Between “Bad Things” and “Good Vibrations”: Leon Theremin and his T-Vox
During the glasnost period when many forgotten biographies were rediscovered and rewritten, one of the most bizarre finds was the Soviet-American inventor and pioneer of electr(on)ic music, Lev Sergeevich Termen (aka Léon Theremin, 1896-1993). Termen, “the secret link between sci-fi films, the Beach Boys, and Carnegie Hall,” whose “electronic musical instrument took the world by storm in the 1920s and ’30s”(Grand Performances. “Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey”. Grandperformances.org, http://www.grandperformances.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/season_schedule.show_detail/s_id/89.) — several decades before the rise of electronic popular music — had been forgotten for 50 years in the East and West.
Some remembered this name, though–among them were Robert … Read more
