Space music

Space music
Stylistic origins Avant-garde music
Classical music
Electronic music
Jazz
Musique concrète
Progressive rock
Krautrock
New age music
Minimalism
Psychedelic rock
Soft rock
Traditional folk music
World music
Cultural origins 1950's Europe
Typical instruments piano, synthesizer, sampler, sequencer, computer, strings, folk and ethnic instruments, acoustic guitar, harp, sitar, tamboura, tabla, organ, flute, cello, woodwind, saxophone, drums, dulcimer, vocals

Space music, also called spacemusic, is an umbrella term, synonymous with a segment of New Age Music and Ambient Music, used to describe music that evokes a feeling of contemplative spaciousness.[1][2][3] Space music can be found within a wide range of genres.[4][5][6] It is particularly associated with ambient, New Age, and electronic music. Some claim that music from the western classical, world, Celtic, traditional, experimental and other idioms also falls within the definition of space music.[7][8][9][10]

Space music can range in character, the sonic texture of the music can be simple or complex, it can be instrumental or electronic, it may lack conventional melodic, harmonic, or rhythmic features, and may be less concerned with the formal compositional schemes associated with other styles of music.[6][11]

Such music can evoke a "continuum of spatial imagery and emotion," [12] which can be beneficial for introspection, and for developing, through a practice of deep listening, an awareness of the spatiality of sound phenomenon.[13] This type of psychonautic listening can produce a subtle trance-like state in certain individuals [14][15][16] which can in turn lead to sensations of flying, floating, cruising, gliding, or hovering.[17][18]

Space music is used by some individuals for both background enhancement and foreground listening, often with headphones, to enable states of relaxation, contemplation, inspiration, and generally peaceful expansive moods; it may promote health through relaxation, atmospherics for bodywork therapies, and effectiveness of meditation.[19] Space music appears in many film soundtracks and is commonly played in planetariums.[20]

An eclectic form of music, produced almost exclusively by independent labels, space music occupies a small niche in the marketplace, supported and enjoyed by a relatively small audience of loyal enthusiastic listeners.[21]

Contents

Definitions

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".[7] He states that the "genre spans historical, ethnic, and contemporary styles",[2] 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."[7] In his essay New age Music made Simple, and in introducing the 200th broadcast of the "Hearts of Space" radio program, Hill has referred to space music as a sub-category of New Age.[18]

Hill's partner Anna Turner (co-host and original co-producer of "Music from the Hearts of Space") 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."[22]

Gerardo "Pkx" Martinez-Casas, original host, producer and creator of KUSF's 90.3 FM, University of San Francisco in California, "Moondance (The Beyond Within)" 1981– 198?, described space music as electronic, environmental and spiritual fine art fashion cosmic sounds as an aid and tool for cultural, contemplative, meditative, social and spiritual awareness.[23] "Space Music experts do agree that Miles Davis' "In a Silent Way", Soundtracks by Philip Glass "The Hours" and "Koyaanisqatsi", Clif Martinez "Solaris", Tangerine Dream "Sorcerer", etc. should be considered Space Music".

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,[24] as does Dallas Smith, writer, teacher and recording artist in his essay New Age Jazz/Fusion.[25] 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."[26]

Radio programmer John Diliberto has stated that space music is related to electronic music,[11] as has Bay Area musician, composer and sound designer Robert Rich, who considers space music to be a combination of Electronic music influences from the 1970s with world music and "modern compositional methods".[27] 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".[28] 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."[29] In the same article, he describes Stephen Hill's "Hearts of Space" spacemusic program as streaming ambient, electronic, world, New Age and classical music.[8] In contrast to this, according to author and National Endowment for the Arts researcher Judith H. Balfe, Billboard editor Jerry Wood describes space music as a one of several "genres within the genre" of New Age music.[30]

Allmusic, one of the world's largest commercial databases of music-related information, defines Space music as a subgenre of New Age music.[31] 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.[32][33][34] 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."[35]

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."[36]

Variety

See also: Krautrock, Space Rock, Ambient music, New Age music, Meditation music, and Space jazz

As described by Stephen Hill, the predominant defining element of spacemusic is its contemplative nature.[2][7] Within that overview, space music includes a wide variety of styles, instrumentation and influences - both acoustic or electronic.[5][6] For example, the playlist archives of the "Hearts of Space" program lists the following genres as included in their programming:[4]

