18/12/09

Anthony Stratton

“Brian Eno“

Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno brought several significant

innovations, changing music as we know it; innovations such as ambient music, generative

music, using the studio as an instrument, and the production of music without careful

forward planning.

Brian Eno was born in 1948 in Suffolk and graduated from an art-based education in

1969. Throughout he was encouraged to engage in avant-garde music, using a tape recorder

as an instrument and joining bands that experimented with improvisation. Within two years

he had become a professional musician with glam/art rock band 'Roxy Music', but went on to

developing his solo career another two years later after disputes with frontman Bryan Ferry

and tiring of the rockstar lifestyle. He immediately began work on a flurry of pop-oriented

albums that challenged the distinction between rock and art, developing a highly influential

sonic philosophy and groundbreaking studio techniques.

One such philosophy that he played a key role in devising was the idea that sound is

like space, only the stimulus is acting on the ears rather than the eyes.

“I believe that we are moving towards a position of using music and recorded
sound with the variety of options that we presently use colour, we might use it
'diagrammatically', we might use it to modify our moods in almost subliminal
ways. I predict that the concept of 'muzak', once it sheds its connotations of
aural garbage, might enjoy a new (and very fruitful) lease of life”. (Eno, 1975)

It is the foundation of his vision of a new form of music, not dissimilar to Erik Satie's

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vision of furniture music: “We must bring about a music which is like furniture – a music, that

is, which will be a part of the noises of the environment, will take them into consideration...

not imposing itself” (Satie, 1969).

In 1975, whilst recuperating from an injury, a visitor brought Eno a record of 17 th

century music, which by the time they had left he realised was too quiet with only one

channel working. As a result, he was led into an immersive state of deep listening in which the

bird-song, wind and rain interleaved with soft chimes and inspired him to create ambient

music: sonic landscapes.

Using the studio techniques he had been developing, namely a tape delay system

borrowed from minimalist composer Terry Riley, Eno set about constructing something that

would “never change much, but it never stops changing, a condition compared by Eno to the

actions of clouds or a river” (Eno, 1986). He created a lesser-known album in 1975 named

'Discreet Music', which experimented with slow background music, and then pushed the

envelope into the public eye with a series of four records entitled 'Ambient' in 1978; the first

of which, 'Ambient 1/Music for Airports', contained a manifesto in the form of a sleevenote,

reading:

“An ambience is defined as an atmosphere, or a surrounding influence: a tint.

My intention is to produce original pieces ostensibly (but not exclusively) for
particular times and situation with a view to building up a small but versatile
catalogue of environmental music suited to a wide variety of moods and
atmospheric idiosyncrasies... Ambient Music is intended to induce calm and a
space to think... 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.” (Brian Eno, 1978)

This new style of music is not only the anathema of artists that create hoping to

capture the centre of attention, it serves the purpose of an unending, looping form of muzac

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designed to fill a space. These pieces were made up of several tracks of incommensurable

lengths, so “no second of the piece is like any other and you are left with a memory of what

the piece is like, not what it is. Lines combine together and fall apart like ice crystals moving

on water.” (Joseph Buck, 2008)

This was an early form of a distinct path he moved down much later in 1996:

Generative Music. In creating something that is always different, there are endless

possibilities for the modulation of the surrounding atmosphere. Eno wanted "to make music

with materials [he] specified, but in combinations and interactions that [he] hadn't." (Eno,

1996a)

"Some very basic forms of generative music have existed for a long time, but as
marginal curiosities. Wind chimes are an example, but the only compositional
control you have over the music they produce is in the original choice of notes
that the chimes will sound. Recently, however, out of the union of synthesisers
and computers, some much finer tools have evolved. Koan Software is probably
the best of these systems, allowing a composer to control not one but one
hundred and fifty musical and sonic parameters within which the computer
then improvises (as wind improvises the wind chimes)... now there are three
alternatives: live music, recorded music and generative music. Generative music
enjoys some of the benefits of both its ancestors. Like live music it is always
different. Like recorded music it is free of time-and-place limitations - you can
hear it when and where you want.
I really think it is possible that our grandchildren will look at us in wonder and
say: "you mean you used to listen to exactly the same thing over and over
again?" " (Eno, 1996b)

We can see that he aspired to create sounds that were predominantly different from

the known, as is the case with many current electronic artists. Eno was pioneering this

mentality from the beginning of his musical career, specifically with the use of his tape

recorder used in a musical scenario during his art college days. The form of samples within a

sonic landscape is an object, and samples can be shaped and skewed and tempered with the

use of a recording studio, thus making the equipment an active member of the composer's

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available instruments.

