Wendy Carlos
29/11/25
An academic essay exploring Wendy Carlos’ creative practice and process of creating Switched-On Bach.
Abstract
This essay explores Wendy Carloss transformative impact on electronic music through her album Switched-On Bach. Born in 1939, Carlos, a transgender musician, pioneered the use of the Moog synthesizer. Carlos' journey encompasses resilience amid bullying and a groundbreaking collaboration with Robert Moog. Switched-On Bach released in 1968, redefined perceptions of synthesizers, achieving critical acclaim and commercial success. Beyond music, Carlos' personal struggles and triumphs as a transgender artist further contributed to her legacy, paving the way for the future in the evolution of electronic music.
Introduction
This essay will be discussing the musical artist Wendy Carlos and her influence on the modern electronic movement. She is an American, transgender musician born in 1939 and helped popularise the use of the Moog synthesiser through her reimaging of Bach’s music. Each element of her career will be detailed in depth throughout this discussion, including aspects of her creative process that prove especially interesting and relevant to this cultural movement and the development of modern music as we know it today.
Carlos’ early life and influences
Wendy Carlos was born Walter Carlos on November 14th, 1939, in Pawtucket, Rhode Island (Playboy, 1979). Every member of her mother’s family was musically literate in one way or another and, in turn, this expectation was passed onto Carlos (Sewell, 2020). She began piano lessons at the age of six, and it has been suggested, in Amanda Sewell’s biography on Carlos, that her parents employed corporal punishment if she didn’t practice. However, Carlos herself subsequently said this is ‘total bogus’ (Carlos, 2020). Her musical upbringing is said to have had many limitations, for example, she didn’t have a piano or an organ to practice on during her lessons as a child. Her family lived on a low income and could not afford it, but eventually, her parents saved to buy her a piano when she was in her early teens. In the meantime, her father drew piano keys on a piece of paper for her to use to practice (Sewell, 2020). This clearly illustrates that the level of importance her family placed on musical literacy when she was a child was to a high degree; and perhaps the act of improvisation when she didn’t have a piano to play on sets a precedent of innovation when the desired equipment did not exist that followed her into later life. Additionally, the hi-fi sound system her parents used to use to listen to music at home was constructed by Carlos herself – it is said she cut the wood for the loudspeaker enclosure and used a cheap soldering kit to wire it (Sewell, 2020). This further shows Carlos’ attitude to electronic innovation from a young age.
While she was in high school, Wendy has spoken about being bullied throughout, specifically by other boys. The other children would call her names like ‘sissy’ and bully her for not playing boys sports, as a result, she desperately tried to fit in with them and copy their mannerisms, even if she hated it. This bullying affected her so much that she became a social recluse, terrified of verbal and physical harassment or losing the respect of people in her life. As such, she threw herself into her work as a means to channel her loneliness and isolation. In her basement as a teenager, she had manufactured a stereo tape machine that was capable of producing quadrophonic surround sound by herself, and taught herself about oscillators and gating envelopes through books – as a child alone she was producing machines that would become the forefront of commercial sound equipment from the 60s onwards (Sewell, 2020). This further indicates Carlos’ incredible ability to create technology that she deemed necessary for her early rudimentary electronic music projects from a young age, becoming increasingly creative and improvisational as she made new machines out of preexisting sound equipment around the house.
Carlos started a Physics degree at Brown University, but heavily struggled as she hadn’t taken certain key classes in high school such as trigonometry or geometry. However, one of her physics professors at Brown was a man named Wesley Nyborg, who at the time was pioneering research into biophysics and ultrasound. He urged her to instead combine her degree practice into both a study of Music and Physics, and helped contact the relevant departments to create this bespoke degree to fit her needs and enable her to graduate (Sewell, 2020). Brown University also had a laboratory containing some equipment to enable her to keep experimenting with electronic sound synthesis. In a 1995 interview, she speaks about making use of several expensive, high-end oscillators to make tapes with a physicist classmate.
She and her classmate would tune an oscilloscope to a 440 Hz reference signal broadcast from a short-wave radio station and then tune another until they had created a desired ratio between sounds, and then record the sound and add it to their library. They eventually created a library of 100 pitches in an octave of thirds and fifths. The technology in question was never supposed to be used for this purpose, but she has said that she did this task to conceptualise her own ideas about tuning and create a library of sounds that could suggest there was practical value in tuning electronic oscilloscopes, showing a visionary ability to prove the ideas within her work (Carlos Interview by ‘Freff’, 1995).
