5 of the Creepiest Sounding Instruments
5 of the Creepiest-Sounding Instruments
Five Instruments That Produce Eerie Sounds
With Halloween around the corner, here’s a compilation of sinister-sounding instruments from across the sphere. Goosebumps are imminent…
It makes for the spookiest time of year, so why not surf through the crevices of dubbing some of the creepiest, most fear-inducing instruments ever made?
From bizarre contraptions to medieval music machines, these five truly creepy-sounding instruments will shiver your spine.
Creepiest Sounding Instruments: Theremin
The first on the list is this visually unimposing electronic device. The theremin is restricted in the air (creepy strike one) and brings out sounds in the air, a warbling tone, just like it would sound in a haunted sci-fi flick.
The pitch control and the volume make use of two metal antennas through hand movements. Its origin is Russia.
This instrument was patented in 1928, Leon Theremin, and then it became a characteristic sound for horror and alien-themed soundtracks.
Using one hand for pitch and the other for volume, the thereminist can summon a nearly touchless ghost of eerie glides and ghostly vibratos.
Creepiest Sounding Instruments: Hydraulophone
This is one of the latest entries on our list. The hydraulophone is a 12-jet instrument that generates sound by blocking streams of flowing water with the fingers.
With its innocent imputation, however, it has a very subtle, watery kind of voice and becomes this haunting, alien sound somewhere in between quiet and terrified.
It is a sonic paradox- there seems to be a soothing weirdness that qualifies it as an ideal background for a weird Halloween ambiance.
Creepiest Sounding Instruments: Hurdy-Gurdy
Crank a hurdy-gurdy, and listen as a sinister medieval drone emerges. The wheel rubs aligned with the strings like a mechanical violin bow, creating a continuous, buzzing hum.
It sounds like soundtracks to candle-lit rituals or ghostly processions through a haunted forest.
Atmospheric and ancient, the hurdy-gurdy has settled in modern horror and dark fantasy scores- even its ear-popping range can elicit surprise, qualifying as sinister input into a work.
Creepiest Sounding Instruments: Pipe Organ
Mighty and magnificently overwhelming pipes the mighty pipe organ is great and fills vast spaces with reverberations resounding in your bones.
Its deep notes echo like footsteps of some invisible presence in an empty cathedral.
From The Exorcist to Phantom of the Opera, it has long been linked to the macabre. Its grandeur and dread combined are unmatched.
Creepiest Sounding Instruments: 80-Inch Symphonic Gong
Now standing at the very pinnacle of the intimidation charts is the huge 80-inch symphonic gong.
No wonder this behemoth is used in sound design for ominous moments on screen.
Bonus Instruments That Haunt the Halloween Soundscape
Besides the top six instruments providing shivers down the spine, the following spooky-sound experts deserve an honorable mention:
Waterphone
Whale-like wailing, metallic moans, and unearthly echoes are just some of the sounds associated with countless horror movies and their soundtracks.
Invented by Richard Waters, the waterphone is played either with a bow or with a mallet and was even used to call real orcas in the wild–truly something one cannot just do without for a haunting soundscape!
Blaster Beam
More than just a name, this huge, 18-foot metal-and-stringed instrument produces deep and terrifying bass tones.
The instrument was invented in the 1970s, and its low rumble feels like an earthquake in your very soul.
You’ve undoubtedly heard it in sci-fi and horror without realizing it; this is sound incarnate with fear.
Ondes Martenot
The rocking tones of this weird electronic instrument were born during World War I.
It’s the soundtrack of Ghostbusters and There Will Be Blood, and its ghostly glides fit right into horror themes.
It’s played from either a keyboard or a sliding ring, which brings a blend of influences from the theremin and organ.
Apprehension Engine
This Frankensteinian instrument, conceived to terrify, is armed with metal rulers, strings, magnets, springs, and reverb tanks.
Screeching metal shrieks and unsettling drones from the Apprehension Engine have sent shivers down the audience’s collective spine in some of the most bone-chilling horror scores of recent times.
7 Weird Instruments for Some of the Most Spine-Tearing Horror Sounds
Fear and Horror are among the most beloved genres in books, films, and games; however, they completely thrive on making one uncomfortable. Why do we enjoy it so much?
It turns out fear releases dopamine, that feel-good chemical that surges during excitement and love.
It is a chemical thriller. In horror films, perhaps one thing does more to enhance fear than jump scares or gory monsters: sounds.
Those freakishly haunting scores, the increasing climax, ghostly whispers in the background-sounds unheard of at an average rock concert.
Standard pianos and violins simply don’t work. That’s why a wonderful range of instruments is invent and adapt over the years, each one weird enough to conjure terror on screen.
Time to look into seven of the weirdest instruments used in making unforgettable sounds of horror:
- Glass Harmonica
- Mega Marvin
- The Apprehension Engine
- Waterphone
- Theremin
- Gravikord
- Ondes Martenot
Final Thoughts on the Creepiest-Sounding Instruments
Mysterious sounds are the pulse of any good Halloween scene.
From waterborne whispers to metallic wails, the above instruments do not simply create music; they render fear audible.
They would be the perfect partners when designing a haunted house or scoring a horror film in the season of screams.
