In his now-famous Ambient Manifesto of 1978, English composer BRIAN ENO
defined a new kind of environmental music. He also released some very
sophisticated examples of his own. Along with the manifesto
came the classic AMBIENT...
In his now-famous Ambient Manifesto of 1978, English composer BRIAN ENO
defined a new kind of environmental music. He also released some very
sophisticated examples of his own. Along with the manifesto
came the classic AMBIENT 1: MUSIC FOR AIRPORTS. But the follow-up
release in 1982, AMBIENT 4: ON LAND was something else entirely: a group
of 'psychic landscapes' that existed between ambient sounds from nature
and composed music. Like experiments by WENDY CARLOS on SONIC
SEASONINGS a decade earlier, it explored a new musical territory at the
intersection of field recordings, electronics and acoustic instruments
that's still influential today. The word ecotone is a combination of "ecology" and "tone," from the Greek tonos
or tension — a place where ecologies are in tension. In the natural
sciences, an ecotone is a transition area between adjacent plant
communities, such as forest and grassland. It can be narrow or wide,
local or regional; a gradual blending or a sharp boundary line.
On this transmission of Hearts of Space, we explore that boundary
with a group of these psychic landscapes, on a program called ECOTONES.
These soundscapes are environments in which you exist, rather than music to
which you listen. Unlike most music which conveys a sense of movement,
they're largely static environments with a feeling of both peace and
chaos.
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