Wendy Carlos

Nowadays, any old fool with a computer can find decent sounding samples and whip up some electronic music. (And dare I say there are a few prominent film composers with very expensive equipment creating music at the same level as these fools). But it was much harder in the mid-'60s, and composer Wendy Carlos was at the forefront of the electronic music revolution. She collaborated with Robert Moog in pioneering the brave new world of synthesized music. However, Carlos was no mere technician playing with toys. She was a classically trained musician, with a deep knowledge and understanding of music theory and classical works. Not only has she reworked and deconstructed pieces by composers like Bach and Beethoven, she has also developed musical scales she names the Harmonic, Alpha, Beta, and Gamma. Her solo works are legion, but she also composed music for three prominent films. Two of them were for Stanley Kubrick: A Clockwork Orange and The Shining, though the latter film didn't use a lot of her music. Her score for Disney's Tron is one of the best works of electronic/orchestral/choral music that I've heard. Not only is her use of synthesizers unique even to this day, but also she clearly knows her way around the orchestra. In some ways, her fusion of all these elements has yet to be surpassed. Her site (www.wendycarlos.com) contains much more information, with articulate essays by the composer on her works and other interests, which range from solar eclipses and maps to color and art.

Tron