PballQhead
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Wendy Carlos, neé Walter, is a trans woman…who is arguably the mother of all electronic music we know and love today.
Not even an exaggeration, she was one of the first musicians to treat a synthesizer as a legitmate instument…she won three Grammys for playing Bach on a synth, and then expanded that into original work including writing the scores for A Clockwork Orange, The Shining, and Tron. She literally made the Moog a respectable instrument, not just some theremin-like curiousity.
Sadly because of her identity she was lost in time, but she deserves better.
More info: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/nov/11/she-made-music-jump-into-3d-wendy-carlos-the-reclusive-synth-genius
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendy_Carlos
OrkenMork
And father!
hotrodny
I thought Daphne Oram was the mother of electronic music
BuckIndy
Unfortunate500
She won a Grammy and had a nearly 40 year music career.
I would hardly call her "lost".
ItHappenedInThe20thCentury
From the Guardian article: "Warner Music has not still corrected her name on the soundtrack to A Clockwork Orange."
WHAT THE FUCK ?!§
berlinson
Delia Derbyshire takes that title, sorry.
doobiedoobop
Delia Derbyshire and the other female engineers at the Radiophonic Workshop would like a word
loxiabun
🎵🎶🏳️⚧️💜🎶🎵
UncleMartha
Meaning absolutely no disrespect to Wendy Carlos, I though Daphne Oram was the first mother of electronic music. I'm not remotely an expert, I'm happy to be corrected.
BeTheFirstToComment
https://media4.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPTY1YjkxZmJleG9mcjAwY2phajBhaXZyOHlrZmpub3V3bHh0MTNtNzFvMG53OXRlNyZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/tyu2Mqk2E8jvlgUeyY/giphy.mp4
charondaboatman
Her album Switched on Bach became a favorite with my parents. I liked it. My love for it came with Yes, ELP and Tangerine Dream.
Bugdaze
I am familiar with the old ways
Relictivity
She also arranged a single in 1968 by a psych band called Childe Harold. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnZ9fVNNuIA
xmaneds
#TransPride
debrogney
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OP157WMfOqo
alcaray
I'm thinking the father might be Raymond Scott, then. Or maybe whoever invented the theramin.
Servoth
That would be Leon Theremin, in 1920.
UnlimitedTrickPony
sorry, but that is obviously wrong ... the mother of electronic music is clearly Bebe Barron ... together with her husband Louis they created the whole soundtrack for the movie Forbidden Planet (1956) ... long before Wendy started to produce anything ... they also had to build all their devices from scratch
UnlimitedTrickPony
also like to mention Daphne Oram but her works were released / aired later than the Barrons
lankydoubletown
jfitz
Where the heck is the photo of her in that insanely pimp suit and the total sideburns, absolutely did not give a fuck about anyone’s opinion surfing a wave of talent.
spooktree
shit, i thought KOMPRESSOR was the first musician to treat a synthesizer as a legitimate instrument
ItHappenedInThe20thCentury
...are you being serious?
ItHappenedInThe20thCentury
because if you are, you're one of the lucky 10.000 today
Da3n
Hardly "lost". Most people have heard her music.
xizar
I've viddied this malenky bit of inout a fair few times but never noticed the courtesy deodorant at the start.
Pokegeologist
Didn't realize this was from Clockwork Orange. Was about to say straight sex in my parents' time was weird.
StTriniansHeadBoy
She’s unquestionably an incredibly important and influential person in electronic music, but I’m not sure if she’s the mother of it. Her first album came out in 1968, whereas Delia Derbyshire created the Doctor Who theme tune in 1963. That’s before the Moog was released.
I find there can be a weird kind of US-centrism where some people can go “this was the first American to do x, therefore this was the first person to do x”.
thelatebillstickers
Not to take anything away from Derbyshire’s work, but you have to understand that electronic sound wasn’t really accepted as being real music by the musical establishment at the time. It was regarded as something between a curiosity and just noise. Carlos, in choosing to play Bach, delivered something that couldn’t be dismissed. She met them on their own terms and changed many minds. That is her contribution in addition to technical proficiency and musical virtuosity.
ItHappenedInThe20thCentury
Fuck Yeah Delia Derbyshire and Daphne Oram too!
dap6000
She recorded an album with Weird Al, too.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_%26_the_Wolf_(%22Weird_Al%22_Yankovic_and_Wendy_Carlos_album)
ItHappenedInThe20thCentury
oh wow, I had no idea about this and now I absolutely must have it
zeacorzeppelin10
Yes the retelling of Peter and wolf is great and its unfortunate that it is out of print.
zeacorzeppelin10
I have been trying to get all of her albums, you have to buy them on CD as her music doesn't stream.
Ankylosaur
I found two on vinyl at a yard sale last month. The one on the left, "Secrets of Synthesis", is her explaining how she made her music in technical detail, with lots of samples.
zeacorzeppelin10
Yeah her switched on back cds had techniques
kahlas
I think the main reason she might be lost, such as I never heard of her, is because Vangelis started just before her. He also achieved much greater commercial success during the same time period. I listened to some of her early work before making this comment and I will say I definitely prefer Vangelis.
ItHappenedInThe20thCentury
Switched-on Bach was a HUGE success in 1968, and she did the also super-successful soundtrack to A Clockwork Orange in 1971, way before Vangelis had any great reach like he would have after the mid/late 70s.
They weren't really competing for the same audience, in a way.
kahlas
The one thing I remember about watching A Clockwork Orange is how terrible I found the soundtrack. I chalked it up to being intentional to create a more dystopian feel to the film. Switched-on Bach wasn't really an electronic album. It's classical music on a synthesizer. It was sold as classical music and its success was due to sales to people who enjoyed classical music already. Vangelis started out as electronic. Carlos didn't record any original songs on an album till 1972.
ItHappenedInThe20thCentury
That's why I said they weren't really competing for the same audience. Vangelis is not the reason she is not better known, unfortunately it does have to do with her gender identity as she started needing to avoid the public eye right when she was getting the most successful musically.
kahlas
I'm sure that had something to do with it sure. Though that was also an era where if you played your cards right you could not just survive but thrive by embracing who you were. Such as with Freddie Mercury, David Bowie, and Elton John.
ItHappenedInThe20thCentury
That's a lot more late 70s and 80s, and none of those guys were trans, let alone trans women.