Moog Synthesiser
Carlos first met Robert Moog in the 1964 Audio Engineering Society show and later writes in her obituary to him that she felt excited upon seeing his collection of Moog Synthesizer modules on display. She saw what she believed were machines that the primitive world of electroacoustic world long needed and soon began a lasting career changing friendship with Moog. The devices Moog had been creating were perfect for Carlos’ developing practice, they were something she had only envisioned and wished for previously. ‘It was a perfect fit: he was a creative engineer who spoke music: I was a musician who spoke science.’ (Carlos, 2005). By 1966, the pair were already collaborating on a custom-built synthesizer for Carlos. Moog delivered it to her apartment personally, and the final product contained three oscillators, a white noise source, as well as a few envelopes and filters (Carlos, 2007). This collaboration played a crucial role in the development of the synthesizer and its adaptation for musical composition, as evidenced in the release and reception of Switched-On Bach.
Switched-On Bach
It is said that Carlos’ close friend, Rachel Elkind-Tourre, made her realise how natural an album of Bach’s music would be as a culmination of her efforts and as her first release using the Moog synthesizer (Carlos, 2001). Carlos had been working on demo LPs for Moog to give to potential customers in exchange for more Moog synthesizer components and refers to these works as ‘learning pieces’ to show off what the new instrument could do and its clear potential. This points to a gradual development process of Carlos learning to use her new instruments and experimenting with them in multiple ways, including the aforementioned idea of arranging Bach pieces (Carlos, 2005).
The creation process of Switched-On Bach is rarely spoken about, but it is known that Carlos painstakingly and meticulously played one note at a time because that was the capability of the monophonic Moog at the time (Barbrick, 2011). Each instrument had to be recorded separately and all combinations were then layered upon each other using an 8-track recorder, which was an unusual tape deck device that Carlos had most likely constructed herself. Carlos initially began recording by making use of a click-track on her tapes, in the place of a physical or digital metronome to synchronise her recordings (SANWAL CBC, 1968). Amazingly, and to the confusion of others, Carlos was capable of memorising every single combination on her synthesiser for each separate instrument instead of needing to write any of the knowledge down (Sewell, 2020). This clearly shows her pure dedication to her craft and her intricate understanding of her instrument. Another factor making the recording process even more painstakingly difficult was the early Moog oscillators’ tendency to drift out of tune after continuous use, requiring her to occasionally hit the casing with a hammer to recalibrate the oscillators. This also meant she had to meticulously review every single new segment she had written to check that it was perfectly in tune and calibrated or that section of recording would be ruined. She worked on the project for eight hours a day, five days a week for five months, recording for roughly one thousand, one hundred hours total (Sewell, 2020).
Switched-On Bach was released in October 1968 to immense and unexpected critical acclaim; and suddenly threw the notion of the synthesiser into the public eye as a real and genuine musical instrument worth recognition (Barbrick, 2011).
Impact
Switched-On Bach left a massive mark on the landscape of music, sparking a transformative impact that rippled across genres, industries, and global perceptions of electronic sound synthesis. Prior to the album's release, electronic instruments were often relegated to the fringes of experimental and avant-garde music. However, the unprecedented commercial success of "Switched-On Bach" shattered this belief (Holmes, 2008). The album not only reached high positions on mainstream music charts but also achieved multi-million sales globally, demonstrating the mass appeal of synthesized sounds (Henahan, 1968).
The global recognition of Switched-On Bach extended far beyond commercial success, earning the album three Grammy Awards, including Best Classical Album (GRAMMY.com, 2024). She was also the first ever transgender woman to win a Grammy. This accolade not only acknowledged the artistic merit of Carlos' electronic remaster of classical masterpieces but also bridged the perceived gap between traditional and electronic musical realms. The acceptance within classical music circles proves to be exceptionally important as the genre is known to be quite strict on what it includes, affirming that synthesizers could be respected tools for serious musical expression (SANWAL CBC, 1968).