Prior to the days of recordings, a composer had to note down the music in his head as

best he could onto a typical western grand staff, which would be translated by the conductor,

and then translated by each ensemble member, and this method of music-making ended up

with a great deal of transmission loss. In fact it is likely that many legendary classical

masterpieces are not played entirely the way they were intended. Using a studio with

electronic instruments however, the final piece will be just as the composer intended

depending on their ability and resources, and will never be confined to the sounds of

everyday instruments.

“It puts the composer in the identical position of the painter – he's working
directly with a material, working directly onto a substance, and he always
retains the options to chop and change, to paint a bit out, add a piece, etc.”
(Eno, 2004)

It was this quiet revolution that gave Eno his prestige as a producer and allowed him to

discover new worlds of studio technique. This may be partly due to his lack of ability to

actually play any instrument, and so focused his efforts on creating by ear, resulting in a less

stiff methodology.

Without a specific musical background, Eno could show trained musicians another side

of their task, and taking a step back could show them the bigger picture that they were about

to create. During many collaborations, such as with David Bowie, they would begin creating

with no foundation, no preparation, and instead focus on what could be done rather than

what would be done. Experimenting like this, bouncing ideas off one another, Bowie and Eno

came up with the albums 'Low' and 'Heroes' (1977), which, together with Kraftwerk's albums,

became the founding texts for the synth-pop genre that defined the 80's. Joy Division was

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originally known as Warsaw in homage to the track 'Warszawa' (Hasted, 2008)

I will now be discussing some pieces that could be created, taking these innovations as

inspiration.

Firstly, drawing from the works of ambient music, specifically the ambient rendition of

Johann Pachelbel's 'Canon': 'Fullness of the Wind' from 'Discreet Music', I could take most any

song, (even write software to automate the process) and do as Eno did: “the tempo decreases

relative to the pitch of the instrument. The violins have the fastest rate of decay while the

basses have the slowest.” (Discreet Music)

Similarly, generative music is possible with simple automated triggers of prescribed

sounds; for example a 'Max/MSP' system controlled by a light sensor, or a microphone, or

anything.

Exploration of using the studio as an instrument can result in a piece that is the

equipment functioning in an autonomous fashion: allow a microphone to pick up the sounds

of the producer working to set up the piece, and then reconstruct, arrange, and process these

accidental sounds into something new.

By taking Eno's experience to extremes, we can explore the idea of not following

established musical theory by letting amateurs attempt to create music whilst oversupplying

them with a wealth of powerful experimental instruments they have never seen before. This

way, the piece would be vibrant, groundbreaking, and if we're very lucky musically coherent

too.

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 I firmly believe that the easiest way to move forward is to not stay still. The direction

taken does not often matter, as it is the change of perspective that can shed light on the

nature of things as they are, and these directions can be taken in any dimension: taking a step

back from a painting, leaving an essay and coming back to it later, withdrawing into one’s

mind mid-argument; spatial, temporal and introspectional are a handful of directions in which

the glass ceiling can be pushed, broadening your “mental map”. I believe Brian Eno

demonstrated this in his music, and I believe his innovations broadened the scope of music

itself.

Word Count: 1638

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Bibliography

• Buck, J. (2008) 'Brian Eno – Ambient 1: Music for Airports'.

http://www.musthear.com/music/reviews/brian-eno/ambient-1-music-for-airports/ [accessed
15th December 2009].

• Eno, B. (1975). Quoted in Kevin Eden (year unknown), Ambient Lightworks. Fourth
Door Research, Unstructured 1.
http://www.fourthdoor.co.uk/unstructured/unstructured_01/eno1.html [accessed 15 th
December 2009].

• Eno, B. (1978) Ambient 1/Music for Airports. Sleevenote.

• Eno, B. (1986) Works Constructed with Sound and Light. Brochure accompanying his
1986 exhibition at Riverside Studios, London.

• Eno, B. (1996a) Generative Music, Opal Ltd.

• Eno, B. (1996b) Generative Music 1 and Brian Eno. Intermorphic.

http://www.intermorphic.com/tools/noatikl/generative_music.html#generativeMusic1
[accessed 15th December 2009].

• Eno, B. (2004) 'The Studio as Compositional Tool', Audio Cultures: Readings in Modern
Music, ed. C. Cox, D. Warner. Massachusetts: Continuum International Publishing Group.

• Hasted, N. (2008) Brian Eno: As he turns 60, the professor of rock is as creative as ever.
'The Independent'. http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/features/brian-
eno-as-he-turns-60-the-professor-of-rock-is-as-creative-as-ever-828224.html [accessed 15 th
December 2009].

• Satie, E. (Year Unknown). Quoted in John Cage (1969), Silence: Lectures and Writings,
pp. 77. Wesleyan Paperback.

• Wikipedia (Year Unknown). Discreet Music.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discreet_Music [accessed 16 th December 2009]