User talk:Gene Poole/space music cleanup



Space music, also spelled spacemusic, is a term that has been applied to music from a range of genres since its first recorded use in the 1950s.

In contemporary use "space music" is most often used to describe certain types of ambient, new age and electronic music, and is also sometimes also applied to selected works in the western classical, world, celtic, and experimental idioms.

It generally refers to music that evokes a feeling of contemplative spaciousness.

Space music ranges from simple to complex sonic textures, often (though not exclusively) lacking conventional melodic, rhythmic, or vocal components, typically evoking a "continuum of spatial imagery and emotion", beneficial introspection, attentiveness for deep listening, subtle trance effects called "spacey", and psychoacoustic spatial perceptions, particularly, sensations of flying, floating, cruising, gliding, or hovering.

Space music is often claimed to facilitate heightened states of relaxation, contemplation, inspiration, and moods of a peaceful expansive nature, ; it may promote health through relaxation, atmospherics for bodywork therapies, and effectiveness of meditation. Space music appears in many film soundtracks and is commonly played in planetariums.

Produced almost exclusively by independent labels, space music occupies a small niche in the commercial music marketplace, supported and enjoyed by a relatively small audience of loyal enthusiastic listeners.

Aplication of the term
The term "space music" has been applied to many different genres and styles of music at various times by musicians, radio programmers, music reviewers and music retailers, and there is little uniformity in the manner of its use.

Radio programmers
Most major US-based ambient radio programmers use the term "space music" interchangeably with either New Age music or ambient music - or some combination of the two. Some programmers refer to it as a music genre, without qualifying statements. Others use it as a generic description of the more ethereal, drone-like or beatless types of ambient music.

Music retailers
US-based retailers, for the most part, do not use the term at all.

tba
While there is a general agreement among contemporary Space music radio programmers, music critics, authors, and record producers about the sound and uses of the music, there is little agreement about how to define the term and how space music fits within the continuum of music genres.

The majority of contemporary commentators note a close relationship between space music and new age music, ambient music, or (less commonly), electronic rock, to the extent that the term is often used interchangeably with these genres.

Six referenced commentators do not use the term interchangeably with ambient music, one is ambiguous, and one does so. Eight referenced commentators use the term space music as a subgenre of new age music (separate from ambient music) and do not use it interchangeably, one is ambiguous, three use space music interchangeably with new age music, and four consider space music and new age music completely unrelated. Two referenced commentators refer to space music as a sub-genre of electronic rock.

Stephen Hill, co-founder of "Music from the Hearts of Space" (syndicated nationally in the USA on National Public Radio and XM Satellite Radio), uses the phrase "contemplative music, broadly defined" as an overview to describe the music played on his station, along with the term "spacemusic". He states that the "genre spans historical, ethnic, and contemporary styles", and that it combines elements from many cultures and genres, blended with varieties of acoustic and electronic ambient music, "woven into a seamless sequence unified by sound, emotion, and spatial imagery." He has used a variety of definitions for the term over the years, connecting the term with Electronic music, Ambient music and at times has defined it as a sub-genre of New Age music.

Hill's partner and co-founder of "Music from the Hearts of Space" Anna Turner (1944-1996) wrote in her 1989 essay entitled Space Music, that "New Age Space music carries visions in its notes; it is transcendent inner and outer space music that opens, allows and creates space... this music speaks to our present moment, to the great allegory of moving out beyond our boundaries into space, and reflexively, to the unprecedented adventures of the psyche that await within."

In her book The New Age Music Guide, author, editor and music critic P.J.Birosik classifies Space music as a subgenre of New Age music, as does Dallas Smith, writer, teacher and recording artist in his essay New Age Jazz/Fusion. Steven Halpern, noted recording artist and workshop leader writes that Space music has been considered a synonym for New Age music: " 'Space' is a vital dimension of New Age music; so much so that one of the early appellations for the genre was simply 'space music', referring both to its texture and to the state that it tended to evoke in the listener."

Music critic Lloyde Barde, founder of Backroads music, has also used a variety of definitions for Space music over time. He has referred to it as a type of Ambient music, along with the closely related genre New Age music, and has also stated the opposite; that Space music is a separate genre, with a distinct identity not part of Ambient or Electronic music, "while drawing from any number of traditional, ethnic, or modern styles."

