The Benefits of Ambient Music

'What makes ambient music important to society?' 
'What are the benefits of this type of music?' 
'Why should we care about it at all?'

When I first heard these questions, I was at a loss for answers. I didn't know what to infer from the words 'important to society', or the concept of getting everyone to care about something that really just comes down to a matter of taste in music. What's worse is the fact that when I tried to search online for the benefits of ambient music, I was assaulted not by articles seeking to prove the intrinsic value of the genre. Rather, I found nothing but either experiments involving altering a person's mood using background music, whether it actually be Ambient or not, or people simply trying to sell their music under the guise that it will relieve your stress, and/or make you more productive.
 

Then I realized the problem. To truly understand the world of ambient music and its artists, and steer clear of people who are simply selling you half-baked meditation music with subliminal messages, the question needs to change from 'How does this music benefit society?' to 'How does this music benefit me personally?'. It's when you search for personal opinions on the subject that you begin to see the true value of ambient music. So, coupled with sources from other blogs and talk sites, I give you my four big reasons why Ambient music is valuable.


1: Ambient music teaches you patience.

People who are not initiated to ambient music after listening will usually comment on how they thought it was dull and repetitive, drones on for far too long, and that there simply is no action or climax to any of it. After all, most songs that don't fall into the category of ambient are three minutes in length on average, and are meant to grab your attention and be bombastic. Ambient music will appear to be long and drawn out at first, but if composed correctly will keep your attention should you be giving any to it, because despite its often simple base, it is intrinsically interesting. Of course, if you are at all looking to jump into the genre, but don't want to start with the really deep stuff, I found this list to be somewhat helpful.

There is at least one parallel I can find in the world of cinema as well. Stanley Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey' is a movie that really draws itself out and revels in its atmosphere. For that reason, many people find it boring to sit through, but the story and atmosphere you get from the movie, at least in my opinion, is phenomenal. For that reason, I like to refer to 2001 as an 'ambient movie', even though it was made nine years before the genre was officially born.


2: It's a good way to escape the noise of the outer world.

If you are like me, then you get tired of the constant dribble that you hear around you daily, both at home and outside. To escape that noise, nearly any genre of music will work, but I find ambient to be somewhat more effective than any other genre I've listened to. I say this primarily because ambient music doesn't throw sound at you, but instead surrounds you with it, giving you a space to think and be calm. For this reason, it often feels like an audible barrier, protecting you from invasive sounds.

Now, this may or may not be desirable, given your circumstances and preferences, but I personally find it indispensable at times. To borrow the words of another artist, it is 'an antidote to noise'.
 

3: Ambient music is pure, distilled emotion.

I can't think of another genre that is more basic at heart than ambient and its subsidiaries. The feelings you receive from listening to a specific song, when done right, are direct and powerful. While generally people use ambient music to induce calmness, it has its darker side as well. Generally referred to as Dark Ambient, these songs are often used to invoke fear and dread, and are heard in more horror movies and games than one can easily count. The reason why these songs are prevalent is because they do their job very well, most of the time. If you want proof of this, try playing a horror video game you consider genuinely scary that lets you turn off the music exclusively, and play without music for a while. The results may surprise you!

I also find that if I am suffering from negative feelings, it helps when I put on a positive ambient tune. This is also a matter of preference, though, considering that non ambient can do this too, and more effectively for some people, just not myself. However, I would highly recommend giving the genre a shot, because you never know if it actually will help you or not until you've given it a good test run. If you want to give it a shot without emptying your wallet, I've found an excellent site for listening to and downloading deep ambient music for free!
 

(If the lengthy list of unfamiliar music on this site scares you, don't fret. I will shortly make my next post with a list of recommendations for this site, and others.)


4: There is no better fuel for the imagination.

Most of the artwork I do was inspired by various ambient albums. The Dream States I mentioned in the last post of this blog were fueled by ambient music. I sleep easier if I'm hearing some sort of ambient in the background. Whenever I get or see reviews for the music that artists like myself make in the genre, I always tend to see people describing the atmosphere or world they envisioned in their head while listening to it. This even happens in more or less professional reviews. If just the right mood strikes me while listening to ambient songs, entire worlds will unfold in my mind, to the point where I might just get lost in them for a while, and those can inspire more works of art in the near future, including future songs! Some may say that I've become addicted to this form of music, but really, I have trouble seeing the down-side, especially when I'm opening my imagination to long-form masterpieces like this!

 

Hopefully I've done a decent job explaining why ambient music is so compelling, and deserves a place in the hearts of everyone who admires it. Please leave comments if you want to support or contest this argument. If I have your attention, stay tuned, because next up, I'm going to list some of my favorite albums and/or artists within the genre!

Visual Impacts of Ambient Music

The following video and recording was made by me.

I am reading a paper that I wrote a couple years ago, with background music accompaniment.
The paper itself was written to satisfy an assignment instructing me to write about my dreams.  Since I couldn't quite recall my dreams at the time, I instead wrote about what I called 'Dream States', which were similar.

