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How does Pop music utilize the Concept of Ambience? The importance to twentieth-century music of atmospheric sound, its timbre and personality indeed its Ambience is a measure of how much innovative musical ideas intertwined with technological change. (Prendergast, 2000: 3). Ambience is a terminology in popular music widely envisioned as an atmosphere and mood within many genres of today, yet how is the concept of ambience utilized in Pop music and what is it that ambience signifies? Tamm stated in Brian Eno: His Music and the Vertical Colour of Sound that ambience is a gentle music of low dynamics, blurred edges, and washes of sound colour, produced primarily through electronic means (1989: 3). Brian Eno in Ambient 1: Music for Airports expressed on the CD sleeve that Ambient music is intended to induce calm and space to think (1978). Ambience can become an enhancement, a background sound to develop the atmospheric environment, and in turn express concepts of time, pulse and space. This does not necessarily mean that ambience is the musical arrangement; it may well be the environment in which possesses the characterised sounds that potentially become the musical content. The arrangements lack of rhythm, repetitiveness and undefined structure in the background of a listeners attention is a concept in essence determined by the French experimentalist Erik Satie and developed by American minimalists John Cage and La Monte Young to name a few, whom were heavily influenced by the Dadaist/Futurist rejection of traditional styles of expression in art. Satie himself labelled his ambient music as furniture music (1917), music designed to complement social activities, decorative rather than the focus of attention. Yet this does not mean that all ambiences lacks artistic intent, in fact ambience

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compliments a whole array of diversified mediums in todays popular music. Its concepts are utilised in commercial Dance bands such as Moby, Boards of Canada and The Orb, video game sound effects such as Fallout, applied to major motion picture soundtracks such as Donnie Darko and used to assist in the promotion of product advertising such as Panasonic. The relaxing concepts of ambience according to John Cage act as a deliberate ignorance towards a societys inherited aesthetic claptrap (Cage, 1978: 82). The concept of no time, or at least no characterised time signature signified within Satie whom Cage discusses in Silence, considers the sounds of the everyday (ambient noises) because there is a question of bringing ones intended actions into relation with the ambient unintended ones (ibid, 80), a level of natural order. As Eno stated on the initial American release of Music for Airports/ Ambient 1:

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. (1978).

Hence the musical idea that ambience is a perceived environment designed to fit with the everyday, complimenting the sounds we notice and the sounds we choose to ignore. Saties furniture music (1917) created a social setting for the interplay of knives and forks at the dinner table. The listener could enjoy the accompaniment of music yet also leave the environment of the room for water, without the music breaking down and the musical concept lost. As Cage states regarding the lack of consideration towards the non-musical sounds, One would

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have to pass beyond, inviting disaster (1978: 80). In turn Silence (ambient noise) has only duration, and hence ambient musics musical structure must be just empty time (ibid), its passiveness becoming empty space, a portrayal of silence. Ultimately this is one of the reasons today in popular music that ambience is linked with New Age Music, Sci-fi, Chill out and Ambient House.

Eno and Satie share many similarities with the work of the Avant Garde movements Musique Concrte. Ambience, the character of the place or the quality it seems to have (Cambridge Dictionaries, 2011) involves as Musique Concrete an environment that thrives on the surrounding sounds. Musique Concrtes acousmatic voice is manipulated into an orgainsed environment so that the listener hears and imagines a completely new visual form. For example Etude Aux Chemins de fer (1948) by Pierre Schaeffer represents the environment of a typical travelling train, yet the actual samples have been manipulated into the foreground to sound like a travelling train, they are not original recordings of the same train, they are samples of a mixture of trains at different stages of movement organised to depict one. Ambient Music similarly concentrates on the placement of sounds within an environment, but the focus of sounds remains a passive attention for the listeners awareness. Enos Ambient 1: Music for Airports created on spliced tape loops of piano and synthesizer, is not meant to disguise the original visual identity of the instruments, but rather prove that the placement of sound away from the foreground into the background, provides a new way of listening to music as part of the visual and aural experience. Eno stated in reference to the commercialised background sound business Muzak:

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Whereas conventional background music is produced by stripping away all sense of doubt and uncertainty (and thus all genuine interest) from the music, Ambient Music retains these qualities. And whereas their intention is to `brighten the environment by adding stimulus to it (thus supposedly alleviating the tedium of routine tasks and levelling out the natural ups and downs of the body rhythms) Ambient Music is intended to induce calm and a space to think. (1978).

Eno is creating something that has a serious artistic concept to it, that opposes the commerciality of Muzak, but yet intertwines with technological change (Prendergast, 2010: 3) and thus relevant with that current scene. This emphasis on the quality and randomness of sound has been developed by John Cage and Karl Stockhausen among others. For instance Prendergast in The Ambient Century credits popular musics modern day fascination with sound to

Stockhausens experiments with the properties of sound environments.

Serialism, in its dislocative way, had thrown up an interest in the essence of single sound...New qualities in sound were perceived, new tonalities divorced (2010: 2). from any traditional acoustic instruments were realized.