  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),[37] examples of recording artists who create the contemplative experience of space music using acoustic instruments and influences of cultures from around the world are plentiful: Andreas Vollenweider (harp), George Winston (piano), Carlos Nakai and Coyote Oldman (Native American flutes),[10] 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).[9]

Historical usage of the term space music

In 1928, the German composer Robert Beyer published a paper about "Raummusik" (spatial music),[38] which is an entirely different sense of the term. Karlheinz Stockhausen, who became a colleague of Beyer in Cologne in 1953, used the expression "space music" in this sense when 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."[39] In the sense meant here, he stated in 1967, "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."[40]

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."[41]

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.[42]

Physicist Werner Meyer-Eppler 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 "elektronische Musik" using magnetic tape recorders, sine wave generators and serial composition techniques.[43]

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."[44] 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." [45]

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.[46][47] 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 commercial availability of digital synthesizers in the early 1980s.

The Czech-American composer Václav Nelhýbel, released in 1974 a record named Outer Space: Music by Vaclav Nelybel. From the liner notes: “Ingenious use of echo, artificial reverberation and electronic alterations gives the music in this category a weird, spooky futuristic, ‘out of this world’ quality, well-suited to super-natural happenings of any kind. Piano, drums and electronic instruments are used to achieve the strange atmosphere and spatial sounds.” Vaclav Nelhybel crafts a supernatural world, describing nebulae, meteors, star clusters and craters on Mars with sounds natural and manipulated to tell the story of cosmic space.

Beginning in the early 1970s, the term "space music" was applied to some of the output of such artists as Vangelis, Jean-Michel Jarre, Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream,[37] 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,[48][49][50][51] and also in part to the "outer space" themes that are apparent in some of their works. These space music explorations diverged from traditional pop-song formats into longer less structured compositions.[52] Following their early influence on the development of space music, Tangerine Dream later produced increasingly rock-influenced works that are not generally described as space music.[53]

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.[54]

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.[55] 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, Frank 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.

In film and television soundtracks

Space music has been effective for creating moods and soundscapes in film and TV soundtracks; in particular, electronic forms of space music have been used to convey an auditory metaphor for non-ordinary consciousness.[56] Examples of space music in film soundtracks include Peter Gabriel - Passion: Music for The Last Temptation of Christ, Philip Glass - Koyaanisqatsi and The Hours (soundtrack), Cliff Martinez - Solaris (2002 film), Vangelis score to Blade Runner,[57] [58] Tangerine Dream's moody soundtracks for Legend, Sorcerer (soundtrack) and Risky Business, [59] [60] Jonn Serrie's surround-sound score for the IMAX short film, Hubble: Galaxies Across Space and Time, [61] Brian Eno's score for the 1989 film For All Mankind,[62] 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. [63]

Television science-fiction series Babylon 5 was scored by former Tangerine Dream member Christopher Franke, released on CD in 1996 on Franke's independent label Sonic Images. The scores for many of the Babylon 5 TV movies and numerous Babylon 5 episodes[64] were also released by Sonic Images.[65] In 1994, the German TV station Bayerischer Rundfunk launched the television program Space Night,[66] 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 notable artists who have created works of space music:

