Switched-on Bach - 50 year Anniversary

Mercky posted:

the first synth LP released back in 1968,

Ummm the first synth album - weren't the Monkees using the Moog in 1967 along with the Doors in the same year and I'm sure Beaver & Krause had a few all synth albums out prior to 1968.

Wendy Carlos is a very interesting person and is long over due a reappraisal. Sadly her albums are mostly out of print and go for huge sums. Luckily I snuffled up her catalogue a few years ago when it was still in print. Her classical interpretations are wonderful but her later work on film scores such as the The Shining are incredible. Nice to see Rachel Elkind gets a mention in the article.

What sits uncomfortably for me is her lawsuit againt dear old Nick Currie (aka Momus) but I guess sometimes you have to make a point.

AndyP19 posted:

Mercky posted:

the first synth LP released back in 1968,

Ummm the first synth album - weren't the Monkees using the Moog in 1967 along with the Doors in the same year and I'm sure Beaver & Krause had a few all synth albums out prior to 1968.

Wendy Carlos is a very interesting person and is long over due a reappraisal. Sadly her albums are mostly out of print and go for huge sums. Luckily I snuffled up her catalogue a few years ago when it was still in print. Her classical interpretations are wonderful but her later work on film scores such as the The Shining are incredible. Nice to see Rachel Elkind gets a mention in the article.

What sits uncomfortably for me is her lawsuit againt dear old Nick Currie (aka Momus) but I guess sometimes you have to make a point.

Yes I'm sure you're right about Beaver and Krause in '67 but i think SOB was probably  the first commercially successful all synth album after which the Moog really caught on. I liked the bit about Mick Jagger flogging his Moog to the fledgling Tangerine Dream

I think the first commercial album with Moog was Perry and Kingsley’s Kaleidoscopic Vibrations: Electronic Pop Music From Way Out (1967) followed swiftly by the magnificent The Zodiac by Cosmic Sounds - a collaboration between Mort Garson and Paul Beaver (with zodiacal readings by Cyrus Farryar, which you either love or loathe!).

Wendy Carlos was a ground breaker in so many ways though, and my way into Bach.

Her music had a great impact on me as well. 

I don't recall liking any classical music until I heard my brother's "Switched on Bach" LP in the late 60s. I thought it was wonderful. A couple of years later while a student at University, I was transfixed by the soundtrack of "A Clockwork Orange". I purchased the soundtrack album as soon as it was released and also bought my own copy of "Switched on Bach" which I was delighted to find was every bit as exciting as I remembered it. I subsequently purchased "Switched on Bach II" and "Switched on Brandenburgs" when they were released, but sadly don't have any of her other albums. All of my albums are on Vinyl. It's just not possible to get hold of digital copies of her albums - such a shame.

I think I would still place "Switched on Bach" in my top ten albums of all time list - very probably the only 'classical' record that would get in there.   

Hmack posted:

Her music had a great impact on me as well. 

I don't recall liking any classical music until I heard my brother's "Switched on Bach" LP in the late 60s. I thought it was wonderful. A couple of years later while a student at University, I was transfixed by the soundtrack of "A Clockwork Orange". I purchased the soundtrack album as soon as it was released and also bought my own copy of "Switched on Bach" which I was delighted to find was every bit as exciting as I remembered it. I subsequently purchased "Switched on Bach II" and "Switched on Brandenburgs" when they were released, but sadly don't have any of her other albums. All of my albums are on Vinyl. It's just not possible to get hold of digital copies of her albums - such a shame.

I think I would still place "Switched on Bach" in my top ten albums of all time list - very probably the only 'classical' record that would get in there.   

Yes it was very formative for me too, likewise my brother had an original vinyl copy (which I still have somewhere along with clockwork orange) and I really got taken by it at an early age, later on I recall Rick Wakemans Six Wives, Autobahn and later Tangerine Dreams Ricochet having similar influences and to this day electronic still remains a favourite genre, I guess I have Wendy, or Walter depending how you look at it, to thank for that! 

I couldn't agree more.