Ambient Music
More than a decade after Eno's Ambient 1: Music for Airports album was released in 1978, the term was adopted by a wave of musicians emerging from the electronic dance-music scene.
Ambient is now often used as an adjective, "Ambient House" "Ambient Dub" or "Ambient Jungle" (changed to Drum & Bass) for instance. This newer ambient music was derived from the techno dance scene, and could still contain dance beats, but slowed-down or low in the mix.
This music originated in "chill-out rooms" at clubs or raves where a D.J. would spin discs to create a calm space for recovering from frenetic techno dancing. It has developed into a genre of its own, independent of the dance scene, and contains many varied sub-styles.
Now, the term "ambient" is used to describe a wide range of music from many disciplines with only an avoidance of traditional song-structure in common.
A sound has four characteristics: frequency, amplitude, timbre and duration. Silence (ambient noise) has only duration.
John Cage
Erik Satie
Erik Satie was a music composer, and a performing pianist, though mainly for café and cabaret audiences. Satie wrote theatre and ballet music, as well as piano music.
Satie's most popular compositions were short pieces for piano "Gymnopedies" (1888) and "Gnossiennes" (1890).
John Cage uncovered certain radical experiments ignored by most Satie scholars, such as Vexations (1892-1893), which is a page of piano music meant to be repeated 840 times, and furniture music that, because it is not meant to be heard, predicted not only Ambient music but also Muzak.
Nevertheless, we must bring about a music which is like furniture-a music, that is, which will be part of the noises of the environment, will take them into consideration. I think of it as melodious, softening the noises of the knives and forks, not dominating them, not imposing itself. It would fill up those heavy silences that sometimes fall between friends dining together. It would spare them the trouble of paying attention to their own banal remarks. And at the same time it would neutralize the street noises which so indiscreetly enter into the play of conversation. To make such a music would be to respond to a need."Don't listen! Keep talking!"
In 1917 the first
performance in
Further Listening
Satie: Gymnopédies No1-3; Gnossiennes
No1-6 Aldo Ciccolini
Label: Emi Classics - #67260
John Cage
John
Neff Performing 4'33" by John Cage at Suitable
Cage’s composition 4’33", in which the natural sounds occurring during that length of time constitute the piece, likewise demolishes this distinction. Cage often said that 4’33" was his favorite of his own works, and that he believed that the most beautiful music was the natural sounds around us.
Brian Eno
AN AMBIENT SPEAKER SYSTEM
I regard this music as environmental: to be experienced from the inside. Accordingly I considered releasing a quadraphonic version of it, an idea I abandoned upon realizing that very few people (myself included) own quadraphonic systems.
However, I have for many years been using a three-way speaker system that is both simple to install and inexpensive, and which seems to work very well on any music with a broad stereo image. The effect is subtle but definite - it opens out the music and seems to enlarge the room acoustically.
In addition to a normal stereo hi-fi system all that is required is one extra loudspeaker and some speaker cable. The usage of this speaker in the three-way system is such that it will not be required to handle very low frequencies: therefore a small or "mini" speaker will be adequate.
As shown in the diagram, the two terminals of the new speaker are connected to the two positive (red) speaker connectors on the amplifier. This speaker is located somewhere behind the listener - at the apex of a triangle whose base is formed by the original loudspeaker set-up. One of the unexpected benefits of this system is an increase in the usable listening area - almost any point in the room will yield good (although not necessarily "accurate") stereo sound.
I arrived at this system by accident, and I don't really know why it works. What seems to happen is that the third speaker reproduces any sound that is not common to both sides of the stereo - i.e., everything that is not located centrally in the stereo image - and I assume that this is because the common information is put out of phase with itself and cancels out.
More technically, the lower the impedance of the added speaker, the louder it will sound. If it is found to be too loud (although this rarely seems to happen), you can either insert a potentiometer (6-12 ohms, at least 10 watts) into the circuit, or move the speaker further away.
© Brian Eno 1992(1982 release)
Reality Check
Brian Eno, among the more prominent of the "alternative" sound artists, has been quick to claim that his "ambient" approach is a vast improvement over the old Muzak.
Eno's Music For Airports (Ambient 1) was installed and played at the Greater Pittsburgh International Airport in the early 80's.
Unfortunately, patrons got so creeped-out over his compositions that the regular background music had to be restored.
Further Listening
Harold Budd / Brian Eno : Ambient 2: The Plateaux Of Mirror (1980)
Jon Hassell / Brian Eno : Fourth World, Vol. 1: Possible Musics (1980)
Brian Eno : Ambient 4: On Land (1982)
Harold Budd /Brian Eno : The Pearl (1984)
Gen. George Squier patented the transmission of background music in the 1920s, that is music from phonograph records delivered over telephone lines.
MUSIC + KODAK = MUZAK
Originally, Muzak was conceived as a service that could be piped directly into the home for $1.50 a month, much like cable television today, as an alternative to the then unreliable technology of broadcast radio. Three channels were offered -- news and announcements, light music, and classical.
As the technology of radio improved, Muzak found it's niche in providing commercial-free music to businesses such as restaurants, dentists offices, and, of course, public spaces like elevators (nervous riders needed something to calm them).
1930 
1936
Elevator Music
The account base grew quickly throughout the 1940s when word spread that workplace music increased morale, thus increasing productivity and attendance.
Doctors
began to apply psychological theory to the behavioral studies of humans in
Muzak researchers found that very particular song combinations could influence behaviors in incredibly precise ways, with success rates showing around 80 percent of subjects responding ‘correctly’ to audio cues to move faster or slower and become more emotionally involved in their environment.