Alphabetized by last person name including single name, or first group name

See also

Footnotes

  1. ^ "In fact, almost any music with a slow pace and space-creating sound images could be called spacemusic." Stephen Hill, co-founder, Hearts of Space, What is spacemusic?
  2. ^ a b c "When you listen to space and ambient music you are connecting with a tradition of contemplative sound experience whose roots are ancient and diverse. The genre spans historical, ethnic, and contemporary styles. In fact, almost any music with a slow pace and space-creating sound images could be called spacemusic." Stephen Hill, co-founder, Hearts of Space, What is spacemusic?
  3. ^ Lanza, Joseph (2004). Elevator Music: A Surreal History of Muzak, Easy-listening, and Other Moodsong. University of Michigan Press. p. 184. ISBN 0472089420. "space music evokes vague images of regal landscapes perhaps encountered in past lives or the tones of a harmonic convergence between earth and other celestial bodies..." 
  4. ^ a b Hearts of Space Playlist - Complete list of genres
  5. ^ a b Herberlein, L.A. (2002). The Rough Guide to Internet Radio. Rough Guides. p. 95. ISBN 1858289610. 
  6. ^ a b c "A timeless experience...as ancient as the echoes of a simple bamboo flute or as contemporary as the latest ambient electronica. Any music with a generally slow pace and space-creating sound image can be called spacemusic. Generally quiet, consonant, ethereal, often without conventional rhythmic and dynamic contrasts, spacemusic is found within many historical, ethnic, and contemporary genres."Stephen Hill, co-founder, Hearts of Space, sidebar "What is Spacemusic?" in essay Contemplative Music, Broadly Defined
  7. ^ a b c d "The program has defined its own niche — a mix of ambient, electronic, world, new age, classical and experimental music....Slow-paced, space-creating music from many cultures — ancient bell meditations, classical adagios, creative space jazz, and the latest electronic and acoustic ambient music are woven into a seamless sequence unified by sound, emotion, and spatial imagery." Stephen Hill, co-founder, Hearts of Space, essay titled Contemplative Music, Broadly Defined
  8. ^ a b "Hill's Hearts of Space Web site provides streaming access to an archive of hundreds of hours of spacemusic artfully blended into one-hour programs combining ambient, electronic, world, New Age and classical music." Steve Sande, The Sky's the Limit with Ambient Music, San Francisco Chronicle (Sunday, January 11, 2004).
  9. ^ a b Hurwitz, David (2005). Exploring Haydn: A Listener's Guide to Music's Boldest Innovator. Amadeus Press Unlocking the Masters Series. Hal Leonard. pp. 78–81. ISBN 1574671162. 
  10. ^ a b Nidel, Richard (2005). World Music: The Basics. Routledge. p. 310. ISBN 0415968011. 
  11. ^ a b "The early innovators in electronic "space music" were mostly located around Berlin. The term has come to refer to music in the style of the early and mid 1970s works of Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream, Ash Ra Tempel, Popol Vuh and others in that scene. The music is characterized by long compositions, looping sequencer patterns, and improvised lead melody lines." - John Diliberto, Berlin School, Echoes Radio on-line music glossary
  12. ^ "This music is experienced primarily as a continuum of spatial imagery and emotion, rather than as thematic musical relationships, compositional ideas, or performance values." Essay by Stephen Hill, co-founder, Hearts of Space, New Age Music Made Simple
  13. ^ "Innerspace, Meditative, and Transcendental... This music promotes a psychological movement inward." Stephen Hill, co-founder, Hearts of Space, essay titled New Age Music Made Simple
  14. ^ Lanza, Joseph (2004). Elevator Music: A Surreal History of Muzak, Easy-listening, and Other Moodsong. University of Michigan Press. p. 184. ISBN 0472089420. "Space music is just as important for its ability to confound our spoon-fed sense of time and place. Its mercurial stirrings create openings between worlds: inner and outer space; ancestral rhythms and ultra-civilized electronics, the clock on the wall and the hallucinatory "psyhonaut" time that drifts in and out of waking life." 
  15. ^ Lanza, Joseph (2004). Elevator Music: A Surreal History of Muzak, Easy-listening, and Other Moodsong. University of Michigan Press. p. 185. ISBN 0472089420. "The mystique of communing with some larger, transpersonal, extraterretrial Gaia is commonly included as part of space music's packaging. Explaining compositions such as 'The Galactic Chalice' and 'Celestial Communion,' Constance Demby refers to the 'transformative journey' with 'sounds to awaken and activate soul memory of our true origin.'" 
