ambient history, ambient songs, ambient artists
Please improve this article if you can.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.Nature inspired ambient music
4.Hence, Brian Eno is considered the father of ambient music: his 1978 release Ambient 1: Music for Airports includes a manifesto describing this music.Although having coined the phrase "ambient music", he is also quick to reference the works and influence of Erik Satie and John Cage, in particular Cage's use of chance as in using the I Ching to influence the contents of a musical composition.Eno coined the term in an essay to distance his work from elevator music and Muzak, it is more often similar to mood music or an ambient background in movie and radio sound effects.Many of the works of turn of the century French composer Erik Satie are regarded as predecessors to ambient music.The earliest electronic soundscape music and theories come from the work of Pierre Schaeffer who followed the futurists in classifying music into categories such as man made, natural, short and long.He made some of the first electronic music using record players and natural sounds, and cutting up tape, making the first experimental music use of recording and magnetic tape (Musique Concrete).Even his work can be seen as preempted by Schopenhauer's ideas of 'soundworlds', literally worlds made up entirely of sounds.Karlheinz Stockhausen created pioneering electronic musical experiments later in 1955, and these two (amongst others) lay the groundwork for ambient music to appear decades later when music technology had developed.Ambient music can be seen as a kind of minimalism that was an influence on Eno's groundbreaking style.John Cage created the ultimate minimalist work with his 4'33", three periods of silence first played on the piano, which can also be considered ambient music because it causes the audience to become aware of the ambient sound surrounding them.Among the first electronic ambient albums were Affenstunde (1970) and In Den Garten Pharaos (1971) by Popol Vuh.Another important album was Sonic Seasonings (1972) by Wendy Carlos.In the 1970s, some ambient, krautrock, and other musicians who were influenced by new age spirituality created the eclectic genre known as New Age music, selling millions independent from the mainstream music industry by direct order or new age shops.By the 1980s, New Age music had become so much better known than ambient music, that ambient was taken as a synonym for "New Age", and many ambient musicians deliberately took on new age themes to market themselves to this audience.Under the guise of various styles, this new genre sometimes referred to as ambient house, ambient techno, ambient dub, IDM, ambience, or simply "ambient" in common use, saw the birth of a new wave of artists like The Orb, Aphex Twin, the Irresistible Force, Geir Jenssen's Biosphere, and the Higher Intelligence Agency.Early Warp records artists, (as well as later ones such as Aphex Twin), FSOL Future Sound of London (Lifeforms, ISDN) Autechre, (Incunabula, Amber), Boards of Canada, Massive Attack, Portishead, and The KLF all took a part in popularising and diversifying ambient music.Chillout is generally linked to club culture and is sometimes used as a term which includes ambient music as a subset of itself, though usually chillout music has a beat and is not completely ambient with no rhythm at all.UK techno developed in particular at Warp Records in Sheffield, where previous electronic pioneers such as Cabaret Voltaire and Autechre laid the groundwork for ambient techno to develop, and for Aphex Twin and Boards of Canada to develop later.From this scene developed ambient dub and ambient techno.Electroacoustic and acousmatic music are 'classical' art music forms that use electronic sound creation instead of or alongside acoustic instruments.Some club groups have made live ambient music, mixing dub techniques and styles with ambient textures and dance grooves.Soundtracks
Ambient music has been used in many television shows and motion pictures and is notable for contributing to their atmosphere, or soundscapes.Being an alternative to canned incidental music or stock music cues, it also gives the musician artistic freedom.The traditional practice of composing for film or television usually involves the composer creating recognizable theme songs or jingles for the setting, hero or villain, and for plot elements such as love interest, action, comic relief, and death scenes.However, ambient music is noted for taking a less formulaic approach in its use in film and TV shows.Star Wars in favor of a more atmospheric music score by Toto and Brian Eno.Electronic musician Paddy Kingsland is noted for the music style he brought to several serials of the television series Doctor Who which had until then relied mostly on stock music cues or minimal music for much of its history.Bill Laswell, especially in his music project Divination, where he collaborates with different musicians on each album (though sometimes the same ones are on more than one of the albums such as Tetsu Inoue and others).Laswell also presented Ambient dub and Ambient house music on albums by his collaboration project Axiom Dub, featuring recording artists the Orb, Jah Wobble, Jaki Liebezeit and DJ Spooky.As writer and performer David Toop explains on the liner notes of such defining ambient dub releases as "Earthjuice" and the "Ambient Dub" (A.Organic ambient music
Organic ambient music is characterised by integration of electronic, electric, and acoustic musical instruments.Aside from the usual electronic music influences, organic ambient tends to incorporate influences from world music, especially drone instruments and hand percussion.Organic ambient is intended to be more harmonious with nature than with the disco.Some works by ambient pioneers such as Brian Eno, which use a combination of traditional instruments (such as piano, though usually processed through tape loops or other devices) and electronic instruments, would be considered organic ambient music in this sense.Nature inspired ambient music
The music is composed from samples and recordings of naturally occurring sounds.The samples may be arranged in repetitive ways to form a conventional musical structure or may be random and unfocused.Some overlap occurs between organic ambient and nature inspired ambient.One of the first albums in the genre, Wendy Carlos' Sonic Seasonings, combines sampled and synthesized nature sounds with ambient melodies and drones for a particularly relaxing effect.The album Second Nature by Bill Laswell, Tetsu Inoue, and Atom Heart is an ambient album that uses processed nature sounds, with reverb and cho to create a hypnotic environment.Related styles include ambient industrial and isolationist ambient.See also List of dark ambient artists)