Wendy Carlos became famous overnight; invitations to perform onstage and work on other projects came streaming in, which was much to her horror as she was at the time dealing with severe social anxiety. She had been on oestrogen for a while but was still being known publicly as Walter Carlos, much to her dismay. In an upsetting retelling from Carlos’ interview by Playboy, she vowed to never perform onstage again as the one time she did perform Switched-On Bach, she had a nervous breakdown just before going onstage. She was terrified of the public seeing the effects of the oestrogen on her face and body, most likely stemming from beliefs originating from her childhood bullying (Playboy, 1979). Eventually she did come out, to much of the public’s indifference, leaving her stating that her only regret is not coming out sooner. She went on to work on the soundtrack for ‘A Clockwork Orange’ with Stanley Kubrick among several other achievements.
Wendy Carlos' pioneering approach to Switched-On Bach not only inspired contemporaries but also became a cornerstone for future generations of musicians. The album's success and the later diversification of electronic music genres influenced the trajectory of popular music as we know it. This can be evidenced by the subsequent explosion of popularity of not only Carlos but her Moog synthesiser – It’s been said that she was hounded by stars like George Harrison and Stevie Wonder coming to her apartment and begging to see her (Sewell, 2020). The integration of electronic sounds into all mainstream genres of music owes a debt to Switched-On Bach, demonstrating the legacy of an album that transcended its time.
In the wake of "Switched-On Bach," there was a surge of interest in electronic music technology. Musicians worldwide, inspired by Wendy Carlos' groundbreaking work, began to explore the creative possibilities of synthesizers and electronic instruments. This aforementioned surge in interest led to advancements in technology and innovation, paving the way for the evolution of electronic music over the ensuing decades. The album, therefore, acted as a catalyst for the development of new technologies and the integration of electronic elements into various musical genres (Holmes, 2008). We would simply not have synthesizers in electronic music without Carlos’ visionary work.
Conclusion
In conclusion, this essay detailed the life, career and impact of Wendy Carlos. Tt is clear the influence that Carlos had on the electronic music movement, in addition to her influence on other aspects of music such as the classical genre. Without Carlos’ cultural impact, synthesizers would not have been brought into the public eye, nor been developed to the extent that they have been. Without a doubt, it is clear that Wendy Carlos pioneered a genre, in spite of her struggles in life.
Bibliography
Barbrick, G. (2011) Book Review: Keyboard Presents Synth Gods, Edited by Ernie Rideout - seattlepi.com. Available at: https://web.archive.org/web/20140308220438/http://www.seattlepi.com/lifestyle/blogcritics/article/Book-Review-Keyboard-Presents-Synth-Gods-Edited-1306589.php (Accessed: 11 February 2024).
Carlos Interview by ‘Freff’ (1995). Available at: https://www.wendycarlos.com/cochran.html (Accessed: 10 February 2024).
Carlos, W. (2001) Rachel Elkind-Tourre. Available at: https://www.wendycarlos.com/rachel.html (Accessed: 11 February 2024).
Carlos, W. (2005) Wendy Carlos On Bob Moog. Available at: https://www.wendycarlos.com/moog/ (Accessed: 10 February 2024).
Carlos, W. (2007) Wendy Carlos Studio Collection. Available at: https://www.wendycarlos.com/photos.html#studios (Accessed: 11 February 2024).
Carlos, W. (2020) Wendy Carlos HomePage. Available at: https://www.wendycarlos.com/ (Accessed: 9 February 2024).
Henahan, D. (1968) ‘Switching On to Mock Bach’, The New York Times, 3 November. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/1968/11/03/archives/switching-on-to-mock-bach.html (Accessed: 12 February 2024).
Holmes, T. (2008) Electronic and Experimental Music: Technology, Music, and Culture. Taylor & Francis.
Playboy (1979) ‘Playboy Interview: Wendy/Walter Carlos’. Available at: http://transascity.org/files/history/Carlos_Wendy_Playboy_Interview_1979.pdf.
SANWAL CBC (1968) Glenn Gould On The Moog Synthesizer. Available at: http://archive.org/details/cbc-glenn-gould-on-the-moog-synthesizer-1968 (Accessed: 11 February 2024).
Sewell, A. (2020) Wendy Carlos: A Biography.
Wendy Carlos | Artist | GRAMMY.com (no date). Available at: https://grammy.com/artists/wendy-carlos/1220 (Accessed: 12 February 2024).