  16. ^ Lancaster, Kurt; Brooks McNamara (1999). Warlocks and Warpdrive: Contemporary Fantasy Entertainments With Interactive and Virtual Environments. McFarland & Company. p. 29. ISBN 0786406348. "Space music presents a virtual fantasy of traveling in outer space." 
  17. ^ "...Spacemusic ... conjures up either outer "space" or "inner space" " - Lloyd Barde, founder of Backroads Music Notes on Ambient Music, Hyperreal Music Archive
  18. ^ a b "Space And Travel Music: Celestial, Cosmic, & Terrestrial... This New Age sub-category has the effect of outward psychological expansion. Celestial or cosmic music removes listeners from their ordinary acoustical surroundings by creating stereo sound images of vast, virtually dimensionless spatial environments. In a word — spacey. Rhythmic or tonal movements animate the experience of flying, floating, cruising, gliding, or hovering within the auditory space."Stephen Hill, co-founder, Hearts of Space, in an essay titled New Age Music Made Simple
  19. ^ "Restorative powers are often claimed for it, and at its best it can create an effective environment to balance some of the stress, noise, and complexity of everyday life." -- Stephen Hill, Founder, Music from the Hearts of Space What is Spacemusic?
  20. ^ "This was the soundtrack for countless planetarium shows, on massage tables, and as soundtracks to many videos and movies."- Lloyd Barde Notes on Ambient Music, Hyperreal Music Archive
  21. ^ "Like most people in the independent side of the music business, we inhabited what are called the niche genres.... All niche music regardless of style or content has one thing in common: it's all something that relatively small numbers of people really, truly, love." Stephen Hill, Powered By Love: Niche Music in the New Millennium, feature article in Ambient Visions Magazine, 2002
  22. ^ "New Age Space music carries visions in its notes; it is transcendent inner and outer space music that opens, allows and creates space... Space music moves; the balance between the rhythm track and melody line determines a great deal of the imagery, altitude, and impact of a particular piece... At its best and most essential, 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." Anna Turner, "Space Music", in The New Age Music Guide: Profiles and Recordings of 500 Top New Age Musicians, edited by Patti Jean Birosik, p. 134 (New York: Collier Books; London: Collier MacMillan Publishing Company, 1989).
  23. ^ "In the archives of KUSF 90.3 FM http://www.kusf.org/ University of San Francisco, California" "Archives meaning that if you email them with the name of the person, show and date they will confirm"
  24. ^ "Currently no less than fourteen separate subgenres are being called New Age music. These include New Age East/West, Electronic/Computer, Environmental/Nature, Folk, Jazz/Fusion, Meditation, Native American/Indigenous, New Age Pop, New Age Progressive, Solo Instrumental, Sound Health, Space Music, Traditional. New Age, Vocal, and World Music." P. J. Birosik, "Preface", in The New Age Music Guide, edited by P. J. Birosik, p. vii (New York: Collier Books; London: Collier Macmillan Publishing Company, 1989).
  25. ^ "New Age Jazz/Fusion is distinguished from other New Age subgenres, especially space music, by its rhythm and identifiable melodies." Dallas Smith, New Age Jazz/Fusion, page 46, The New Age Music Guide: Profiles and Recordings of 500 Top New Age Musicians, edited by Patti Jean Birosik, p. 46 (New York: Collier Books; London: Collier MacMillan Publishing Company, 1989).
  26. ^ " '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. By "Space" we mean the elecrto-acoustic enhancement of instrumental tones, through reverb and echo; in New Age music such enhancement is not simply a "special effect", but rather an integral part of the music itself." Steven Halpern, Notes on New Age Music, in The New Age Music Guide: Profiles and Recordings of 500 Top New Age Musicians, edited by Patti Jean Birosik, p. xix (New York: Collier Books; London: Collier MacMillan Publishing Company, 1989).
  27. ^ "I got into space music in the '70s as a teenager and I wanted to play with those clichés again—the cyclic, repetitive structures of '70s electronic music—but steer away from the formula by using some of the compositional methods of Steve Reich and Terry Riley, for example. It's a combination of world music, modern compositional methods and '70s schlock." Robert Rich, quoted in Plugged in to the Joy of Ambient Music, by j. poet, San Francisco Chronicle (May 28, 2006).
  28. ^ "Ambient, spacemusic, dub, downtempo, trip hop, acid jazz...artists from all these categories." Waveform...Starstreams and beyond: Ambient Visions Talks with....Forest, listing styles of music played on Musical Starstreams, from interview in Ambient Visions Magazine, 2003