Bay Area musician, composer and sound designer Robert Rich considers space music to be a combination of Electronic music influences from the 1970s with world music and "modern compositional methods". Forest, host of Musical Starstreams refers to Space music as a separate genre along with Ambient music, and others including dub, downtempo, trip hop, and acid jazz in the list of genres he calls "exotic electronica". Similarly, WXPN Radio's Star's End, programming ambient music since 1976, on its website lists Space music as a separate genre, along with Ambient, New Age, and others.

Steve Sande, freelance writer for the San Francisco Chronicle considers space music to be "Anything but New Age," and writes that "spacemusic [is] also known as ambient, chill-out, mellow dub, down-tempo." In the same article, he describes Stephen Hill's "Hearts of Space" spacemusic program as streaming ambient, electronic, world, New Age and classical music.

All Music Guide, one of the world's largest commercial databases of music-related information, defines Space music as a subgenre of New Age music. Similarly, mainstream retailer Barnes & Noble, independent online music retailer CDBaby, and RealNetwork's music download service Rhapsody all classify Space music as a subgenre of New Age music. Rhapsody's editorial staff writes in their music genre description for Space music (listed as a subgenre of New Age music) that "New Age composers have looked upward for inspiration, creating an abstract notion of the sounds of interstellar music."

Musicologist Joseph Lanza relates space music to prior generations of relaxing or environmental music, with a twist, writing, "Space music is easy-listening with amnesia, sounding like the future but retaining unconscious ties to elevator music of the past."

Variety
As described by Stephen Hill, the predominant defining element of spacemusic is its contemplative nature. Within that overview, space music includes a wide variety of styles, instrumentation and influences - both acoustic or electronic. For example, the playlist archives of the "Hearts of Space" program lists the following genres as included in their programming:


 * 1) Electronic space music: Electronic Space, Ambient/Downtempo, Ethno/Ambient
 * 2) Acoustic or partially acoustic space music - Regional or national: African/Sub-Saharan, Celtic, Japanese, Scandinavian/Arctic, Central Asian, Latin American, Southeast Asian/Indonesian, Chinese, Mediterranean, Middle Eastern/North African, Spanish/Moorish, Tibetan, Native American, World Fusion, East Indian
 * 3) Acoustic or partially acoustic space music - Western:Contemporary Instrumental, New Vocal,  Holiday,  Miscellaneous/Eclectic,  Space Jazz,  Sacred/Choral,  Guitar,  Piano,  Orchestral/Chamber

While many space music recording artists specialize in electronic forms, evolving out of the traditional Kosmische musik of the Berlin School (also known as Krautrock), examples of recording artists who create the contemplative experience of space music using acoustic instruments and influences of cutlures from around the world are plentiful: Andreas Vollenweider (harp), George Winston (piano), Carlos Nakai and Coyote Oldman (Native American flutes), David Darling (cello), Paul Horn (woodwinds), Paul Winter (saxophone), and more. Examples of Space music artists using combinations of acoustic and electronic instruments are Deuter (flute and other esoteric instruments), Kitaro (Japanese drums and synthesizers), Laraaji (acoustic zither with electronic processing), Constance Demby (hammered dulcimer, cello, vocals, custom acoustic instruments and synthesizers), Oregon (world music influenced jazz), Mychael Danna (ethnic instruments and orchestra with electronic minimalism), and others.

Author and classical music critic David Hurwitz describes Joseph Haydn's choral and chamber orchestra piece, The Creation, composed in 1798, as space music, both in the sense of the sound of the music, ("a genuine piece of 'space music' featuring softly pulsating high violins and winds above low cellos and basses, with nothing at all in the middle ... The space music gradually drifts towards a return to the movement's opening gesture ... "); and in the manner of its composition, relating that Haydn conceived The Creation after discussing music and astronomy with William Herschel, oboist and astronomer (discoverer of the planet Uranus).

History
Karlheinz Stockhausen used the term "space music" in describing his early development as a composer, "The first revolution occurred from 1952/53 as musique concrète, electronic tape music, and space music, entailing composition with transformers, generators, modulators, magnetophones, etc, the integration of all concrete and abstract (synthetic) possibilities within sound (also all noises) and the controlled projection of sound in space." In 1967, he stated, "Several have commented that my electronic music sounds 'like on a different star,' or 'like in outer space.' Many have said that when hearing this music, they have sensations as if flying at an infinitely high speed, and then again, as if immobile in an immense space."

