Wendy Carlos

born on 14/11/1939 in Pawtucket, RI, United States

Wendy Carlos

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Wendy Carlos

Wendy Carlos (born Walter Carlos on November 14, 1939) is an American composer and electronic musician. Carlos first came to notice in the late 1960s (as Walter Carlos) with recordings made on the Moog synthesizer, then a relatively new and unknown instrument; most notable were LPs of synthesized Bach and the soundtrack for Stanley Kubrick's film A Clockwork Orange. Several years prior, two Carlos compositions using classical (pre-Moog) electronic techniques had been issued on LP (Variations for Flute and Tape and Dialogues for Piano and Two Loudspeakers). Although the first Carlos Moog albums were interpretations of the works of classical composers, she later resumed releasing original compositions. Carlos used the Synergy synthesizer,[1] one of the first polyphonic digital additive synthesizers.

Work

Carlos' first release was entitled "Moog 900 Series Electronic Music Systems" (R. A. Moog Company, Inc., 1967) and it was an introduction to the technical aspects of the machine.[2]

Switched-On Bach (1968) was an early album demonstrating the use of the synthesizer as a genuine musical instrument. As an early user of Robert Moog's first commercially available synthesizer modules (Moog assembled these as custom installations that differed greatly from user to user), Carlos helped pioneer the technology, which was significantly more difficult to use than it is today. Multitrack recording techniques played a critical role in the time-consuming process of creating this album. Switched-On Bach was the last project in a four-year-long collaboration with Benjamin Folkman and won gold records for both Carlos and Folkman. The album then became one of the first classical LPs to sell 500,000 copies, going gold in August 1969, and platinum in November 1986.[3]

A sequel of additional synthesized baroque music, The Well-Tempered Synthesizer, followed in 1969. (Its title is a play on Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier.) A second sequel, Switched-On Bach II, was released in 1973, continuing the style of the previous two albums, adding a Yamaha Electone organ to the Moog for certain florid passages in Bach's 5th Brandenburg Concerto.

Sonic Seasonings (1972) was packaged as a double album, with one side dedicated to each of the four seasons, and each side consisting of one long track. The album blended recorded sounds with synthesized sounds, occasionally employing melodies, to create an ambient effect. Not as popular as some other Carlos albums, it was influential on other artists who went on to create the ambient genre. In 1971, Carlos composed and recorded music for A Clockwork Orange. Portions of her work for this film in addition to its classical material re-appeared in her Tales of Heaven and Hell in 2003 in movement 3 A Clockwork Black. She worked with Stanley Kubrick again on the score for The Shining, though in the end Kubrick mostly used pre-existing music cues by other composers.

In 1982, she scored the film Tron for The Walt Disney Company. This score incorporated orchestra, chorus, organ, and both analog and digital synthesizers. Some of her end-title music featuring the Royal Albert Hall Organ was replaced with a song by Journey, and the music that originally was composed for the lightcycle scene was dropped. Digital Moonscapes (1984) switched to digital synthesizers from the analog synthesizers that were the trademark of her earlier albums. Some of the unused material from the Tron soundtrack was incorporated into it.

Beauty in the Beast (1986) saw Carlos experimenting with various tunings, including just intonation, Balinese scales and several scales she invented for the album. One of her scales, the Harmonic Scale, involved setting a "root note", and retuning all of the notes on the keyboard to just intonation intervals from the root note. There are a total of 144 possible notes per octave in this system: 12 notes in a chromatic scale times 12 different keys. Other scales included Carlos' Alpha, Beta & Gamma scales, which experimented with dividing the octave into a non-integral number of equally-spaced intervals. These explorations in effect supplemented the more systematic microtonal studies of the composer Easley Blackwood, Jr., whose etudes on all twelve equal-tempered scales between 13 and 24 notes per octave had appeared in 1980.

Secrets of Synthesis (1987) is a lecture by Carlos with audio examples (many from her own recordings), expounding on topics she feels to be of importance. Some of the material is an introduction to synthesis, and some (e.g., a discussion of hocket) is aimed at experienced musicians.

