On the Other Ocean

Editorial Reviews
Tom Johnson, Village Voice
"One of the most thoroughly satisfying recordings of the year...subtle, sustained, serene, sophisticated, super."

Album Description
In 1977, Behrman began to use a computer and homemade synthesizer to 'listen' to players and react to what they played. Figure in a Clearing and On the Other Ocean are his first pieces. Extremely sophisticated, yet extremely simple; totally committed to technology, and yet totally human, highly abstract, yet highly emotional. On the Other Ocean, drifts placidly on six pitches. Arthur Stidfole plays lush, sustained bassoon tones, Maggi Payne adds slow flute lines of great warmth, and a microcomputer, Kim-1, provides sustained electronic tones that respond automatically to the instrumentalists. Figure in a Clearing, moves somewhat more erratically on its six pitches. David Gibson's cello tones blend miraculously with the triangle waves of the computer's response, and man and machine seem finally and irrevocably joined.

Originally released by Lovely Music on LP in 1978; reissued on CD in 1996.

Tracks:

Valse Sentimentale - Clara Rockmore
Oraison - Ens D'Ondes De Montreal
Etude Aux Chemins De Fer - Pierre Schaeffer
Williams Mix - John Cage
Klangstudie II - Herbert Eimert/Robert Beyer
Low Speed - Otto Luening
Dripsody - Hugh Le Caine
Forbidden Planet: Main Title - Louis Barron/Bebe Barron
Elektronische Tanzste: Concertando Rubato - Oskar Sala
Poem Electronique - Edgard Varese
Sine Music (A Swarm Of Butterflies Encountered Over The Ocean) - Richard Maxfield
Apocalypse-Part 2 - Tod Dockstader
Kontakte - James Tenney/William Winant
Wireless Fant - Vladimir Ussachevsky
Philomel - Milton Babbitt
Spacecraft - MEV

Tracks:

Cindy Electronium - Raymond Scott
Pendulum Music - Sonic Youth
Bye Bye Butterfly - Pauline Oliveros
Projection Esemplastic For White Noise - Joji Yuasa
Silver Apples Of The Moon, Part 1 - Morton Subotnick
Rainforest Version 1 - David Tudor
Poppy Nogood - Terry Riley
Boat-Woman-Song - Holger Czukay
Music Promenade - Luc Ferrari
Vibrations Composees: Rosace 3 - Francois Bayle
Mutations - Jean-Claude Risset
Hibiki-Hana-Ma - Iannis Xenakis
Map Of 49's Dream The Two Systems Of Eleven Sets Of Galactic Intervals: Drift Study '31/69 c.... - La Monte Young

Tracks:

He Destroyed Her Image - Charles Dodge
Six Fants On A Poem By Thomas Campion: Her Song - Paul Lansky
Appalachian Grove - Laurie Spiegel
En Phase/Hors Phase - Bernard Parmegiani
On The Other Ocean - David Behrman
Stria - John Chowning
Living Sound, Patent Pending Music For Sound-Joined Rooms Series - Maryanne Amacher
Automatic Writing - Robert Ashley
Canti Illuminati - Alvin Curran
Music On A Long Thin Wire - Alvin Lucier
Melange - Klaus Schulze
Before And After Charm (La Notte) - Jon Hassell
Unfamiliar Wind (Leeks Hills) - Brian Eno

Amazon.com

Opening with Clara Rockmore's reworking of Tchaikovsky with the theremin, and finishing with one of Brian Eno's ambient soundscapes, OHM artfully succeeds in its goal of giving a representative (as opposed to the impossible, comprehensive) overview of the first several decades of electronic music. Over 3 discs, 42 compositions, and 96 pages of notes and photos, OHM clearly illustrates the producers' and contributing writers' point that early electronic music is much of the foundation of contemporary music. Herein lies the connective tissue bridging musique concrète, 20th-century classical, electronic experimentation, and the theoretical avant-garde to psychedelia, ambient, dub, techno, electro, and synthpop and the globalization of sound. The groundbreaking uses of loops, sampling, drones, remixes, and cut-and-paste technology are put fully into context. The diversity of music included makes any sort of summation impossible, but that is also the point: electronic music is not really a genre, but an open field of endless possibility. From John Cage's famous "William's Mix" of tape snippets to Karkheinz Stockhausen's electronic orchestral compositions, from David Tudor and Holger Czukay's experiments in unrelated blendings of audio elements to David Behrman's supremely peaceful duet between computers and musicians, the aural renegades on OHM tread where none (save a few of their contemporaries) had gone before. The liner notes convey the incredible amount of hard work and experimentation it took to stitch together many of these pieces in the predigital era. Putting aside the inevitable quibbles about what's missing (much of it due to legal and/or logistical issues), a more complete collection of musical eggheads, eccentrics, and visionaries is hard to imagine. --Carl Hanni

Customer Reviews:

excellent but uncomplete.......2006-11-12

Althought most of the music here is an excellent collection of electronic music history, this 3 CDs lack of the important contribution given by the RAI phonology studios of Milan, Italy in the 50s
(which was bigger than Koln's WDR studios) with Bruno Maderna, Luciano Berio and Luigi Nono.
This is a big mistake. Milans studios were the biggest of europe and produced many important electroacoustic pieces.
If the collection aim to describe faithfully electronic music history, it should include this artists too.

To call it music may be a bit limiting. .......2006-10-24

Some of the tracks on here are "music". That is that they contain all the bits we're trained to experience as music -- melody, etc. Some are not, and the composers would be the first people to tell you that. A lot of these works are reactions to ingrained rules, so they're bound to be jarring.