Noted music historian Joseph Lanza described the emerging light music style during the early 1950s as a precursor to modern space music. He wrote that orchestra conductor Mantovani used new studio technologies to "create sound tapestries with innumerable strings" and in particular, "the sustained hum of Mantovani's reverberated violins produced a sonic vaporizor foreshadowing the synthesizer harmonics of space music."

Jazz artist Sun Ra used the term to describe his music in 1956, when he stated that the music allowed him to translate his experience of the void of space into a language people could enjoy and understand. In 1960, the German composer Robert Beyer published a paper about "space" or "room music" He had been inspired by Homer Dudley's 1948 invention of the Vocoder and began in 1951 to work with a device known as a Melochord, in conjunction with  magnetic tape recorders, leading to a decade of working at the Cologne school specializing in "Elektronischen Musik" using magnetic tape recorders, sine wave generators and serial composition techniques.

In 1969, Miles Davis was introduced to the music of Stockhausen by young arranger and cellist, and later Grammy award winner, Paul Buckmaster, leading to a period of new creative exploration for Davis. Biographer J.K.Chambers wrote that "The effect of Davis's study of Stockhausen could not be repressed for long. ... Davis's own 'space music,' shows Stockhausen's influence compositionally." His recordings and performances during this period were described as "space music" by fans, by music critic Leonard Feather, and by Buckmaster who stated: "a lot of mood changes - heavy, dark, intense - definitely space music."

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Grateful Dead developed a new form of improvisational space music in their extended formless jam sessions during live concerts (which their fans referred to as "Space" though the band did not formally assign that title), and their experimental space music albums such as Aoxomoxoa, and later in the 1980s, Infrared Roses, and Grayfolded. Band member Phil Lesh released experimental space music recording Seastones with computer music pioneer Ned Lagin in 1975, one of the first albums to be issued in the innovative but commercially unsuccessful format SQ-Quadwith. Lagin used in real-time stage and studio performance of minicomputers driving real time digital to analog converters, prior to the time digital synthesizers became commercially available in the early 1980s.

Beginning in the early 1970's, the term "space music" was applied to some of the output of such artists as Vangelis, Jean-Michel Jarre, Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream, due to the transcendent cosmic feelings of space evoked by the sound of the music and enhanced by the use of the emerging new instrument, the synthesizer,   and also in part to the "outer space" themes that are apparent in some of their works. Their later albums became increasingly rock-influenced and are not generally considered as space music.

In 1971-72, Sun Ra brought his "space music" philosophy to UC Berkeley where he taught as artist-in-residence for the school year, creating notoriety among the students by devoting the second half-hour of each class to solo or band performances. In 1972, San Francisco public TV station KQED producer John Coney, producer Jim Newman, and screen writer Joshua Smith worked with Sun Ra to produce a 30 minute documentary film, expanded into a feature film released in 1974, entitled "Space is the Place", featuring Sun Ra's Arkestra and filmed in Golden Gate Park. These early uses of the term were largely limited to the artists who applied it to their own music, and a few of the commentators who wrote about them.

In 1973 KPFA Berkeley, California radio producers Anna Turner and Stephen Hill used the phrase in the title of their local public radio show Music from the Hearts of Space. They developed an innovative segue music assembly technique, cross-mixing "spacey" instrumental pieces to create a sustained mood. The term began to be used more widely when the show was syndicated nationally in 1983. Other US-based radio programmers adopted the term as well, among them, John Diliberto, Steve Pross, and Gino Wong with Star's End, launched in 1976, F. J. Forest (a.k.a. “Forest”) with Musical Starstreams, launched in 1981 and nationally syndicated in 1983, and John Diliberto again with Echoes, launched in 1989.

Niche market
While Space music aficionados are enthusiastic about the music, it occupies a small, specialized niche in both the retail marketplace and radio programming.