  29. ^ "spacemusic, also known as ambient, chill-out, mellow dub, down-tempo ....Anything but New Age." Steve Sande, The sky's the Limit with Ambient Music, San Francisco Chronicle (Sunday, January 11, 2004).
  30. ^ Balfe, Judith H. (1993). Paying the Piper: Causes and Consequences of Art Patronage. University of Illinois Press. p. 280. ISBN [[Special:BookSources/0252063104]|0252063104]]]. 
  31. ^ Allmusic New Age music page - includes Space music as subgenre of New Age music.; Allmusic Space music page - subgenre of New Age music; Allmusic Electronica music page - does not list Space music as a subgenre; Allmusic Ambient music page - does not list Space music as a subgenre.
  32. ^ Barnes & Noble website - Space music is not listed on the main music genres page. Space music is listed as a subgenre of New Age music on the New Age music genre page, as is Ambient music. Ambient also appears as a subgenre on the Dance & DJ genre page, along with Electronic music.
  33. ^ Space music is listed on the Rhapsody Music Service New Age music genre page as a subgenre of New Age. Space music is not listed on Rhapsody electronica/dance genre page or Rhapsody Ambient music subgenre page.
  34. ^ CD Baby - Space music is listed as a subgenre of New Age music. Both Electronic music and New Age music list Ambient as a subgenre. Electronic genre page, New Age genre page.
  35. ^ "Although there is no sound in the vacuum of space, many New Age composers have looked upward for inspiration, creating an abstract notion of the sounds of interstellar music. Space indicates not only a style of composition, but also a certain cosmic consciousness.... Artists like...Space music pioneer Michael Stearns try to evoke peace and unity with their spacescapes, creating compositions that are tranquil, hypnotic and moving." Rhapsody online music service - definition of Space Music on New Age music subgenre page
  36. ^ Lanza, Joseph (2004). Elevator Music: A Surreal History of Muzak, Easy-listening, and Other Moodsong. University of Michigan Press. p. 185. ISBN 0472089420. 
  37. ^ a b Dr. Ulrich D. Einbrodt (2001). "Space, Mysticism, Romantic Music, Sequencing, and the Widening of Form in German Krautrock during the 70's" (PDF). Justus Liebig University, Giessener Electronic Library. http://geb.uni-giessen.de/geb/volltexte/2001/592/pdf/p010004.pdf. 
  38. ^ Robert Beyer, "Das Problem der ‘kommenden Musik,'" Die Musik 20, no. 12 (1928): 861–66. See also p. 36 in Lowell Cross, "Electronic Music, 1948–1953", Perspectives of New Music (Autumn-Winter 1968): 32–65, and p. 7 of David Dunn, "A History of Electronic Music Pioneers", from the catalog of the exhibition Eigenwelt der Apparatewelt: Pioneers of Electronic Art, presented as part of Ars Electronica 1992, in Linz, Austria.
  39. ^ Schwartz, Elliott; Barney Childs (1998). Contemporary Composers on Contemporary Music. Da Capo Press. p. 380. ISBN 0306808196. 
  40. ^ "In 1967, just following the world premier of Hymnen, Stockhausen said this about the electronic music experience: '... Many listeners have projected that strange new music which they experienced—especially in the realm of electronic music—into extraterrestrial space. Even though they are not familiar with it through human experience, they identify it with the fantastic dream world. 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. Thus, extreme words are employed to describe such experience, which are not "objectively" communicable in the sense of an object description, but rather which exist in the subjective fantasy and which are projected into the extraterrestrial space.' " Page 145, Electronic and Experimental Music: Pioneers in Technology and Composition, Thomas B. Holmes, Routledge Music/Songbooks, 2002, ISBN 0415936438
  41. ^ Lanza, Joseph (2004). Elevator Music: A Surreal History of Muzak, Easy-listening, and Other Moodsong. University of Michigan Press. p. 80. ISBN 0472089420. 
  42. ^ According to Author Norman Mailer in 1956, quoted on page 154: "a friend took me to hear a jazz musician named Sun Ra who played 'space music.' " and according to Sun Ra himself, also in 1956, quoted on page 384: "When I say space music, I'm dealing with the void, because that is of space too... So I leave the word space open, like space is supposed to be." and on page 247, in an interview, Sun Ra states: "sometimes when I'm playing for a band, playing space music... I'm using ordinary instruments, but actually I'm using them in a manner... transforming certain ideas over into a language which the world can understand." -- Space is the Place By John F. Szwed, 1998, Da Capo Press