Beginning in 1998, all of her catalogue was remastered. In 2005, the two-volume set Rediscovering Lost Scores was released, featuring previously out-of-print material, including the unreleased soundtrack to Woundings, and music composed and recorded for The Shining, Tron and A Clockwork Orange that was not used in the films.

Personal life

Carlos was born as Walter Carlos in Pawtucket, Rhode Island and began musical education at age six with piano lessons. Following undergraduate studies of music and physics at Brown University accompanied by early explorations of electronic music, Carlos earned a master's degree in composition at Columbia University, studying there with Vladimir Ussachevsky, a pioneer in electronic music (other teachers included Otto Luening and Jack Beeson).

Remaining in New York after graduation, Carlos met Dr. Robert Moog and was one of his earliest customers, providing feedback for his further development of the Moog synthesizer. Carlos convinced Moog to add touch sensitivity to the synthesizer keyboard, to allow a greater level of dynamics and musicality.[4]

Around 1966, Carlos met Rachel Elkind, who went on to produce Switched-On Bach and other early albums. With the proceeds of Switched-On Bach, the two renovated a New York brownstone, which they shared as a home and business premises, installing a studio for live and electronic recording on the bottom floor. Carlos took the unusual step of enclosing the entire studio in a Faraday cage, shielding the equipment from radio and television interference.[5]

The artist's first recordings were released under the name Walter Carlos. Carlos underwent sex reassignment surgery in 1972[6] after living as a woman beginning in May 1968. Her album By Request (1975) featured the name "Walter", and the first release credited to her as "Wendy" was Switched-On Brandenburgs (1979). (The earlier albums have since been re-released under the Wendy Carlos name.) Carlos' first public appearance after her gender transition was in an interview in the May 1979 issue of Playboy magazine. In it, she states "I was about five or six...I remember being convinced I was a little girl, much preferring long hair and girls clothes, and not knowing why my parents didn't see it clearly".[7] Carlos chose to be interviewed in Playboy because "The magazine has always been concerned with liberation, and I'm anxious to liberate myself", but she later came to regret the decision because of the unwelcome publicity it brought to her personal life, notably in Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, where her surgery was described in anatomical detail. On her official site, her transition is discussed in an essay stating that she values her privacy on the subject.[8]

In 1998, Carlos sued the songwriter/artist Momus for $22 million[9] for his satirical song "Walter Carlos" (which appeared on the album The Little Red Songbook), which suggested that if Wendy could go back in time she could marry Walter. The case was settled out of court, with Momus agreeing to remove it from the CD and owing $30,000 in legal fees.[10]

Carlos is also an accomplished solar eclipse photographer.[11][12]

Awards and honors

Switched-On Bach was the winner of three 1969 Grammy Awards:[13][14]

  • Album Of The Year, Classical
  • Best Classical Performance Instrumental Soloist Or Soloists (With Or Without Orchestra)
  • Best Engineered Recording, Classical

In 2005, Carlos was the recipient of the SEAMUS Lifetime Achievement Award "in recognition of lifetime achievement and contribution to the art and craft of electro-acoustic music" by the Society for Electro-Acoustic Music in the United States.[15]

Discography

(Albums released during years 1965-1975 were originally released under name "Walter Carlos". Later albums and all re-issues have been released under the name "Wendy Carlos".)

Studio albums

  • Switched-On Bach (1968)
  • The Well-Tempered Synthesizer (1969)
  • Sonic Seasonings (1972)
  • Wendy Carlos' Clockwork Orange (1972) (All the music composed or realized for the film.)
  • Switched-On Bach II (1973)
  • By Request (1975)
  • Switched-On Brandenburgs (1979)
  • Tron (soundtrack) (1982)
  • Digital Moonscapes (1984)
  • Beauty In the Beast (1986) SYNCD 200, Jem Records, South Plainfield, NJ[16]
  • Peter and the Wolf (1988) (with "Weird Al" Yankovic)
  • Switched-On Bach 2000 (1992) Telarc Int. Co., CD80323.[16]
  • Tales of Heaven and Hell (1998): (contains a track using 15 equal temperament)

