government. I praise myself lucky, that I was able to go to the electronic industry” and moved to the small village Neubeuern in southern Germany, where in 1947 Bode built the first European post-war electronic instrument, the ‘Melochord’. In 1949 Bode joined the AWB company where he created the ‘Polychord’ a simpler, polyphonic version of the ‘Melochord’ which was followed by the ‘Polychord III’ in 1951 and the ‘Bode Organ’, a commercial organ which became the prototype for the famous Estey Electronic Organ. After leaving AWB, Bode’s designs included the ‘Tuttivox’, a miniature electronic organ and collaborated on a version of Georges Jenny’s ‘Clavioline’, both big sellers throughout Europe.
In 1954 Bode moved to the USA, settling in Brattleboro, Vermont where he lead the development team (and later, Vice President) at the Estey Organ Corporation. In 1958, while still working at Estey, Bode set up the Bode Electronics Company where in March 1960 he created another unique instrument; a modular synthesiser “A New Tool for the Exploration of Unknown Electronic Music Instrument Performances” known as the ‘Audio System Synthesiser’ which Robert Moog used as the basis for his line of new Moog synthesisers.
After the Estey Organ Company foundered in 1960, Bode joined the Wurlitzer Organ Co and moved to Buffalo, New York where he was one of the first engineers to recognise the significance of transistor based technology in electronic music. Bode’s concepts of modular and miniature self-contained transistor based machines was taken up and developed in the early 1960’s by Robert Moog and Donald Buchla amongst others. 1962 saw the beginning of a long collaboration between Bode and the composer Vladimir Ussachevski at the Columbia Princeton Center for Electronic Music which lead to the development of innovative studio equipment designs such as the ‘Bode Ring Modulator’ and ‘Bode Frequency Shifter’. The commercial versions of these inventions were produced under the Bode Sound Co and under license Moog Synthesisers.
Harald Bode retired in 1974 but continued to pursue his own research. In 1977 he created the ‘Bode Vocoder’ (licensed as the ‘Moog Vocoder’). In 1981 he developed his last instrument, the ‘Bode Barberpole Phaser’.
Harald Bode’s sketchbooks
Sources
Bode’s Melodium and Melochord by Thomas L. Rhea. Contemporary Keyboard magazine (January 1980, p. 68)
The Elektronische Monochord at NDR Studio, Köln, 1952
The Monochord was commissioned from Dr Freidrich Trautwein, the inventor of the Trautonium, by the Electronic Music studio of North West German Radio studios, Köln to upgrade its synthesis module which consisted at the time of one sine wave generator and filter system. The Monochord was basically a modified concert Trautonium with a monophonic variable pitch interval keyboard controlling a valve based tone generator. The keyboard was pressure sensitive and allowed one hand to play pitched notes while the other changed timbre and variations of the envelope shape. A foot pedal controlled the overall volume output from the machine.
The Siemens Synthesiser or ‘Siemens Studio For Electronic Music’ was a German development similar to the RCA Synthesiser originally to compose live electronic music for Siemens’s own promotional documentary films. Like the RCA MkII, The Siemens Studio was a modular ‘composition and synthesis system’ that generated musical sequences and synthesised and recorded the results. The Siemens Synthesiser was developed by Helmut Klein and W.Schaaf at Siemens Halske in Munich, Germany in 1959 for the Studio Für Elektronische Musik in Munich. The Siemens system linked and controlled the studio using a similar system to the RCA Synthesiser, a set of four punch paper vari-speed rolls controlling the timbre, envelope, pitch and volume of a bank of 20 oscillators, a white noise generator, a Hohnerola (a hybrid electronically amplified reed instrument marketed by Hohner-similar to the ‘Multimonica‘) and an impulse generator. The synthesiser had a tonal range of seven octaves.
Siemens studio Equipment:
Tone Generation
Hohnerola: “An electronic tongue-instrument of 84 tones from C to H”
An impulse or sawtooth generator with 84 tones
1 white noise generator
A generator for statistic impulses which are made from white noise with the help of a trigger
4 sine tone generators [20 – 20’000 Hz]
20 special sine generators. These generators a 3 frequency spectrum, from 1r5 – 160 Hz, 150 – 1600 Hz and 1500 – 16000 Hz, with the option of continual change from sine to square wave.
A tone generator based on photo-electric principles
Tone Modulators
Analogue reverb
Echo delay
Pitch transformer
Echo frequency transformer
Vocoder
Programming with the ‘Semi Automatic Hole-strip Punching Machine’ (left: the coding console. right: the hole puncing machine)
Additional input devices were also developed for the Siemens Synthesiser; a drawn sound technique (photoelectrically generated sounds) allowed the scanning of photographic slides using Siemens’s specially designed ‘Bildabtaster’ technology. The German painter Günter Maas used this device to translate several of his paintings into musical compositions. Later models also had a Siemens Vocoder built in as a sound controller uniquely for its time, allowing the musician to give the sound vocal envelope characteristics.
The machine room at the ‘Studio for Electronic Music’ (L-R:punch-paper controller, 2 four channel magnetic tape recorders, ‘Bildabtaster’ picture-scanner. Foreground:2 Master magnetic tape machines)
The development of the Siemens synthesiser continued after the Munich studio had relocated to Ulm and came to an end when the studio was dissolved in 1969. The Siemens system was used by many European experimental composers throughout the 50’s and 60’s including Mauricio Kagel, Bengt Hambreus, Milko Kelemen and the director of the Munich Studio Für Elektronische Musik, Josef Anton Riedl.
The punch-paper strip controller (Lochstreifen-Schnellsender) A synchronous-motor moves the paper strips across the reader. The 4 parallel moving strips are read by removeable steel wire brushes. The system can also be run in reverse.Diagram explaining the punch-tape coding for the Seimens Studio
Coding of the Punch-tape reader:
Pitch: The pitch is defined by two strips. One strip chooses the octave, the second the tones within the octave. There are 7 octaves , and 12 tones within those octaves, making 84 tones in total. They can be chosen in fixed tuning with the electronic tuner or in a tuning that can freely be chosen with the impulse generator and sine generators. Combinations allow the choice of several different generators.
Volume: The volume can be defined in 32 steps of 1,5 dB.
Timbre: The colouring (timbre) by a choice of 14 band filters or filter combinations
Duration: The duration of the signal is defined by the number of equal hole combinations in connection with the reading speed of the punch-paper strip. There are three different speed settings of the paper strip, 64, 90 or 128 signals a second. The normal speed is 64 signals per second, i.e. a duration of 16 ms per signal. The duration is a quarter note, played in Mäzel’s Metronome MM = 120, is 0,5 s which equates to 32 equivalent hole combinations, an eighth note is then 16, a sixteenth note 8 hole combination.
Sources:
H.Klein:”Uber ein Apparatur zur Steuerung und Verformung von Klängen”,Nachrichtentechnische Fachberichte,cv(1959),31 Répertoire international des musiques expérimentales (Paris,1962),36.