  43. ^ A History of Electronic Music Pioneers by David Dunn, in the catalog of the exhibition: Eigenwelt der Apparatewelt: Pioneers of Electronic Art, presented as part of Ars Electronica 1992, in Linz, Austria.
  44. ^ Chambers, J. K. (1998). Milestones: The Music and Times of Miles Davis. Da Capo Press. p. 246.. ISBN 0306808498. 
  45. ^ Carr, Ian (1998). Miles Davis: The Definitive Biography. Thunder's Mouth Press. pp. 284, 303, 304, 306. ISBN 1560252413. 
  46. ^ "purveyors of freely improvised space music," -- Blender Magazine, May 2003
  47. ^ ""Dark Star," both in its title and in its structure (designed to incorporate improvisational exploration), is the perfect example of the kind of "space music" that the Dead are famous for. Oswald's titular pun "Grayfolded" adds the concept of folding to the idea of space, and rightly so when considering the way he uses sampling to fold the Dead's musical evolution in on itself." -- Islands of Order, Part 2,by Randolph Jordan, in Offscreen Journal, edited by Donato Totaro, Ph. D, film studies lecturer at Concordia University since 1990.
  48. ^ "a quartet of albums, Phaedra, Rubycon, Ricochet and Stratosfear, established the Dream's modus operandi with throbbing, cosmic rubber band rhythms thrumming like galactic space basses through floating mellotron pads, ghost flutes and electronic effects whirling by at hyperspeed. This was the soundtrack for countless planetarium shows... the first electronic music to shed the synthesizers reputation as cold and unfeeling... beyond emotion, into the sensual and the transcendent. It was as if the universe were wrapping you up in a warm velvet glove and showing you the wonders of existence." Time Warped in Space by Echoes Radio producer and host, John Diliberto.
  49. ^ a b c d e f g h Listed in "A Classic Space Music Countdown to Liftoff: 10 Essential classic space music albums, counting down from 10 to 1" Time Warped in Space by Echoes Radio producer and host, John Diliberto.
  50. ^ a b "At its most abstract - solo albums by Klaus Schulze and by Tangerine Dream's leader Edgar Froese - these were clouds of sounds to lose yourself in, a Rorschach mindscreen for projecting fantasies onto." Reynolds, Simon. "Kings of the cosmos", in The Guardian, April 22, 2007, retrieved May 13, 2007
  51. ^ Jack Chambers.; Detlef Junker, Philipp Gassert, Wilfried Mausbac David Brian Morris (2004). The United States and Germany in the Era of the Cold War, 1945-1990: A Handbook. Cambridge University Press. p. 342. ISBN 0306808498. 
  52. ^ Junker, Detlef; Philipp Gassert, Wilfried Mausbach, David Brian Morris (2004). The United States and Germany in the Era of the Cold War, 1945-1990: A Handbook. Cambridge University Press. p. 342. ISBN 0521834201. 
  53. ^ "The Dream's sound started getting a lot more rock 'n' roll in the 1980s, especially once the dreaded Private Music years set in. They'd record good music after that, but it never had the impact, cultural resonance or lasting import of their 1970s output." Time Warped in Space by Echoes Radio producer and host, John Diliberto.
  54. ^ official website for "Space is the Place", documentary film about Sun Ra's Arkestra, filmed in 1972
  55. ^ "Hill began the program as a volunteer at KPFA-FM, Berkeley, in 1973, and worked with Anna Turner as co-producer. Ten years later--Jan. 8, 1983--the program went national." Hearts of Space: a mellow carriage leader after a decade on the public radio satellite -- published Feb. 1, 1993 in Current, "the newspaper about public television and radio in the United States"
  56. ^ Norman, Katharine (2004). Sounding Art: Eight Literary Excursions Through Electronic Music. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.. p. 32. ISBN 0754604268. 
  57. ^ "...includes music in his 'classic' style, ethnically influenced e-music, deep sequences, symphonic synths, and sci-fi space music." Blade Runner soundtrack album review (Multi-CD extended version), Jim Brenholts, Windows Media Guide, from Allmusic
  58. ^ "Vangelis...composes and performs mainly instrumental music and film scores. ...he has flirted with many genres and has proved to be very hard to categorize. His music has been filed as 'synthesizer music', 'new age', 'progressive rock', 'Symphonic rock', 'Space music', 'electronic music', etc" Vangelis Papathanassiou Biography, Newsfinder, A literary favour to world culture, Gus Leous, July 2003
  59. ^ "The terms New Age and Space Music have been aptly applied to the ethereal improvisational electronic work of Tangerine Dream.... Tangerine Dream lends itself to movie soundtracks; their music graces dozens of popular motion pictures." Tangerine Dream Biography Contemporary Musicians, Ed. Suzanne M. Bourgoin. Vol. 12. Thomson Gale, 1994. eNotes.com. 2006