And he argues that the Serialist attitude towards segregation of sound in an environment led John Cage and the Minimalists La Monte Young, Phillip Glass Michael Nyman and Steve Reich to experiment with chance, silence and repetition ultimately concentrating on the placement of sound associated with ambience. Prendergasts approach to the transition is that American Minimalists

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saw Serial Music as over complicated, too serious and lacking in fun, they looked for music that, one could actually enjoy listening to and that you could float away to (ibid: 93), music with a social outlook in mind and ultimately a sound that popular recreational drug taking related with. For instance the emergence of the Velvet Underground in Brooklyn propelled La Monte Youngs simplicity on pitch and repetition to a whole array of guitar bands in the form of drones, distortion and trance. My Bloody Valentine, Sonic Youth, Faust, The Verve and Spiritualised are just a few of the many guitar bands whom Toop in Ocean of Sound credits with providing ambient qualities to a wider audience. Nyman described the approach of Youngs repetition as limitless (1974: 1) stating:

Youngs musical system is modal and relies on the establishment of a drone and the articulation of very stringently selected, harmonically related frequencies (overtones) above this drone (ibid: 121).

The repetition of drones is what Nyman states led to music which appears on a passive level (ibid: 123), music that trances into the background with no restrictions on the listeners attention. Toop stated:

Ambient was born in its present definition at least: music that we hear but dont hear, sounds which exist to enable us to better hear silence; sound which rests us from our intense compulsion to focus, to analyse, to frame, to categorise, to isolate. (1995: pp140-141).

Repetition provided not only a social set-up but arguably a spiritual outlook. The Avant Garde composers discussed share a similar link in their music with the

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essence of spirituality influenced by the Gregorian chants, Balanese Wayang and Javanese of old. In fact spirituality can be interpreted in many composers score titles. For instance Youngs Dream House (1963), Cages Imaginary

Landscapes (1939) focus on the concept of escapism. To dream and to imagine are a rest from the reality of our intense compulsion to focus (ibid). According to Cage, Imaginary Landscape prompts the listener to remember a

subconscious thought in an unfocussed moment (ibid 143). Kawasaki similarly interviewed by Toop on the ceremonial chant of the Omizutori festival in Japan stated, that repeating chants not only stimulates a persons imagination but the focus of sound is determined by their imagination.

They sing, and sometimes silence, sometimes ring a special bell. Sometimes they sing very fast... Maybe they are in a trance. People have only imagination: What are they doing?...The sound causes many imaginations. (ibid: 153).

Hence the duration of sound and silence in ambience provides the suspension of time, a quality that embarks on the same qualities displayed in meditation; a trance that stimulates a listeners mind and spirituality. According to Cage the spirituality of eastern music expresses a common tendency towards tranquillity and thus a reflection of permanent emotions (Toop, 1995: 141), and in a tradition of Avant Garde composers motivated to break Western cultures rules of composition, tranquillity becomes a popular association of that current music trend. Eastern musics diverseness and common interest with the modernist composer influenced minimalisms experimentation with rhythm and drones in turn providing a breakthrough for the practice of ambient qualities in the

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mainstream over the course of the sixties. The Beatles for instance in the later albums Revolver (1966), Magical Mystery Tour (1967) and Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band (1963) display many eastern concepts involving spaciousness and duration influenced from such artists as Ravi Shankar whom is described as open-ended, modal, and improvisatory (Prendergast, 2000: 205). Tomorrow on the Revolver (1966) album in particular displays much of what Prendergast discusses as melismatic highs (ibid: 206), the improvised long drawn out sounds of the sitar. Along with this Within You Without You on Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band (1963) drones low sitar sounds below improvised eastern sliding notes. Yet the Beatles were not only adopting the concepts of the East, they were as Prendergast quotes in the beginning of this essay, innovative musical ideas intertwined with technological change (ibid: 3). The Beatles use of accessible new electronic technology were sharing similar concepts with the avant-garde on the modern capability of non-acoustic sound. How then does the natural tranquillity associated with ambience in natural instruments associate with the synthetic portrayal of electric?

Psychedelic Rock pronounced an era where electronics tangled with the accessibility of the hallucinogenic. Certain bands of more prominence associated with ambience are Pink Floyd, The Velvet Underground, Can, King Crimson and Gong. Mike Watson author of Ambient Music Guide.com stated that Pink Floyds relevance to ambience can be heard in, the slow trance-inducing bass/drum throb, the ethereal organ and synth backdrops, the sighing and crying guitar lines, the clever and unexpected sound effects (1992). There are several key factors that have developed this impression. Primarily as with the

experimentalists in the avant-garde, technology in Rock was changing so that

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bands could now overdub sound effects, and secondly post-war youth had disposable income and a new optimistic modernist mindset. Pink Floyd were defining a new concert concept (Prendergast 2000: 260) in their ability to use light shows in their coloured sounds (ibid). In turn they were developing a specific environment through the use of lighting and sound technology for their dreamy ambient sound. What classified as dreamy was Pink Floyds use of found sounds (ibid), their elongated, symphonic approach to music

composition and the escapism that provided Prendergasts description: mindexpanding (ibid: 262).

