Composer Wendy Carlos spurred electronic music to new commercial heights during the late '60s, popularizing the synthesizer with the enormously successful Switched-On Bach album. Born in Pawtucket, Rhode Island on November 14, 1939, Carlos pursued her M.A. in composition under Vladimir Ussachevsky and Otto Luening at Columbia University's famed Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center. Following her graduation, she moved to Manhattan, where she found work as a recording engineer. In Manhattan, she met Dr. Robert Moog and, not long afterward, she began playing the Moog synthesizer. Carlos released her first recording, Switched-On Bach, in 1968. A showcase for the Moog synthesizer, Switched-On Bach interpreted the legendary composer's most renowned fugues and movements via state-of-the-art synth technology; purists were appalled, but the record captured the public's imagination and in time became the first classical album certified platinum by the RIAA. It also earned three Grammy Awards. A similar effort, The Well-Tempered Synthesizer, followed in 1969. In 1971, Carlos wrote the music for Stanley Kubrick's controversial film #A Clockwork Orange, introducing the vocoder -- an electronic device designed to synthesize the human voice -- in her score. After 1976's Brandenburg Concertos 3-5, Carlos again worked with Kubrick, providing the score for his 1980 adaptation of Stephen King's #The Shining. Two years later, she wrote music for the Disney film Tron. Subsequent efforts included a spoof of Prokofiev's "Peter and the Wolf" recorded with Weird Al Yankovic and Switched-On Bach 2000. ~ All Music Guide, Rovi