  60. ^ " In 1983 the group made a substantial contribution to the soundtrack for the film Risky Business, .... the title piece, also known as Love On A Real Train involved repetitive elements that were close to the minimalism of Steve Reich... 'we stumbled upon a minimal kind of thing, like Steve Reich or Philip Glass. It was a new way of drawing a romantic theme, which we still get credit for today.' " Tangerine Dream - Their Changing Use Of Technology Part 2: 1977-1994, Sound on Sound Magazine, January 1995
  61. ^ "the award-winning IMAX short film, Hubble: Galaxies Across Space and Time, ... transforms images and data from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope into a voyage that sweeps viewers across the cosmos. .... space music composer Jonn Serrie wrote the surround-sound score." Hubble IMAX Film Takes Viewers on Ride Through Space and Time Hubble Telescope News Release, June 24, 2004
  62. ^ Harpole, Charles; Charles Musser, Eileen Bowser, Richard Koszarski, Donald Crafton, Tino Balio, Thomas Schatz, Stephen Prince, David A. Cook, Paul Monaco, Peter Lev (2004). History of the American Cinema. Simon and Schuster. p. 385. ISBN 068480493X. 
  63. ^ "[Michael Stearns] scored the IMAX film Chronos for Ron Fricke... Chronos opened in May of 1985 and on opening night the soundtrack was beamed via satellite to over 200 radio stations nationwide on Stephen Hill's program Music From the Hearts of Space." from Stearns' bio on the Michael Sterns official website
  64. ^ [1]
  65. ^ "don't get confused and start thinking that classically crafted space music is a thing of the past. We recently received several releases from Sonic Images, an independent Los Angeles label operated by synthesist Christopher Franke, who played with Tangerine Dream for 17 years during the apex of the German group's popularity. Franke, who now resides in L.A., is represented on the label by two recent albums: a compilation of soundtrack music for the sci-fi TV series Babylon 5 and Klemania," DECLARATIONS OF INDEPENDENTS, Billboard Magazine, January 27, 1996
  66. ^ Space night official website
  67. ^ a b c d e f "Pioneered by Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze and Walter Carlos, then popularised by Tomita, Jean Michel Jarre, and Vangelis, this genre - space music, some call it..." Reynolds, Simon. "Kings of the cosmos", in The Guardian, April 22, 2007, retrieved May 13, 2007
  68. ^ "RIVERS OF BELIEF-an ENIGMAtic mix of the spiritual & the seductive". Hearts of Space. 24 May 1991. http://hos.com/php/showProgram.php?program=0263. 
  69. ^ a b c d e Steve Sande (January 11, 2004). "The sky's the limit with ambient music". SF Chronicle. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/01/11/PKGAA45D9R1.DTL. "10 essential spacemusic CDs, Selected by Stephen Hill of Hearts of Space" 
  70. ^ Planetarium Music
  71. ^ Hearts of Space playlist
  72. ^ Hearts of Space playlist
  73. ^ Patti Jean Birosik, The New Age Music Guide: Profiles and Recordings of 500 Top New Age Musicians, p113, 1989, Collier MacMillan, ISBN 0020416407, "Deep Breakfast...one of the best-selling New Age Space music albums ever"
  74. ^ Affirmation Spot "Ray Lynch...one of the luminaries of the "space music" genre"
  75. ^ Insound Review of R. Carlos Nakai, Cycles, Vol. 2 (1985) "This is a set of heavenly space music compositions with their bases firmly in the Northern plains and Southwestern deserts. "
  76. ^ Jim Brenholts, Allmusic, Sundance Season, R. Carlos Nakai "Nakai is one of the leading practitioners of this style. In his hands, the flute takes on space music qualities."
  77. ^ Robert Lamb, "Symphonies of the Planets: Music from the Hearts of Space?", HowStuffWorks, September 15, 2009. [2]
  78. ^ Hearts of Space playlist
  79. ^ "As in previous Spacejazz excursions, we favor the more melodic or space creating players over the instrumental technicians. We'll be hearing from the group OREGON with music from 45th PARALLEL;" -- Music from the Hearts of Space, Program 260 : "Spacejazz 6 Animato"
  80. ^ Billboard Chart 1992 cited in Allmusic
  81. ^ Hearts of Space playlist
  82. ^ "Among the first, and arguably the best to bring that psychedelic ethos into the electronic age was Tangerine Dream. While their 1970 debut, Electronic Meditation, sounded like Karlheinz Stockhausen meeting the Grateful Dead, their later albums essayed the sound that would be the template of space music." Time Warped in Space by Echoes Radio producer and host, John Diliberto.
  83. ^ eNotes biography of George Winston "prime acoustic example of what is popularly called new age space music"

Further reading