Product Description

Albert Glinsky's "Theremin" blends the whimsical and the treacherous into a chronicle that takes in everything from the KGB to Macy's store windows, Alcatraz to the Beach Boys, Hollywood thrillers to the United Nations, Joseph Stalin to Shirley Temple. "Theremin"'s world of espionage and invention is an amazing drama of hidden loyalties, mixed motivations, and an irrepressibly creative spirit. Albert Glinsky is an award-winning composer whose music has been performed throughout the U.S., Europe, and the Far East.He holds degrees from The Juilliard School and a Ph.D. from New York University, and his work has been honored by the National Endowment for the Arts, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He is Composer-in-Residence and Professor of Music at Mercyhurst College in Pennsylvania. Robert Moog developed the original classic Moog electronic music synthesizer and has been designing and building theremins since 1954. Currently, he is the president of Moog Music Inc., the world's leading manufacturer of theremins. This is a volume in the series "Music in American Life".

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #144527 in Books
• Published on: 2005-02-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 480 pages

From Publishers Weekly
For this biography, Glinsky admirably resurrects the name of Leon Theremin, the Soviet inventor of an electronic musical instrument played by moving one's hands in the space between two antennae, but his use of Theremin's life as a metaphor for the Cold War leads him astray. An engineering prodigy, Theremin (1896-1993) invented his instrument early in the 20th century. The synthesizer's forerunner, the theremin was most often used in soundtracks for science fiction films; an advanced version was also used in the Beach Boys' "Good Vibrations." According to Glinsky, Theremin was also a ladies' manAmarried several times, he was rumored to be looking for female companionship when he was in his 90s. The inventor lived in the U.S. during the 1930s, where for a short time he was the toast of the town, but he quickly fell into debt. After he returned to the Soviet Union in 1938, he was arrested and spent time in a labor camp before he was freedAonly to be forced to remain in service to the state. Glinsky, a composer and professor at Mercy Hurst College in Pennsylvania, is unable to resist the temptation to use Theremin as a metaphor for the political clash between communism and capitalism. Not only does this allegory lack nuanceAGlinsky himself notes that U.S. leftists were persecuted, albeit on a much lesser scale, during the McCarthy eraAbut the political focus clouds the author's portrait of Theremin's personality and prevents him from using his talents to evaluate Theremin's musical legacy. Photos not seen by PW. (Oct.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Lev Sergeyevich Termen (1896-1993) grew up in St. Petersburg, the son of a lawyer and a mother who dabbled in the arts. Naturally inclined toward music and physics, Lev understood electromagnetic fields and applied these principles to design a "space controlled" instrument employing recently developed vacuum tube oscillators and amplifiers. Dubbing the device with his French ancestral name, Theremin, he toured Europe and America, training several to play it. Returning, perhaps abducted, to Russia as Stalin rose to power, he was imprisoned in Siberia for months, then put in a special unit to develop listening devices to spy on the U.S. Embassy. Glinsky tells the tale of Termen's two lives with spirit and empathy, describing the horrors of the Soviet state and Termen's tenacity in continuing to create electronic instruments. Meanwhile, the original theremin inspired Robert Moog to develop his influential electronic synthesizers in the 1960s. Glinsky delves into the physics of Termen's creations, but principally this is the inspiring story of an inventive genius who launched a revolution in music making. Alan Hirsch
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
"Glinsky has traced the fascinating story of Lev Termen, Russian scientist, radio engineer and inventor of the first electronic musical instrument. The haunting wail of the 'theremin' is perhaps best known from the Beach Boys' 1966 hit 'Good Vibrations', but Glinsky demonstrates that its inventor deserves to be more than a footnote in the history of modern music... A fascinating rediscovery of a forgotten man, and a valuable contribution to the history of the future." Times Literary Supplement "Albert Glinsky's splendid and authoritative biography of Leon Theremin is the first complete recounting of an amazing life that spanned--and changed--the twentieth century." Tim Page, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and journalist "Glinsky unfolds an impossibly rich narrative with clarity, breadth, and a contagious sense of excitement... A barely imaginable life, lived, to the last, by a true enigma." Bookforum "With Theremin, Albert Glinsky has created an amazing new thriller biography. As a guide book through the twentieth century, Theremin is an incredible story of invention, music, history, science, and espionage--a celebration of pure creativity." David Harrington, Kronos Quartet