Listening to in Dolby Atmos Streaming, via Tidal/Apple/Amazon

[humprof]

Terry Riley's "In C," performed for the first time 60 years ago tomorrow. It was first recorded four years later by Columbia, and you can find a bajillion different versions of it today--but the two below are the only ones (re-)mixed for Atmos, AFAIK. (Riley is still composing today, age 89, with a view of Mt. Fuji to inspire him.)

It seems that early on, Riley was envisioning "In C" as sort of a "surround" work. Robert Carl's book about the piece includes a reminiscence by Riley's friend Stuart Dempster that "Terry had suggested people could wander around and change the sound by wherever they stood in the room." For the 1967 performance at Carnegie Recital Hall, according to a New York Times review, "loudspeakers were not only positioned about the auditorium but in the halls . . . the audience was urged by Lukas Foss, who oversaw the concert, to walk around and savor the sounds from various places in and out of the hall. Most of the listeners did so, and a few kept right on walking" (!).

Here's some of what Carl reports about the Columbia recording sessions, which took place a couple months later in a decommissioned church (no longer standing) on E. 30th Street in New York:

Columbia had just purchased one of the new Ampex 8-track machines, which used one-inch tape. The microphone setup . . . is difficult to assess; most participants remember a series of [Neumann] mikes hanging over them, and most remember special close miking of the Pulse. [One participant] remembers an immense mixing board, still run with ranks of black dial potentiometers. The recording engineer was Fred Plaut. . . .

[. . .]

The [second of "two other special issues that made the recording a challenge"] was more radical in its implications. Before the recording even began, Riley had decided it needed to be multitracked. This technique seems to be a legacy of his experience doing layered tape-delay pieces, which could build up a thick, propulsive texture very quickly . . . Thus the recording was conducted in three passes. . .

[Violist David] Rosenboom remembers that there was some concern on the pan of Columbia's team about the overdubbing process:

​

There was discussion about Terry's piece, and mine, which was a little unusual for the Columbia engineers, which was that you could take something that they thought of as classical music, and here are some of us talking about music where we would erase the boundaries, we were talking about crossovers between contemporary classical concert music and pop music of the time, and how they related, and we could do things like overdub, either edit and mix and combine things. And they were~ like. "What, you can do that?" But [producer] David Behrman was always the wonderful calm bridge between the Columbia staff and the musicians, saying "Oh yes, you can do that kind of thing!"​

https://www.npr.org/2024/11/03/nx-s...lution-of-terry-rileys-minimalist-masterpiece

 

[dapaladi]

first single "renegade" from manchaster indie rock band "doves", from the new album "constellations for the lonely" that will be released on january 25th.

 

[alansanchez86]

first single "renegade" from manchaster indie rock band "doves", from the new album "constellations for the lonely" that will be released on january 25th.

Big fan of "Lost Souls", will definitely check this out when it comes out.

 

[MrSmithers]

Big fan of "Lost Souls", will definitely check this out when it comes out.

Yeah Steven Wilson highlighted 'Lost Souls' in one of the Album Years podcasts, fantastic album. Glad to see Doves releasing new stuff in Dolby Atmos. Hopefully it's a good mix...

 

[alansanchez86]

Yeah Steven Wilson highlighted 'Lost Souls' in one of the Album Years podcasts, fantastic album. Glad to see Doves releasing new stuff in Dolby Atmos. Hopefully it's a good mix...

Yup, that's how I got introduced to them

 

[ssully]

Using a stereo mix as the baseline is fraught with problems. There are no rules with a remix, especially to Atmos. People who want the same thing should probably stick to the original mix.

I wouldn't say 'fraught with problems', I'd say it's a legitimate approach, and I'm curious what you think those problems are.

It doesn't mean the mix will necessarily be a success. As others note, Steven Wilson uses the stereo mix as a guide, but unlike his slavering fanboy base, I don't consider all of his mixes to be successful.

To me a successful remix does not *lose* anything important to me from the original mix -- and what's important can be anything from an actual part, to a hard-to-pinpoint 'vibe' -- but *adds* sonic delight to it.

Which is probably why I'll sometimes prefer an upmix of the original mix, to a surround remix.

 

[SomethingAnything]

Terry Riley's "In C," performed for the first time 60 years ago tomorrow. It was first recorded four years later by Columbia, and you can find a bajillion different versions of it today--but the two below are the only ones (re-)mixed for Atmos, AFAIK. (Riley is still composing today, age 89, with a view of Mt. Fuji to inspire him.)

It seems that early on, Riley was envisioning "In C" as sort of a "surround" work. Robert Carl's book about the piece includes a reminiscence by Riley's friend Stuart Dempster that "Terry had suggested people could wander around and change the sound by wherever they stood in the room." For the 1967 performance at Carnegie Recital Hall, according to a New York Times review, "loudspeakers were not only positioned about the auditorium but in the halls . . . the audience was urged by Lukas Foss, who oversaw the concert, to walk around and savor the sounds from various places in and out of the hall. Most of the listeners did so, and a few kept right on walking" (!).

Here's some of what Carl reports about the Columbia recording sessions, which took place a couple months later in a decommissioned church (no longer standing) on E. 30th Street in New York:



https://www.npr.org/2024/11/03/nx-s...lution-of-terry-rileys-minimalist-masterpiece

Wow. Thanks for letting me know. It's also on Tidal. Though not that second title. However I have also found A Rainbow in Curved Air and the beautiful Shri Camel. And his Sun Rings with the Kronos Quartet.

The mixes, from what I've heard so far, are excellent. I'm going to enjoy playing these.

(Thanks also, for that word bajillion, a new one for me. I like it. More common in North America, Google tells me.)

 

[humprof]

However I have also found A Rainbow in Curved Air and the beautiful Shri Camel.

I think those are exclusive to Tidal (so far). Enjoy--and let us know how they are!