Audio lectures

  • Secrets of Synthesis (1987) CBS Records, MK42333.[16]

Compilations

  • Bach: Brandenburg Concertos No. 3, 4 & 5 (1975)
  • Sonic Seasonings+ (1998) (Compiles the original album together with an outtake, and the previously unreleased 1986 composition Land of the Midnight Sun)
  • Switched-On Boxed Set (1999) (Compiles all three Switched-On albums and "The Well-Tempered Synthesizer" together
  • Rediscovering Lost Scores, Volume 1 (2005) (Compiles previously unreleased music from The Shining, A Clockwork Orange and several UNICEF films)
  • Rediscovering Lost Scores, Volume 2 (2005) (Compiles previously unreleased music from The Shining, Tron, Split Second, Woundings and 2 Dolby tests.)

Appears on

  • Electronic Music (1965) LP. Vox Turnabout. Includes two compositions by Walter Carlos: Dialogues for Piano and Two Loudspeakers (with Phillip Ramey, pianist) and Variations for Flute and Tape (with John Heiss, flutist).
  • Moog 900 Series Electronic Music Systems (1967) (Demonstration disc displaying the capabilities of the first commercially available Moog synthesizer)
  • A Clockwork Orange (soundtrack) (1972)
  • The Shining: Score Selections (soundtrack) (1980)

References

  1. Synergy Family Owners List. Digital Keyboards Synergy Preservation Page. Retrieved on 9 February 2012.
  2. Walter Carlos Moog 900 Series Electronic Music Systems. discogs.com. Retrieved on January 19, 2010.
  3. Searchable Database. RIAA.
  4. Holmes, Thom. Electronic and Experimental Music: Technology, Music, and Culture. (New York: Routledge, 2008): 218.
  5. Carlos, Wendy. Studio Collection. wendycarlos.com. Retrieved on June 27, 2008.
  6. "Composer Changes More Than Tune", New York Magazine, 2 April 1979, Vol. 12, No. 14. ISSN 0028-7369.
  7. Playboy Interview: Wendy/Walter Carlos, Playboy, Playboy Enterprises, May 1979.
  8. Carlos, Wendy. On Prurient Matters. wendycarlos.com. Retrieved on April 29, 2007.
  9. Shepherd, Fiona, The World Can Change in a Matter of Momus, The Scotsman, September 10, 1999, p. 23.
  10. Selvin, Joel, $1,000 Bought a Custom Song on Momus' Latest Album, The San Francisco Chronicle, November 7, 1999. URL accessed on August 28, 2010.
  11. Solar Eclipse Images. Solar Data Analysis Center at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. Retrieved on October 9, 2008.
  12. Carlos, Wendy. The Wendy Carlos Total Solar Eclipse Page. wendycarlos.com. Retrieved on April 29, 2007.
  13. Grammy Award Winners. grammy.com.
  14. Blood, Sweat and Tears beat out Beatles, Cash, Beaver Country Times, March 13, 1970. URL accessed on August 28, 2010.
  15. Wendy Carlos receives the 2005 SEAMUS Lifetime Achievement Award. seamusonline.org (April 15, 2005). Archived from the original on January 26, 2006. Retrieved on August 27, 2010. (Summary).
  16. 16.0 16.1 16.2 Sethares, William A. (2004). Tuning, timbre, spectrum, scale, Springer ; 2nd edition. URL accessed August 29, 2010.

External links

  • Official website
  • Wendy Carlos at the Internet Movie Database
  • Wendy Carlos at All Music Guide
  • Wendy Carlos in conversation with Frank J. Oteri NewMusicBox, April 1, 2007. (includes video)
  • 1979 Playboy interview
This page was last modified 12.02.2012 02:21:42

This article uses material from the article Wendy Carlos from the free encyclopedia Wikipedia and it is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.