Make Noise Soundhack tELHARMONIC Manual page 5

The tELHARMONIC is a Multi-Voice, Multi-Algorithm synthesizer module coded by Tom Erbe and named for the
music hall where the rst Telharmonium concerts were held. Telharmonic Hall is considered by some to be the
location of the rst electronic music concerts. The Telharmonium was an early, pioneering electronic musical
instrument designed in 1897 by Thaddeus Cahill. It is believed to be the rst additive synthesizer.
The Telharmonium weighed 200 tons and occupied the entire oor of "Telharmonic Hall" on 39th Street and
Broadway in New York City.
The Make Noise Soundhack tELhARMONIC module weighs less than 12 ounces and occupies 14hp in a Eurorack
synthesizer system.
The goal with the tELHARMONIC was to present three historically important pioneering electronic music tone
generation techniques less often implemented within the modular synthesizer: Additive Harmonic synthesis,
inspired by Thaddeus Cahill's original Telharmonium; Noise synthesis, inspired by James Tenney's 1961, early
computer music piece "Analog 1: Noise Study;" Phase Modulation synthesis, inspired by early commercial digital
synthesis from the 1980's.
The tELHARMONIC could be thought of as having two sides. The left side has the voltage controlled music theory.
Through the use of TONIC, INTERVAL, DEGREE and D-Gate, it is possible to create chord progressions, scales and
playing styles using control voltages rather than playing manually or programming with MIDI. These parameters
in uence the Noise, Harmonic and Phase Mod Algorithms in a uni ed way. The right side of the tELHARMONIC has
the controls for sculpting the timbre. These are the CENTROID, FLUX and H-LOCK parameters. Each of these
parameters controls timbre of each of the Algorithms in a di erent way. This allows for complex sounds to be
created around a uni ed melodic structure and pattern. In other words, the Noise, Harmonic and Phase Mod
Algorithms, which are all available simultaneously at their respective outputs, were designed to be blended, mixed
and used together to emphasize a single musical motif.