Of the many major online retailers of music CDs or downloads, mention of space music as a genre is rare. The music is available, but is found listed under other genres, mostly New Age, or Ambient music, or both. Even the wider genre of Electronic music is limited in market presence as a separate genre, with most online retailers generally including it as part of the Dance/DJ genre. The Grammy awards have a stand-alone category for New Age music, but include Electronic/Dance music as a sub-category of Dance music and do not offer a category for Space music . Often Ambient music is classified under both New Age and Dance/DJ simulataneously. Some of the major online retailers that do not mention space music as either a genre or sub-genre in their catalogs include Amazon.com, Sam Goody, Tower Records, eMusic, Microsoft/Zune, FYE/Transworld Entertainment, and iTunes.

In brick and mortar chain stores in the United States, a similar situation prevails - Electronic music is usually found in the Dance/DJ section, and the New Age music section is usually where the Ambient and Space music releases are displayed, as can be found for  example at Barnes and Noble, Borders Books and Music, Sam Goody, and FYE/Transworld Entertainment.

Space music is generally not mentioned in mainstream music publications. In particular, Billboard magazine does not list space music in any of its genre charts; the Billboard Electronic music chart is cataegorized as part of the Dance music chart segment and includes only Dance-related forms of Electronic music. . However Billboard does include on its New Age music chart recording artists considered by some to be space music artists and who appear in playlists on Music of the Hearts of Space; for example Andreas Vollenweider and Kitaro are listed on Billboard's Top New Age albums for 2006.

In major music industry market reports in the USA, Space music does not appear at all as a genre. The 1999 National Association of Recording Merchandisers annual survey lists the market share of Space music-related genre New Age music at only 0.5%. Electronic music is not listed separately, but is included as part of the "other" category, along with 13 additional genres, totalling a 6.7% market share. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) reported similar results for the years 1994-2003, with no mention of Space music; in 2003 reporting New Age music at 0.5%, and the "other" category (including Electronic music along with multiple other genres), bringing in 7.6% market share. In the Arbitron commercial radio listenership by formats reports for 2004, the genres of Space music, New Age music, and Ambient music are not mentioned, all of them falling into the catch-all "remaining formats" category, with a listenership share of 0.1%.

In film and television soundtracks
Space music has been an effective genre for creating moods and soundscapes in many well-known films including the Vangelis score to Blade Runner, Tangerine Dream's moody soundtracks for Legend (Tangerine Dream soundtrack) and Risky Business, Jonn Serrie's surround-sound score for the IMAX short film, Hubble: Galaxies Across Space and Time, and Michael Stearns' soundtrack for the 1985 IMAX film, Chronos, broadcast on Stephen Hill's Hearts of Space radio, on the film's opening night.

Television science-fiction series Babylon 5 features a score by former Tangerine Dream member Christopher Franke, also released on CD in 1996 on Franke's independent label Sonic Images.

In 1994, the German  TV station Bayerischer Rundfunk launched the television program Space Night,, featuring a constant flow of satellite and space images accompanied by space music programmed by European chill-out-DJ Alex Azary.

Notable artists
This list includes artists who specialize in space music, as well as artists who have made some space music albums, but also other kinds of music. In some cases, they went through a phase of creating space music, with other kinds of music before or after. Others intersperse space music releases with their other projects over time.

Alphabetized by last name including single name


 * David Arkenstone
 * Ashra
 * Kevin Braheny
 * Harold Budd
 * Richard Burmer (1955-2006)
 * Walter Carlos
 * Mychael Danna
 * David Darling
 * Constance Demby
 * Coyote Oldman
 * Deuter
 * Brian Eno
 * Edgar Froese
 * Lisa Gerrard
 * Peter Michael Hamel
 * Michael Hedges (1953-1997)
 * Paul Horn
 * David Hykes
 * Mark Isham
 * Jean Michel Jarre
 * Al Gromer Khan
 * Kitaro
 * Eloy Fritsch
 * Laraaji
 * Bill Laswell
 * Ray Lynch
 * Carlos Nakai
 * Omega
 * Mike Oldfield
 * Oregon
 * David Parsons
 * Jeff Pearce
 * Geodesium
 * Porkupine Tree
 * Robert Rich
 * Steve Roach
 * Roedelius
 * Klaus Schulze
 * Hunter
 * Mark Scudder
 * Jonn Serrie
 * Sigur Ros
 * Michael Stearns
 * Tim Story
 * Tangerine Dream
 * Tomita
 * Vangelis
 * Andreas Vollenweider
 * Popol Vuh
 * George Winston
 * Paul Winter
 * Vir Unis
 * Frank Comstock