Ambient

- originated 1960's 70's UK, Jamaica, Japan

− genre emphasizes tone and atmosphere over musical structure or rhythm
− describedc as “sonic wallpaper” - to complement or alter one's space and provide
a sense of calmness
− creates a mood through synthesizers and timbrla qualities.

− textural layers of sound without prevalent musical tropes, rewarding both passive and
active listening.

− active listening

vs.

− passive listening

"Ambient music must be able to accommodate many levels of listening attention without
enforcing one in particular; it must be as ignorable as it is interesting." - Brian Eno
(contemporary pioneer)

Erik Satie – early 20th century French composer precursor - “furniture music” - background
music at a dinner, not requiring one's attention.

"a music...which will be part of the noises of the environment, will take them into
consideration. I think of it as melodious, softening the noises of the knives and forks at
dinner, not dominating them, not imposing itself. It would fill up those heavy silences that
sometime fall between friends dining together. It would spare them the trouble of paying
attention to their own banal remarks. And at the same time it would neutralize the street
noises which so indiscreetly enter into the play of conversation. To make such music would
be to respond to a need." (Satie)

1960's

− some experimentation
− Music for Zen Meditation, Tony Scott https://www.youtube.com/watch?
 v=fp1J8aYzMno
− Soothing Sounds for Baby, Raymond Scott https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=BrY8XLT917o
1970's

− experiental and synthesizer oriented styles (contribute to ambient)

− King Tubby (Jamaica)
− Irv Teibel (Environment Series) https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=lsQlCHM6_A0&list=PLe7RBDUpbnkNbCBjHMBxotqYOdBJwnwZe
− Isao Tomita (Japanese composer)
− Tangerine Dream (Germany)
− Yellow Magic Orchestra (ambient house)

Brian Eno

Brian Eno
− English producer – coined term
− describe music that can be "actively listened to with attention or as easily ignored,
depending on the choice of the listener", and which exists on the "cusp between
melody and texture"

Ambient 1 Music for Airports https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNwYtllyt3Q

liner notes:

Whereas the extant canned music companies proceed from the basis of regularizing
environments by blanketing their acoustic and atmospheric idiosyncrasies, Ambient Music is
intended to enhance these. Whereas conventional background music is produced by
stripping away all sense of doubt and uncertainty (and thus all genuine interest) from the
music, Ambient Music retains these qualities. And whereas their intention is to "brighten" the
environment by adding stimulus to it (thus supposedly alleviating the tedium of routine
tasks and leveling out the natural ups and downs of the body rhythms) Ambient Music is
intended to induce calm and a space to think. Ambient Music must be able to accommodate
many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular; it must be as ignorable
as it is interesting.

− Synthesizer-oriente
−
1980's
− mid 1980's Yamaha DX-7, Korg M1 made synthesizers commercially available
− 16bit Macintosh built in sound and IBM models would be in studios and homes

1990;s early 1990's

− Orb, Aphex Twin
− “chill out” music emerged from British ecstasy culture – downtempo remooms outside
the main dance floor – where ambient, dub, and downtempo beats were played to
ease the mind...
2000's
− 2000's natural landscapes common on youtube
− 1 to 8 hours long – helping people with yoga, sleep, study, massage, meditiation..
peaceful

− Ambient Dub – (pioneered by King Tubby)

− Ambient house – lack of tonal center...atonality “Brainvoyager” (Dutch)
− Ambient techno – atmosperic blended with tencno (Aphex Twin, B12,
− Ambient industrial: experimental
− samples are highly processed to the point of unrecognizable, some works based
on radio telescope recordings, babbling of newborns, source recordings
− Ambient pop : electronic textrures and atmospheres mix reflect meditiave qualitieies
of ambient -
− Dark Ambient features toned-down or entirely missing beats with unsettling passages
of keyboards, eerie samples, and treated guitar effects.– Merzbow -
− Space Music – expansive, lacking conventional melodies, rhythms – invocking spatial
imagery and emotion – used in film soundtrakcs, planetariums, for meditiation
− for deep listening, bakground enhancement, foreground listening

Experimental Music
− music that pushes existing boundaries and definiations.
− Includes “indeterminate” music
− music incorporating chance
− in performance
− in creation of a piece
− hybridizing disparate styles incorporating unorthodoxy
− John Cage – used indeterminacy
− American composer
− used the I Ching in writing Music of Changes
−
− Pierre Schaeffer
− GRMC (Group de Recherches Music Concrete)
−

David Cope also distinguishes between experimental and avant garde,

describing experimental music as that "which represents a refusal to accept the
status quo" (Cope 1997, 222). David Nicholls, too, makes this distinction, saying
that "...very generally, avant-garde music can be viewed as occupying an
extreme position within the tradition, while experimental music lies outside
it" (Nicholls 1998, 318).

Fluxus[edit]
Main article: Fluxus
Fluxus was an artistic movement started in the 1960s, characterized by an
increased theatricality and the use of mixed media. Another known musical
aspect appearing in the Fluxus movement was the use of Primal Scream at
performances, derived from the primal therapy. Yoko Ono used this technique
of expression (Bateman n.d.).

Noise Music
− rooted in modernism, electronica, Futurism, Dada
− culturally originited 1910 Europe