These states were caused more or less by my imagination infused with various ambient songs, so I felt it right to post it here in this blog.

Enjoy the video!

A Brief History of Ambient Music

Ambient music in its true and modern form has only been around for a short time, but its psychological origins arguably date back to prehistory, as it could be argued that elements of the genre exist in nearly all types of music. Though not a formal genre until its coining by Brian Eno, the roots of Ambient music as we know it today stretch back to the era of classical compositions. The man generally credited with starting the chain of the phenomenon was known as Erik Satie.

Erik Satie: (image taken from http://www.satie-archives.com/)

Satie is not considered a musician in the general sense. Rather, he is remembered as an artist and experimenter with sound. Having lived a less than glamorous life, from his rejection from formal schools of music to his inability at times to make ends meet, his taste in music was warped to the point where it was on a level unto itself.¹ When it comes to how he kick-started the concepts behind Ambient music, most will refer to his compositions, starting in 1917, known as his Furniture Music.²

One of the Furniture Music movements

Pieces like the one above were meant to be played by a live orchestra in public settings in order to enhance the mood of that particular area. As such, they are not tremendously complex, and tend to loop for a good while. Thus, they are not good for focusing on, but that was never the point, since the music was simply there to add a backdrop to a particular setting. For this reason, these pieces are seen as precursors to the ideas later developed by Eno and others in terms of how Ambient music should be perceived.

However, this notion seems a bit simplistic for me, as there is more to Ambient music than simply being out of the focus of attention. Another composition exists from Satie though, that, (at least to me), is more important to the founding principles of the genre, and came much earlier.

Vexations: One of the earliest examples of music with truly ambient themes.

Vexations Sheet Music: (image taken from http://www.satie-archives.com/web/articl11.html)

This particular composition was written in 1893, but was not publicly known until after Satie's death in 1925. What we get from this piece is not so much a song, but rather, an envelope of emotion. Satie wrote on his original sheet of the piece to the performer that,

“To play this motif 840 times in succession, it would be advisable to prepare oneself beforehand, in the deepest silence, by serious immobilities.”

Some performers, like John Cage (who we will get to later) have taken this to heart, and have made public performances of this song, playing it 840 times in succession². The primary vibe you might get from this composition, (and perhaps one you have already guessed from the implication of repeating this 840 times) is that of boredom. However, rather than simply being boring due to incompetence, the composition seems to define the emotional state instead. The idea that it implies boredom, however, is not the main reason I bring this song up. Vexations is important because it is a song that, while it does not vie to be focused on, hums in the background, and encompasses its listener in an emotional setting. For that reason, I have declared it as the earliest truly ambient song that I know of.

Despite the influence that Satie's music had on various artists and listeners, his works were not very well known, as he was more or less a social outcast. In fact, the vast majority of his published works, (and his fame, for that matter), did not arise until long after his death.¹ The person primarily responsible for Satie's rise in historical importance is the renowned musician John Cage, who made public many of Satie's lost works.

John Cage: image taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:John_Cage_Laugh.png

John Cage is one of the most influential composers of the 20^th century. His take on music was so vastly different from his contemporaries, it shook the very foundations of the medium. As a prime example, we look at his most (in)famous composition, 4'33”.

Essentially, it's a three-part track of silence. At first, you might wonder how something like this was ever even accepted as art, let alone stand as one of the most famous compositions of the 20^th century. You might think that this song was simply a jab from Cage, stating that anything could be made to be art, if you add enough pretentious and obfuscating explanations behind it, and you might be right. However, the consensus that many critics seem to come to after hearing this particular performance is that when someone performs 4'33”, they are not actually performing. Rather, it is the audience, the theater, and the world outside that becomes the performance.³ For this reason, 4'33” stands as the last universal common ancestor of all true ambient music. It doesn't have a focus on any front stage or spotlight, rather, the focus is on atmosphere, on the surroundings. It teaches us that anything can be considered music, and as such, the universe is an orchestra.

Brian Eno: image taken from http://en.wikipedia./wiki/File:Brian_Eno_Profile_Long_Now_Foundation_2006.jpg

Now we come at last to Brian Eno. Eno is the true definition of a musician. Apart from his two predecessors, (perhaps not even), he is the most influential musician, at least in the field of electronic music. Having studied and respecting the works of Erik Satie, among other minimalist artists, and being inspired by the works of Cage, releasing several of his compositions on his own labels, he is generally regarded as the father of Ambient music.⁴ His early works were not at all what one would call ambient, but elements of the genre became increasingly robust as he continued to make releases and solidify the genre's concept. Eventually, it culminated in the first real ambient album, Ambient 1: Music for Airports. 