The German band Can similarly reinstate the aesthetic of tranquillity into the virtual world of electronics, Can believed in finding a new language through experimentation (ibid: 280). Prendergast describes them as capable of beautiful and elegiac compositions with their ethnically derived rhythm section, tape collages and electronic keyboards... (ibid). It can be argued that here we have a band that forge the spirituality of ambience in eastern music with the unlimited experimentation of modern day electronic technology. For instance Prendergast credits them with a direct influence on our modern perspective of ambience displayed with The Orb and The KLF. Yet apart from experimentation, Can approached the live performance as a medium for editing. A long drawn out performance enabled the edited layers of instrument upon instrument, a lack of attention to the foreground sounds and thus an environmental sound with Enos intentions, space to think (1978). As Prendergast stated, Having shown that the ideas of Stockhausen, Cage and Minimalists could be adapted to Rock to produce new and startling results, Can became a legendary influence on subsequent generations of exploratory musicians (2000: 282). Hence we

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diverge into electronics and the utilization of Ambient House, the oxymoron... dance music for sitting still (Toop, 1995: 52).

Ambient House according to Fantasia utilizes, the timbral characteristics of sounds, often organized or performed to evoke an "atmospheric", "visual" or "unobtrusive" quality (2011). According to Toop unlike Eno who focussed instead on the act of listening (Toop, 1995: 40), ambience in dance music expressed emphasis on creating music. The Orb for instance used the sampler to great effect to create the spacious, ambiguous sounds that define Ambient House. Yet passive listening through the medium of computer technology was not justifiable.

One of the frequent criticisms aimed at new ambient and electronic music is that the music lacks stars, focal points, magazine-cover fodder, dynamic performers (ibid: 49).

The lack of focal point relates with The Orbs ability to hypnotise and to trance. Ambient Houses popularity in the nineties is in part due to the genres aural relations with the effects of come-downs in the drug culture at the time. The ambiguous atmospheric sounds provided a complimentary environment for winding down from the nocturnal rhythm of dancing your ass-off (ibid: 41). As Toop states with regards to the concepts of performance, Ambient House disregarded the expectation of performance with its seamless mix (ibid). Toop portrays the art of music making in Ambient House as almost sacrificial in its performance, Like an all night performance of the Balinese gamelan or a Central African cult ceremony, the music moved through dusk until dawn (ibid). The art

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of music performance in this case has taken on sacrificial tribal elements, using electronics to display a more primitive, but powerfully expressive ritual. This can also relate to the Minimalists adoption of repetition as a more communicative language. As McClary states in the afterword of Attalis Noise,

Whether performance art, minimalism, or neo-tonality, the new styles challenge the ideology of the rigorous, autonomous, elitist music produced in universities for seminars. They call into question the institutions of academic training and taxonomies, of orchestras and opera houses, of recording and funding networks (1985: 157).

Although McClary focuses on minimalisms reaction to the aura of serialism, focussing on the academic side of society, Minimalism and Ambient Houses repetition represent societys activities and their ability to blend. This does not mean that these genres lack in artistic credibility. The concept of ambience is represented in the passive sound. For instance the lack of concentration allows the subconscious section of our brain to dream and in turn break down societys structure, regulation and influence. On listening to The Orbs Blue Room (1992), the listener is transported into different sonic environments, the layering of sounds blend from the foreground into the background and in turn is passive in the listeners concentration. Likewise The KLFs Chill out (1990) placement of tonal high synthesizer arpeggios in the background place them almost ignorable to the listeners ear. The focus attention is placed on the human sampled voice that fades in and out as aural sceneries change. Similarly The Orbs Little Fluffy Clouds (1991) displays the link between Minimalism with its

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use of repetition on the rhythm but also the lyrical content. The voice is depicted to drone monotonically within the background.

An ambient environment is what Toop portrays as, psychedelic shamanism (1995: 51). There is the fantastical ability that in the art of escapism lies as in the belief of the Shamists, a spiritual communication to be had. Ambience can be argued to act as the medium in which one of a Shamist mentality may heal themselves. This divine music whether it be in Dance, Minimalism or a Balinese Wayang all are utilised in the same manner. And whether each environment is looking to portray religion, science fiction or recreational drug taking, the ambiguity of the sounds and their placement provide escapism, an alternate reality and an altered state. In turn Pop music can argue to utilize ambience in nearly every area of aural culture, and hence ambience has a determination on humans musical creativity. To enter an alternate state of reality, whatever the musical medium, a different approach towards consuming and listening to music is understood. Ultimately a new determination of how Pop music is portrayed and its concepts can be expressed within it.

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Nyman, M. (1974) Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond. London: Studio Vista.

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