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Thoughts in Sound Episode #1 Brian Eno: Architect of Ambience

From John Diliberto | 00:05:02
Producers: John Diliberto

Credit:
Rock's leading conceptualist ponders the meaning of sound and music

Most artists are content to play the notes, but there's a handful of composers and musicians who work at the level of sound itself, turning meaning, finding nuance, charting new hitherto unheard directions in music through a contemplation of the meaning of sound itself. In a series of five non-narrative features, four composers and one music movement grapple with sound from its spiritual to its theoretical dimensions. The artists include John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Brian Eno, Keith Jarrett and in a Minimalist Meditation, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, Philip Glass, LaMonte Young and John Adams.

In episode #1, we hear from Brian Eno. He has become a defining figure in music over the last three decades. Since his days with Roxy Music in the early 1970s, he's been rock's leading conceptualist, drawing upon the avant-garde traditions of John Cage, along with minimalism and electronic music. But he applies their concepts to the most popular music with his productions of U2, Paul Simon, Talking Heads, David Bowie and Coldplay. His ambient music series has continued to resonate through the last 3 decades.

Thoughts in Sound is produced in three formats: a series of five five-minute, stand-alone features, a half-hour documentary, and an hour-long documentary that contains a companion half-hour of the artists? music to illustrate their words. Hide full description

Most artists are content to play the notes, but there's a handful of composers and musicians who work at the level of sound itself, turning meaning, finding nuance, charting new hitherto unheard directions in music through a contemplation of the meaning of sound itself. In a series of five non-narrative features, four composers and one music movement grapple with sound from its spiritual to its theoretical dimensions. The artists include John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Brian Eno, Keith Jarrett and in a Minimalist Meditation, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, Philip Glass, LaMonte Young and John Adams. In episode #1, we hear from Bria...
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Hal Sokolow

Posted on January 29, 2008 at 09:30 AM | Permalink

Review of Thoughts in Sound Episode #1 Brian Eno: Architect of Ambience

This short Thoughts in Sound episode is intriguing because the snippits of Brian Eno speaking are just enough to convey that he has a thought-out philosophy and a deeply felt reason for pursuing his style of expression. It is inspiring because Brian Eno's comments and music reveal creative accomplishment and success, and illustrate what it can mean to transcend traditional boundaries of music for the massses. The episode is engaging because the narrator has a serene voice that coordinates well with the general ambience of the piece and the musical selections leave a positive overall tone and feel. I selected this topic to audition because I am highly interested in how sounds, particularly music, affect human emotions and spirit. I am experimenting with my own forms of musical expression and exploring how music affects the consciousness and awareness of the music player and the music listener. I picked this particular brief episode to audition at this moment because right now I only had a short amount of free time to indulge in some form of personal random activity. This time my random activity was "Let's see what's happening on PRX." Thus, both the duration and content of this sample met my needs at this particular moment. For me it served somewhat like a successful movie trailer where I got enough out of it to come away with an impression that I like what I've experienced and also that I'd like to explore more... and I will. Hopefully it will be successfull in getting others interested enough to search further into the works, feelings and thinking of such fascinating artists.
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James Reiss

Posted on January 07, 2008 at 11:08 AM | Permalink

Review of Thoughts in Sound Episode #1 Brian Eno: Architect of Ambience

Not long ago one of my locker-room buddies was bellyaching that no new interesting music has been written since such old masters as Stravinsky and Bartok. After twelve-tone composers like Schoenberg and Berg took dissonance as far out as possible, where was there to go, my friend asked, drying himself with a Rec Center towel like an overweight version of Michelangelo's "David."

This piece is the first episode in a splendid series of stand-alone drop-ins about recent and current composers. That soon-to-be sexagenarian Brit, Brian Eno, perhaps more than any of his peers, has brought music back from the stratosphere to down-home audiences addicted to anyone from Kate Bush to U2. Harmonically and in terms of its sheer melodic content, Eno's electronic music captures various ambiences, moods in which we can lose ourselves and find enchantments hitherto unreached. Listening to Brian Eno is like standing out on one of the moors that the Bronte sisters wrote about, while a soft rain falls forever. I'm far from the first person to say that Brian Eno rocks.

Other notable drop-ins in this series include composers Philip Glass, Keith Jarrett, and Steve Reich. Anyone in locker rooms or concert halls contending that serious contempo music is so-so will enjoy bending an ear to these not-at-all-esoteric thoughts in sound.

Timing and Cues

Suggest intro:
Coming up, John Diliberto brings us Thoughts in Sound with ambient music creator and U2 and Talking Heads producer, Brian Eno.
Timings & Cues:
0:00 Music intro
0:06 Host intro and program
4:54 Music fade
Out cue: at PRX.org
5:00 Program End

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