The bizarre life of Professor
Leon Theremin, inventor of
the world's first electronic
instrument, is documented in
a film to be presented at the
Detroit Film Theatre this
weekend.
•
Ni C ks
rofessor Leon Theremin
died two years ago at the re-
spectable age of 97, and not
before having changed the
face of modern music with his sin-
gularly bizarre electronic instru-
mental invention, the theremin.
Musicians don't touch the theremin
when they play it; they wave their
hands around it to make sounds
well-known to fans of science-fiction
thrillers like The Thing and Bride
of Frankenstein. But, on the weird- Theremin virtuoso and love interest Clara Rockmore
ness scale, the theremin doesn't performs in concert in the 1920s.
hold a candle to the life story of its
Theremin's story is part James Bond,
inventor.
Dr. Zhivago. Acclaimed interna-
part
The Russian-born professor is the sub-
ject of Steven M. Martin's 85-minute tionally for his electronic instrument in
documentary Theremin: An Electric the 1920s, Theremin performed before
Odyssey, which opens the Detroit Film Lenin and to sold-out shows in London,
Paris and New York. In 1928, he moved
Theatre's 1996 series tonight.
p
to Manhattan, where his studio at-
tracted the attention of wealthy patrons
and, unfortunately, Stalin's paranoia.
In 1938, the Russian secret service
kidnapped Theremin, banished him to
Siberia and forced the scientific genius
to develop secret military tools (the elec-
tronic "bug" being perhaps his most well-
known invention).
Meanwhile, back in the States, the
theremin had become an instrument of
choice for influential film composers,
sparked the creation of the synthesizer
and caught the attention of the Beach
Boys' Brian Wilson, who applies the
theremin's effects in the mega-hit "Good
Vibrations."
Filmmaker Martin, who brought
Theremin from Moscow back to the
United States in 1991, employs inter-
views with Wilson, singer Todd Rund-
gren, synthesizer inventor Robert Moog
and Theremin love interest and protege
Clara Rockmore (with whom Theremin
is reunited in the film) to tell the pro-
fessor's intriguing tale.
"No matter what your thresholds for
pleasure and astonishment," said the
Los Angeles Times, "this film ... will cross
them easily."
—Liz Stevens
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