There are also a few black metal bands, such as Burzum and Distantrumbling, who produce ambient music, be it not always with such a dark atmosphere.Illbient is another kind of dark ambient music that has more of a beat but still creates the spooky disturbing feelings.B12, early Aphex Twin, the Black Dog, Higher Intelligence Agency, and Biosphere.Ambient house tracks generally lack a diatonic center and feature much atonality along with synthesized chords.Ambient industrial is a hybrid genre of ambient and industrial music; the term industrial being used in the original experimental sense, rather than in the sense of industrial metal or EBM.It is important to note, however, that many of these artists are very eclectic in their output, with much of it falling outside of ambient industrial per se.Space music, also spelled spacemusic, includes music from the Ambient genre as well as a broad range of other genres with certain characteristics in common to create the experience of contemplative spaciousness.Isolationist ambient music
Also known as isolationism.The Sombient label is now the primary purveyor of isolationist ambient, in particular with the "drones" compilation series.Some of the artists known for this style of ambient music include Robert Fripp and Chuck Hammer Guitarchitecture.Hearts of Space, a programme hosted by Stephen Hill and broadcast on NPR in the US since 1973.Australian radio station Triple J's Sunday night show Sound Lab regularly focuses on Australian and international ambient, electronic and experimental music.XM Radio's AudioVisions channel 77 plays individual ambient pieces with a New Age slant, while channel 84 has more of a "chill" focus, and also rebroadcasts Musical Starstreams.External links
Ambient Techno in Sound on Sound
Ambient Music Guide Comprehensive ambient music resource site."Ambient House", All Music Guide (Retrieved October 4, 2006).Originally a 1970s reference to the conjunction of ambient electronics and our expanding visions of cosmic space ...Hearts of Space, What is spacemusic?Space Music, without conventional rhythmic elements, while drawing from any number of traditional, ethnic, or modern styles.""When you listen to space and ambient music you are connecting with a tradition of contemplative sound experience whose roots are ancient and diverse.Hearts of Space, What is spacemusic?Hearts of Space, sidebar "What is Spacemusic?"The term has come to refer to music in the style of the early and mid 1970s works of Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream, Ash Ra Tempel, Popol Vuh and others in that scene."This music is experienced primarily as a continuum of spatial imagery and emotion, rather than as thematic musical relationships, compositional ideas, or performance values."This music promotes a psychological movement inward."Rhythmic or tonal movements animate the experience of flying, floating, cruising, gliding, or hovering within the auditory space.""This was the soundtrack for countless planetarium shows, on massage tables, and as soundtracks to many videos and movies.""STAR'S END is (with the exception of "Music from the Hearts of Space") the longest running radio program of ambient music in the world.Ligeti (composer "Monolith" and "Beyond Saturn" themes)
Winston Ryder (sound editor)
"A cutting edge ambient, multimedia accomplishment...Eraserhead
David Lynch
Alan Splet (sound design)
Features innovative ambient noise sound design in place of musical score.This page was last modified 05:18, 8 January 2008.Virtual Weather Station is the premiere choice for connecting your weather station to your computer and "live" to the Internet.Oregon Scientific Weather Stations at wholesale prices.CLUSTER Groove Salad: a nicely chilled plate of ambient beats and grooves.CLUSTER Drone Zone: Atmospheric ambient space music.CLUSTER Groove Salad: a nicely chilled plate of ambient beats and grooves.Smooth and Stylish Beats from Netmusique.CLUSTER Groove Salad: a nicely chilled plate of ambient beats and grooves.CLUSTER Drone Zone: Atmospheric ambient space music."Click here to visit our
advertiser."SHOUTcast Radio is the home of free Internet Radio.Download the SHOUTcast Broadcaster Tools and DJ your own online radio station.There are many forms of ambient music, some of which includes organic, dark, industrial, and nature inspired ambient music.Below you will find a few examples of the many artists that are featured on DI.To share this media with a friend, you must have AIM installed.Like so much of Moby's earliest work, this isn't so much an album as a compilation via his original label, Instinct.Motivations aside, Ambient is an enjoyable collection of experiments; if Aphex Twin's monumental Selected Ambient Works releases eclipse it in terms of both quality and sheer inventiveness, Moby's own efforts in the field are often quite pleasing.String" are agreeably moody and pretty, but not particularly noteworthy beyond that.AnguillaAntigua and BarbudaArgentinaArubaBahamasBarbadosBelizeBoliviaBrazilCayman IslandsChileColombiaCosta RicaCubaDominicaDominican RepublicEcuadorEl SalvadorFalkland Islands (Malvinas)GrenadaGuadeloupeGuatemalaGuiana (Fr)GuyanaHaitiHondurasJamaicaMartiniqueMexicoMontserratNetherlands AntillesNicaraguaPanamaParaguayPeruPuerto RicoSaint LuciaSaint Vincent and GrenadinesSt.American SamoaAustraliaCook IslandsFijiGuamKiribatiMarshall IslandsMicronesiaNauruNew CaledoniaNew ZealandNiueNorfolk IslandNorthern Mariana Isl.Check out top ten lists from the Download Music editors and writers in our annual best of 2007 roundup.Music that inspires you to use your imagination.Ambient,Soundscapin Space Rock, New Age, and all between that.It's all about the atmosphere.Certainly one of the dreamiest varieties of electronic music, Ambient concerns itself with the blending and motion of sonic textures, both organic and artificial.Although beats and rhythmic elements can come into play, Ambient music's key feature is formlessness.This is music for the mind, not the dancefloor.Two of the most groundbreaking Ambient outfits include the Orb and Global Communication, both of which have had a huge impact on the genre since their seminal releases in the early '90s."Visit other CNET Networks sites: Select SiteBNETCHOWCNET.
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