Pretty Minimalism S/D

I used to sometimes play a tape of classical Japanese koto music while studying, which worked for me. (It died on me and I can't give a specific title.)

Also the contemporary gamelan CD Sankgala! worked pretty well, though to this day I'm not sure what I think of it.

also seek: harold budd's 'the room' and 'the pearl'

As a rule, while studying I used to often listen to not excessively noisey things I didn't really like that much, but that I didn't hate either. And then sometimes I would get to like them, as a side effect.

i would say nay on this one. it's actually kinda distracting and less pretty than you would think

Taking Homework, To Make Records, To Do Homework To

Not neccessarily minimal, but there are some good suggestions there.

I tend to go for cyclical and repetitious.
the david grubbs side of the fat cat split is nice too.

conrad
four violins

riley
rainbow in curved air
hall of mirrors at the palace of versailles

young
"Second Dream of the High-Tension Line Stepdown Transformer From the Four Dreams of Chin"

lots of philip glass, pauline oliveros, and others...

if you can tolerate a bit more noise:
nerve net noise- various amusements
otomo yoshihide- cathode
david tudor
john cale's dream syndicate records

in general, i'd recommend anything on lovely music ltd.

as far as terry riley goes, i'd stick to the cortical foundation records. but then i really detest in c style minimal recods--with which i'd lump john adams and glass.

(but i'm answering the thread title, and not the actual question. which i can't answer because i don't listen to music when i study. brain can't handle that much information.)

Supercollider "Supercollider"
Supercollider "Dual"

hahaha!

All of these guys have other records that are also good for zoning out, especially Roach as he has recorded probably 60 albums (some better than others).

I used to listen to Pole for hours when I was doing some real tedious cleaning up of a database working nights a couple of years back. My office was in the server room, so it fit well with all of the hums from the computers.

jess that gas stuff is terrific. thx all, will investigate. tho probably after i'm done with all this shit, heh.

(bitches brew is very unreaderly surely?)

in a classical stylee - john luther adams awfully titled 'Clouds of Forgetting, Clouds of Unknowing' is also very nice in a minimalist way but not very pretty.

also - harold budd's a good choice including his latest solo piano stuff - very reminiscent of eric satie

*sobs quietly* ... *sulks off to play crappy pitter-pat on his 'lectric guitar*

god, this really rings a bell. sometimes i'd just lazily put on some record i borrowed or which i owned but wasn't terribly fond of, and because i was concentrating on work wouldn't get up to change it out of impatience. and often i'd find myself almost subliminally discovering things about such records that i hadn't noticed before. so that's one argument in favor of "passive" listening.

best recording of 'vexations' is an out-of-print recording by Alan Marks on London records. He plays it for one hour, his pacing is perfect, and the recording is glacial. He includes two minutes of silence at the end of the single-track disc, which frustrates loop play, unfortunately.

There's another pianist who's name I've forgotten and I can't find his recording with google; he does a good 22 minute version, I'll post back with his name from home...

While googling I also finally found 3 disc set of Satie piano works by France Clidat; the only one I've heard that ranks with the Ciccolini (I still haven't heard the Pascal Rogé). Found this nice overview of Satie recordings with one of the weirdest popup ads ever.

After decades of voracious and eclectic music-seeking, I find as I get older I'm often most drawn to "less is more" music, fewer sounds eith greater impact.

Did this mix of some of my favorite super-minimalist song-form music, and it constantly calls me back:

https://musicophilia.wordpress.com/2020/02/23/pith-and-echo/

Various – ‘Pith & Echo’
1968-2019
Part I

01 [00:00] Mark Hollis – “Westward Bound” (‘Mark Hollis’ 1998)
02 [04:10] Low – “It’s All Been Done” (‘Double Negative’ 2018)
03 [07:40] David Sylvian – “The Only Daughter” (‘Blemish’ 2003)
04 [12:55] The Knife – “Still LIght” (‘SIlent Shout’ 2006)
05 [16:00] Areski – “Liberte” (‘Un Beau Matin’ 1971)
06 [17:55] Melanie De Biasio – “Brother” (‘Lilies’ 2017)
07 [21:00] Brian Eno – “By This River” (‘Before And After Science’ 1977)
08 [24:00] Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark – “Sealand” (‘Architecture & Morality’ 1981)
09 [31:40] Yves Jarvis – “To Say That Is Easy” (‘The Same But By Different Means’ 2019)
10 [35:50] Jansen / Barbieri – “The Insomniac’s Bed” (‘Stories Across Borders’ 1991)
11 [39:40] Tor Lundvall – “Falling Trees” (‘Sleeping And Hiding’ 2005)
12 [42:45] Anja Garbarek – “It Seems We Talk” (‘Smiling & Waving’ 2001)
13 [47:20] Grouper – “Blouse” (‘Grid of Points’ 2018)

Part II

14 [49:40] John Martyn – “Small Hours” (‘One World’ 1977)
15 [58:35] Nico – “Frozen Warnings (Alternate)” (‘The Marble Index’ 1968)
16 [62:55] Arthur Russell – “All-Boy All-Girl” (‘World of Echo’ 1986)
17 [66:35] Richard Skelton – “Votive” (‘Border Ballads’ 2019)
18 [69:05] Beth Gibbons & Rustin Man – “Show” (‘Out of Season’ 2002)
19 [73:25] Bonnie Prince Billy – “Banks of Red Roses” (‘When We Are Inhuman’ 2019)
20 [79:05] Bjork – “All Is Full of Love” (‘Homogenic’ 1997)
21 [83:20] Colin Self – “Once More” (‘Orphans’ EP 2019)
22 [90:05] Yosuke Tokunaga – “Table” (‘8 Furnitures’ 2019)
23 [93:50] Duendita – “Bury Me” (‘direct line to My Creator’ 2018)
24 [98:25] Moses Sumney – “Doomed” (‘Aromanticism’ 2017)

[Total Time: 1:42:50]

So often I want to hear music that is very simple and almost still, without any embellishment, that I even tried making some myself:

https://ianmanire.bandcamp.com/album/sketches

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a1001152445_16.jpg

New Park Jiha - All Living Things, out 14/02/2025.

From Bandcamp: "Park Jiha, the acclaimed Korean composer/multi-instrumentalist, makes patient, immersive music; music that illuminates the essence and texture of the natural, living world."

I would rather post this in a post-minimalism thread if we had one, but it is certainly pretty. Delicate, meditative, comforting, but still retaining the dynamics of something like a dance, and the aforementioned natural textures. Sonically, the Korean instruments are at the forefront (her signature reed mouth organ, hammered dulcimer, flute, glockenspiel) over discrete layers of electronics. The mouth organ (piri/saenghwang) has a relatively thick and deep, fascinating sound.

In her own words, speaking of her formative period and creative process :
https://www.15questions.net/interview/fifteen-questions-interview-park-jiha/page-1/

prati motherfucking bagnati ...

https://open.spotify.com/album/61B1GQvwCDsQMEP6yaySOB?si=SYxLQF9dTPKdScwX2Px8TQ

damn this is amazing

love the park jiha record - beautiful

prati bagnati del monte analogo

omfg this is killer

All about the title track but yes

yeah it's true, the last two tracks i treat as the comedown from the first, still lovely.

messina's "reflex" is nice, not as utterly magical as pbdma but fits the thread well, sort of a glass/budd hybrid

heh, the third track 'Amon ra' is by far my favorite on that lp

I haven't heard this in years. It’s def a triptych of textures but the second track is the only one that doesn’t stand alone imo.

tt is Laraaji in furs, the thing I really like about it is the vintage Vogue mag opulence. Movement is relaxed to the point of near paralysis, as if on quaaludes. You could cut the atmosphere with a knife, and it’s as scenic as the album cover. But it’s also painful, because the splendor is lost and remote and irretrievable. It has the feeling of a perfect moment corrupted by the sense that it’s all slipping through your fingers.

The third one is a handmade oregami sailboat held suspended on a string to the tt’s luxury yacht. It moves like the little kinetic sculpture spinning in your hand, or sunlight flickering through a window, refracted off the water in your glass. You would swear you’re hearing violins too, but it’s just the water glasses. This is blissful. The sadness of the tt is healed and banished.