Stimulus Progression
Eventually it was found that techniques such as Stimulus Progression, which calculates the energy of a collection of songs into a standardized format, could increase the efficiency and output of employees substantially.
Songs are rated on a scale according to their intensity. Muzak engineers then arrange these selections in such a way as to directly oppose a worker’s ‘fatigue curve,’ such as adding a boost to the music’s intensity during the lethargy that often follows lunch.
Under this system, which structured all of Muzak's background music broadcasts, the work day is fragmented into fifteen minute blocks, each enough for roughly five or six song selections.
Each song in a given
block is progressively more stimulating than the last; the music should
encompass a constant progression of brightness. In between blocks is a pause for
silence, usually lasting up to fifteen minutes .
In order to enable efficient and accurate progressions, Muzak programmers have to reduce the 'internal stimulus' of a piece to an objective, quantitative value. They break down selections according to tempo, rhythm, instrumentation and tonal mass (this last one refers to the relative size of the orchestra used, as well as the auditory qualities of the different instruments incorporated).
The result is then figured into the Muzak Mood Rating scale, ranging from a somber negative three to an ecstatic eight. Songs nearing the extremes are thrown out automatically, and programmers just utilize those with a value between two and six..
Put together, they form upward scoops of sonic stimulus which exactly compensate for those dark quarter-hours of the soul when employee's residual energy is lowest.
A normal block might go: 3, 4, 5, 5, 6. But in those production down-times of the morning and afternoon, Muzak will up the tempo with a little lift, perhaps a 4, 5, 6, 6, 6. Muzak research has shown that this auditory boost can stifle a worker's falling output and realign them with the task. And the stimulus of each program block is always lifting, never falling.
On average, absenteeism decreases by as much as 88%, typing errors lessen by 25%, and the overall mood of the work environment becomes more congenial.
Eighty-five percent of subjects also approved of the music being played.
It was also at this time that Muzak began putting its music on audio tape, shelving the phonograph-through-telephone lines.
The unit to the left was
made expressly for MUSAK by PRESTO for their "elevator" music playback systems.
Muzak Criteria
It is obvious that no one walks into a factory, office, store, or restaurant to listen to Muzak. Since their focus should remain on working, dining, or shopping, it follows that the spatial music must never pertain elements that might distract or interrupt this normal course of things.
Muzak, Shopping, and Foreground Music
As studies confirmed that as employees worked harder with Muzak, it also proved that shoppers ended up purchasing more if a precisely engineered song selection was employed. Muzak’s influence over the consumer occurs in two ways:
The customer is encouraged to remain in a particular environment for a longer or shorter period of time, and to shop or eat at a faster or slower pace, depending on which behaviors will encourage sales.
Hence, grocery stores play slow tempo music to persuade customers to move in a more leisurely manner and, in turn, purchase more items, while fast-food restaurants will play faster music to encourage a larger turnover rate by urging customers to eat faster.
Another
method that Muzak employs to encourage more purchases is as part of a technique
known as Atmospherics. This form of encouragement does not concern
itself with a customer’s length of stay or turnover rate, but rather
reinforces the target audience’s general perception of a given store in order
to play upon the discrepancy between the shopper’s actual life and their
idealized self-image.
A fashion store has more in common with a bar than it has with a supermarket. A young woman goes to buy an outfit that she plans to wear on Friday night, so the store evokes the right associations and atmosphere by using the kind of music she would hear in a club.
With fitness centers, it's not a gym anymore. It's a dance club with exercise bikes. This place is sumptuous. It's got club lighting and big-screen TVs. It's got Muzak throbbing away. Everyone's wearing designer clothes. It's retailing a leisure lifestyle.
An elderly woman was enjoying a leisurely
stroll through a shopping mall when she noticed a new boutique. Shuffling
a bit closer, she heard Hip Hop music blaring from inside. Turning immediately to
rejoin her companion, she declared, "Not for me!"
Here is a woman who is attendant to reality. The music told her: "Don't
bother to come in here; we're not selling to you.'"
The boutique was using music as an "audience-sorting device," much as
a
Playing the right music has a lot of commercially beneficial effects for the
seller. For example, it tends to pull the customers' attention, distracting them
in a way that lowers their sales resistance.
Patrons of country western bars drink more when the jukebox plays slower music. Hard drinkers prefer listening to slower paced, wailing, lonesome, self-pitying music.
Diners that listen to loud, fast music eat more food.
In contrast, those who listen Mozart or Brahms eat less and eat slower.
Studies have shown that a weight loss of 5 pounds a month is possible by listening to soothing music.
In the 80s, Muzak merged with Yesco, the Seattle-based originators of "foreground" music. While Muzak re-recorded popular songs for background play, Yesco compiled reel-to-reel tapes of current original artist hits to be used as foreground music.
This "foreground music" trend could very well be more about economics than changing musical aesthetics. Musak hired full orchestras to reinterpret favorite songs, but with mounting musicians' union levies, the process has proven too expensive. As a result, Muzak and other background music providers have opted for private record label agreements, enticing clients with foreground choices that supposedly reinforce a chosen business image and consequently have a more aggressive environmental impact.
Further Listening
Muzak - Stimulus Progression 6 - LP
(USA) 1974
A genuine Muzak LP from the Muzak Corporation of America ('Specialists in the Physiological and Psychological Applications of Music'). Complete with liner notes on the subtleties of mind and mood control.
Department stores
Groceries
Further Reading
Ocean of Sound David Toop
Elevator Music: A Surreal History of Muzak, Easy-Listening, and Other Moodsong by Joseph Lanza