A more successful way to approach such a broad and varied collection of audio experimentation is to think of it as curated sound. This isn't something to wash the dishes to, or to seduce someone to (although if you did manage to seduce someone with the recordings on this anthology, HOLD ON TO THAT PERSON, because they've got to be a keeper). These are unique sound textures that deserve a close, probably solitary listen, and I think if you're in the right frame of mind, it can be a very rewarding listen.

My main complaint is sequencing: each dicrete piece follows it's own internal logic, so there are more than a couple rough gear changes. However, since each piece is so different, and the collection is so varied, I'm not sure that you could totally escape that.

A worthwhile collection.......2006-01-11

The OHM collection contains some of those ground breaking electronic compositions that have shaped today's styles, from the early electronic instruments of Theremin and Martenot, through Pierre Schaeffer's Music Concrete tape music and the electronic music of Stockhausen and Subotnick, to the mainframe computer output of Risset and Chowning.

It is unfair to mark this collection down due to the production quality and 'musicality' of its contents, to do so would be to staggeringly miss the point of the development of electronic music through the 20th Century. What this collection shows is the ideas behind those at the cutting edge of the genre before many could even conceive of such output. That said it is hard going at points, as experimental music can be.

Highlights for me are no doubt Olivier Messiaen's 'Oraison' on CD 1, David Tudor's 'Rainforest Version 1' on CD 2 and on CD 3 David Behrman's 'On the Other Ocean' and Maryanne Amacher's 'Living sound Patent Pending'.

OhMyGodHowDreadful.......2005-08-15

Ok, this collection is supposed to be early works and, thus not expected to be very sophisticated or polished. But the OHM collection sounds like the first attempt of a spastic cat turned-loose on a Moog keyboard. When it is not boreing, this collection of random and dissonant sounds (I can't call it music) is without any redeeming qualities to make it worth while. Don't get me wrong, I am a long-time fan of Wendy (nie Walter) Carlos and some other real pioneers of electronic music. However, I find that the Ohm collection has no similar qualities and is a major disappointment.

Kid Stockhausen.......2003-01-17

This is required listening for anybody interested in the history of electronic music. Although implicitly aiming for the techno music audience, this audio history is overwhelmingly focused on the classical avant-garde of electro-acoustic composers. The closest you'll get to pop electronica is the Brian Eno track at the end of the third disc. No Kraftwerk, no Moroder, etc. Instead "OHM" manages to point to the continuities between, say, John Cage and artists currently working at the experimental edges of electronica (so-called IDM). It seems to be saying, "You think Kid 606 is visionary? Well check out this Stockhausen track from '59!"

Admittedly, some of the songs are much more interesting to think about than they are to listen to. Some of the early pieces that were made through thosuands of hours of pains-taking tape-splicing could be made today in an afternoon with a digital audio editor and a few effects plug-ins.

Tracks:

On the Other Ocean (23:30)
Figure in a Clearing (19:12)

Album Description

In 1977, Behrman began to use a computer and homemade synthesizer to 'listen' to players and react to what they played. Figure in a Clearing and On the Other Ocean are his first pieces. Extremely sophisticated, yet extremely simple; totally committed to technology, and yet totally human, highly abstract, yet highly emotional. On the Other Ocean, drifts placidly on six pitches. Arthur Stidfole plays lush, sustained bassoon tones, Maggi Payne adds slow flute lines of great warmth, and a microcomputer, Kim-1, provides sustained electronic tones that respond automatically to the instrumentalists. Figure in a Clearing, moves somewhat more erratically on its six pitches. David Gibson's cello tones blend miraculously with the triangle waves of the computer's response, and man and machine seem finally and irrevocably joined.

Originally released by Lovely Music on LP in 1978; reissued on CD in 1996.

Customer Reviews:

That Long Lone Place.......2000-07-20

Behrman's prarie music, not so abstract, drones as though we floated over sand. It's that strange thing, America, roams on the flatness of the land as though it could never end. Its a sound landscape that meditates on hope, draws slowly out like breathe. In the abstract is the sound pure and representing nothing but its internal logic, the music - if in fact that is what it is, saturates the listening, often just a humming monotone - beautiful is. Is beautiful. Why should music hope? Is it finding the name of the place in a place uncertain it can loose, but a music certain it will not loose itself steadied by it's own sort of Hebrewic Americanism? Maybe that's the solemn generating form, without representation or actual narrative concern. And can music be abstract, well perhaps.

Average customer rating:

Bridge Across Eternity

Manufacturer: Celestial Sounds
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music

Cantatas | Vocal Non-Opera | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music

General | International | Styles | Music

General | New Age | Styles | Music

General | Soundtracks | Styles | Music

General | Vocal Pop | Pop | Styles | Music

Opera & Vocal | Holiday | Miscellaneous | Styles | Music

Classical | Indie Music | Stores | Music

General | International | Indie Music | Stores | Music

Celtic | New Age | Indie Music | Stores | Music
ASIN: B00000IIUX
Release Date: 1994-06-14

Tracks:

Sheep May Safely Graze/Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring
Simple Gifts/O'Carolan's Draught
Sinfonia
Innsbruck, Ich Muss Dich Lassen
Paduane ala Venetine
Gymnopedie #3
Primavera, from the Four Seasons
Ocean Waves
Ave Maria
Lauda
Fur Elise
Belle Qui Tiens Ma Vie
Ascension

Product Description

Bridge Across Eternity exemplifies the range of passion Cynthia brings to her musical recording. This predominately classical album features Cynthia on the Celtic harp, with a rich accompaniment heard on woodwinds and strings.