Embed Doc
Copy Link
Readcast
Collections

CommentGo Back

Download

Dominick GrilloMUS 345Composer Paper

Brian Eno

“I don’t consider myself a professional musician, though I do consider myself a professional composer,” (Tamm, 47) said Eno in 1981. Brian Eno: the minimalist-thinking, “Father of Ambient Music”, self-described non-musician, opinioned character who has become one of the most famous electronic music composers of all time. Eno began his musical career as a member of the art rock band Roxy Music in the early1970s, but it was during his later solo work, collaborations, and producing duties that he became well known throughout the musical spectrum. (Tamm, 15-25)Eno was a member of Roxy Music for a brief two album period before leaving the band to focus on his solo career. “Between 1972 and 1988 he released eleven solo albumsranging stylistically from progressive rock to what he has called ‘ambient’ music”(Tamm, 3). Eno’s ambient music is, “a gentle music of low dynamics, blurred edges, andwashes of sound color, produced primarily through electronic means,” (Tamm, 3). Enohas also collaborated with many different musicians and artists to different degrees or commercial and critical success and is a highly sought after in-studio producer. Eno has produced compositions for movies and television shows that are meant to be playedunobtrusively in the background. “He was commissioned by Microsoft to design the littlearpeggio that sounds when Windows 95 is booted up,” (Selvin). And even though theaverage college student may not know who Eno is, just about everyone has heard theradio staple, “Once in a Lifetime”.

Brian Eno has a minimalist philosophy that became much more pronounced witheach solo album he released. Comparing his first solo album,

Here Come the Warm Jets

,with one of his later “ambient” albums, such as

Ambient 1: Music for Airports

, one issomewhat shocked they were both released from the same mind. Minimalism is paramount to Eno. “Minimalism represents the most significant and potentially fruitfulaesthetic point of departure during the twentieth century.” The idea, “promises untoldriches not simply in the development of compositional techniques, but in thedevelopment of new ways of listening,” (Tamm, 23). Eno enjoys the different ways asingle note can be used in a song. He was inspired by Steve Reich’s

It’s Gonna Rain

, asong created out of a single recording of those three words, repeated for hundreds of times. It is, “probably the most important piece I head, in that it gave me the idea I’venever ceased being fascinated with – how variety can be generated by very, very simplesystems,” (Tamm, 23).Eno is also heavily influenced by the composer John Cage. Cage used repetitivesounds to try to obtain new meaning out of the, “ambient unintended ones,” (Tamm 20).Even in Eno’s early solo work, it is clear he is striving for something that isn’t entirelyabout having a catchy melody or hook. He uses repetition and a “stripped-down” soundto try to create something new. The songs may meander at times without a clear sense of direction, but in Eno’s eyes that is completely fine because the journey is just asimportant as the end point. He has, at different points in his life, embraced rock musicand rejected it. He enjoyed the “notoriously unpolished” stage act of the 1970s RollingStones and later decided he didn’t like the complete lack of control. Eno may change his

mind about many facets of the music industry, but he has experimented with minimalismand ambient sound his entire life.The two pieces chosen for discussion in this paper are

1/1

from the album

Ambient 1: Music for Airports

and

Needle in the Camel’s Eye

from the album,

HereCome the Warm Jets

. These two pieces were selected primarily to showcase the vastlydifferent styles that were used in Eno’s earlier albums as opposed to his later ambientwork.Released in 1973,

Here Come the Warm Jets

was Eno’s first solo album. He brought in “some sixteen musicians into the studio,” (Tamm, 98) and allowed them to basically play whatever they wanted to play. Eno brought the different musicians together because he “wanted to see what happens when you combine different identities like thatand you allow them to compete,” (Tamm, 98). The experience was organized under thenotion that the musicians would play their instruments and Eno would cut and paste andsculpt a composition together from these wildly divergent instruments andimprovisational pieces. The finished album does not seem as radical as the idea may haveseemed during the creation phase. The songs would not seem out of place for many 1970slow-budget garage bands banging on their instruments in Middle America.Understandably, the musicians probably never thought their parts would be combined insuch often dangerously unmelodic notions. The album gives no notice toward thedirection Eno would take on his later more gentle, ambient records.

Ambient 1: Music for Airports

gives a better example of the minimalist ambient philosophies that are commonly attributed to Eno. This album defined the term “ambient”and was released in 1978 with the intention of being played in airports. The quiet,