Ambient 1 Cover: image taken from http:https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEim0K8A1vTICai_ZHUcIXyf9ROgpyjcXQc8hy8yls1sW4aiAco-GJum3j9fvz2zTKG4S_DsGUUXxMDpGTrI-MllewUDCgTzzsNolUq1mTIzW4hB1NIksaWiJqsTm6Ty5abBYfJ7T_sPxhk/s1600/Brian+Eno+Ambient+1+Music+For+Airports.jpg

If one were to read the notes included with the release, they would find Eno's formal definition of the genre:

“Whereas the extant canned music companies proceed from the basis of regularizing environments by blanketing their acoustic and atmospheric idiosyncracies, 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 levelling 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 accomodate many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular; it must be as ignorable as it is interesting.”⁵

Although I have practiced making Ambient music for years, I didn't pay this particular album much interest at first. It simply felt like a half-baked composition, lacking any complexity. Now, I herald it as one of the greatest examples of the genre, for a couple reasons. Firstly, it does a tremendous job of filling in your surroundings, and essentially taking you to a very different setting. Secondly, it functions incredibly well as a calm-inducing sound-scape. Finally, it is wrought with emotion, to the point where it can send you into a euphoric trance if you are in that persuasive state.

Because of this, it was revolutionary, and started the genre in a single sweep. No true fan of Ambient music doesn't at least know of this release. From here, it blossomed into the multitude of artists and listeners who make up the modern Ambient scene.

That about sums it up. The rest, as they say, is history.

1“The homepage of the French composer ERIK SATIE” Last modified on Sunday, January 23, 2011 5:16:07 AM

http://www.satie-archives.com/web/satie.html

2Wikipedia: “Furniture Music” Accessed on Monday, February 20, 2012 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furniture_music

3“John Cage and the Avant-Garde: The Sounds of Silence:” Last modified on Sunday, April 02, 2000 3:25:58 PM. http://www.classicalnotes.net/columns/silence.html

4Wikipedia: “Brian Eno” Accessed on Wednesday, February 22, 2012 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Eno

5“Music for Airports liner notes” Accessed on Wednesday, February 22, 2012 http://music.hyperreal.org/artists/brian_eno/MFA-txt.html

An Intro

I make music.


Whenever you hear someone say that, what do you usually think of? Do thoughts of a group of kids playing their rock instruments in a garage come to mind? Do you envision someone playing a piano or a violin to a perspective audience? Do you think of someone staring at a computer screen, dragging green bars around that represent chords of a digital instrument while they rearrange blocks on a digital dark-gray canvas, and then press a Play button to test it?

Now, when you hear this, which of those three do you think is the most likely scenario?

Though this song is not conventional, listen to it carefully. Allow your mind to wander and create visual scenarios for this song on its own. For best effect, try to remove yourself from any other auditory and/or visual distractions. Turn the lights down, if not off entirely, and just listen. If you find yourself lacking the patience to just listen, then you may allow yourself to read or view something, be it from a physical source or off the internet. Just make sure there's no other audio involved. (though I find that normal speech doesn't detract from the experience too much) Once you feel you have listened for long enough, scroll down some to see the basal image that inspired this song.

The song is titled Whitecreek. It was inspired by the image above, taken in the winter of last year. (February 2011)

Assuming that you didn't scroll ahead too soon, what came to mind before you saw this image? Now that you have seen it, do you feel that your vision came anywhere close to this image, or the name of the title? Did you enjoy the song, or were you bored by it? Do you think that the song added to or detracted from your local atmosphere? Did you turn it off early, or did you let it loop for a bit? If you were reading and/or listening to someone speak, do you feel that your mental imagery was altered more by the song, or the words? Which were you paying more attention to?

(keep in mind that there are no right or wrong positions to come to regarding this manner)

The song linked to above is formally classified as Ambient.

Ambient music, as coined by the father of the genre and not to be confused with the term of ambience, refers to music that is soft and unobtrusive by nature. The name comes from the Latin word ambire, which means 'to surround'. Instead of acting to grab your attention, it instead serves as a backdrop, and helps to enhance the mood of a setting. And, due to my particular tastes in music, it is my obsession.

At least to me, it is the penultimate in emotional manipulating, and is second to none for fuel to the imagination. It is music at its core. In order to demonstrate this further, I refer to this track, written and composed by master Brian Eno in the late seventies.

Notice that this song is nothing more than recordings of a choir, paced in a non-structured fashion. This is a demonstration of how an extremely simple and minimalistic track can be made so powerful when tuned just right. It is songs like these that inspire me. They help me out of pits of depression, and help me get into flows of creativity more easily. I've practically become addicted to them at this point, since I find it more difficult to sleep at night without my nocturnal playlist of long-form ambient songs. In fact, I love it so much, that I came to eventually start writing my own, as you saw with the first example.

My first official track was made and released on January 6th, 2009. Most of my attempts to make songs fail, as they would naturally, and the ones that succeed usually derive from other things I've listened to, and others from things I have thought about. Songs with good ideas and chords typically tend to survive better than those that do not, especially in the ambient genre.

If you still do not understand my devotion to ambient music, then please take a moment of your time to listen to this particular song, by America's ambient forte, Steve Roach:

If you share my fascination, or are at least interested in the topic, then please read on, and keep this blog in mind.  I would also highly suggest commenting, to leave suggestions and thoughts.