The Bizarre, Beautiful Story of Clara Rockmore, Pioneering Electronic Artist and Google Doodle Subject

Termen had invented a way for Reisenberg to regain the music she had lost, a loss that had broken her heart. The theremin gave players precise melodic control, so much so that to play it correctly required perfect pitch -- the ability to recognize a note without context.

Termen and Reisenberg seemed, and were, destined for one another. Reisenberg became Termen's ether-wave muse, customizing the instrument to her specifications. Reports say Reisenberg began to weep the first time she tested Termen's invention. Reisenberg, taken with the instrument, developed a system for finger movements that allowed for more precise performance. The pair made headlines across the country, selling out Carnegie Hall on multiple occasions. 

Termen fell in love -- in one of his many shows of affection he created a birthday cake that spun and alit as Clara approached it. The inventor proposed to his young ether-wave muse several times -- Reisenberg ended up marrying a lawyer and taking his name, becoming Clara Rockmore. (Termen would go on to marry the principal ballerina for America's first all-black ballet company, going on to design a stage that would generate music according to the ballerinas' movements.)

The pair's journey ended suddenly -- Termen was abducted by his home country and taken back to Moscow in 1938, being conscripted into the service of the NKVD, a proto-KGB. Famed political theorist and American ambassador to Russia George Kennan was on the receiving end of Termen's genius in 1945; schoolchildren presented him with a gift that was implanted with a listening device called The Thing that Termen had designed and which eavesdropped on the envoy for several years.

Clara would go on to work with synthesizer pioneer Bob Moog on her first record, which wasn't released until 1977, when Rockmore was around 56. The impressive and practical genius wrote the book for modern thereminists like Armen Ra and Pamelia Kurstin.

Rockmore and Termen were reunited just before the latter's death, a scene shown in the documentary Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey.

Today's Doodle was created by artist Robinson Wood, interaction designer Kevin Burke, and engineers Will Knowles and Kris Hom.