Continuing our drive into ambient music, this time we are listening to The Pearl – a seminal album from American composer Harold Budd in collaboration with ambient pioneer, Brian Eno.
Released in 1984, The Pearl offers a collection of delicately meditative pieces that meander through various moods and atmospheres. Backed by Eno’s esoteric aural landscapes, Budd’s piano work shines, drenched in otherworldly reverb and delay, taking the listener on a journey within.
As a composer Budd’s style took in the avant-garde influence of John Cage and inflected it with a minimalist, impressionistic sensibility, creating moods and ambiences while shunning what he termed the “pyrotechnics” of more academically minded modernist composers.
Tragically, Budd died in 2020 during the early days of the coronavirus pandemic at the age of 84. Yet his musical legacy lives on, providing a rich world of sound for us to explore for years to come.