Product Details

• Directors: Reynold Weidenaar
• Format: Animated, Color, NTSC
• VHS Release Date: July 1, 1998
• Run Time: 28 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 1930696485
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #640,905 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Barry L. Cohen, New Music Connoisseur, Spring 2000, p. 25.

...engrossing and thoroughly informative...it is so carefully put together and so fascinating to view that we cannot help but recommend it...

Product Description

It was 1906. "Get Music on Tap Like Gas or Water" promised the headlines, and soon the public was enchanted with inventor Thaddeus Cahill's (1867-1934) music by wire. The Telharmonium was a 200-ton behemoth that created numerous musical timbres and could flood many rooms with sound. Beginning with the first instrument, constructed in the 1890's, and continuing with the installation of the second instrument at Telharmonic Hall in New York, the rise and fall of commercial service, the attempted comeback of the third Telharmonium, and ending with efforts to find a home for the only surviving instrument in 1951, this documentary provides a definitive account of the first comprehensive music synthesizer.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't waste your time or money, July 27, 2008

By 

Big John (Satellite Beach, FL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Magic Music from the Telharmonium (Amazon Instant Video)

If you are interested in how the Telharmonium worked, what it sounded like, or what it looked like then don't waste your time or money. This is a video slide show that chronicles Mr. Thaddeus Cahill's (the inventor) attempt to raise money and sell "electric" music to New York hotels and restuarants. It is nothing but a series of old black & white photos, newspaper clippings and drawings that pan and zoom across the screen. It is accompanied by a cheesy dialog with outlandish effects, and a sound track of questionable origin that is certainly not from a Telharmonium. As someone interested in the technical details of the Telharmonuim I was extremely disappointed.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wow, the first synthesizer!, December 17, 2007

By 

Kenneth R. Morris "KenFTL" (Fort Lauderdale, FL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Magic Music from the Telharmonium (Amazon Instant Video)

This was a super subject...saw the name on Comcast Music channel Soundscapes and google it....while waiting for the information to come up I mentioned to my friend that if its electricity sounds (was reading the 1906 review) and said this sounds like the first synthesizer....and I was right...but a hundred plus years ago, even before radio! That is really something.