![]() ![]() ![]() His synth, “the Buchla” was not like anything she had ever encountered. In the 1970s Ciani became convinced synthesisers represented the future This led her to the University of California, in Berkeley, and a meeting with synthesiser designer Don Buchla – a pioneer she describes as the “Leonardo da Vinci” of electronic instrumentation. She studied classical music at Wesleyan University in Connecticut while attending MIT in her spare time, where she educated herself on the latest developments in musical technology. But it doesn’t lead to all the doors opening.”Ĭiani grew up in South Boston and started piano at six. How did that come about? There are always little blips that are unexplained. “It’s not to say that there weren’t breakthrough cases. In order to communicate across a culture, to make a statement in the world, you need the infrastructure that does that,” says Ciani. It’s a simple thing: there were just no doors opening. Where was her guitar? Why wasn’t she singing? In the 1970s, the industry expected female artists to look and sound like variations of Joni Mitchell and Carole King. Only in recent years – and particularly with Lisa Rovner’s 2020 documentary Sisters with Transistors – have the contributions of Ciani, Derbyshire and their peers been acknowledged. The story was reduced, in other words, to a simple tale of boys and their toys. Instead, the history of electronica was of cold, dystopian artists such as Kraftwerk and flamboyant gadabouts like Jean-Michel Jarre and Giorgio Moroder conjuring a new sound from out of nothing. As were other female innovators in the genre, such as Bebe Barron, Laura Spiegel and Delia Derbyshire (creator of the Doctor Who theme in 1963). Among the first composers to see the potential of electronic music, she was scrubbed from history in real time. Playing into the void has been Ciani’s experience throughout much of her near 50-year career. But you have to let me play some of Seven Waves. “And they wanted it there for seven in the morning. But still…,” says Ciani – later christened “diva of the diode” by synth purists. “They wanted me to move all my stuff over to their studio. Perhaps there would be an opportunity to mention her forthcoming album, Seven Waves. She would manipulate the machine, Letterman would crack wise, the audience hoot and applaud. Letterman’s people had suggested she bring her huge Don Buchla modular synthesiser – think a Hammond organ meets a Dalek from Doctor Who – and astound the host with its many electronic effects. “I didn’t want to do it,” says Ciani (76), speaking ahead of a concert at Dublin’s Liberty Hall Theatre on October 13th. When the bookers for the David Letterman Show invited experimental electronic composer Suzanne Ciani to appear on the programme in August 1980, her instinct was to say “no”. ![]()
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