Elevator music (also known as Muzak, piped music, weather music or lift music) refers to a type of popular music, often instrumental, that is commonly played through speakers at shopping malls, grocery stores, department stores, , telephone systems (while the caller is on hold), cruise ships, airports, business offices, and elevators. The term is also frequently applied as a generic term for any form of easy listening, smooth jazz, or middle of the road music, or to the type of recordings commonly heard on "beautiful music" radio stations.
Elevator music is typically set to a very simple melody so that it can be unobtrusively looped back to the beginning. In a mall or shopping center, elevator music of a specific type has been found to have a psychological effect: slower, more relaxed music tends to make people slow down and browse longer. Elevator music may also be preferred over broadcast radio stations due to the lack of lyrics and commercial interruptions.
This style of music is sometimes used to comedic effect in mass media such as film, where intense or dramatic scenes may be interrupted or interspersed with such anodyne music while characters use an elevator (e.g. The Blues Brothers, Dawn of the Dead, Mr. And Mrs. Smith, Asterix and Obelix, Mission Cleopatra and Spider Man 2.) Some video games have used elevator music for comedic effect, e.g. Metal Gear Solid 4 where a few elevator music-themed tracks are accessible on the in-game iPod.
The Muzak Holdings Corporation is a major supplier of business background music, and was the best known such supplier for years. Since 1997 Muzak has used original artists for its music source, except on the Environmental channel.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elevator_music
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Elevator Music is also the title of an in-depth look at this sort of music written by Joseph Lanza. Here’s a description of this book with some reviewer quotes:
Description
For a sound intended to be comforting, unobtrusive, and inoffensive, "elevator music"—i.e., easy listening, mood music, "Beautiful Music," and "Music by Muzak®"—has ignited strong and often heated opinions.
With an arsenal of historical anecdotes and facts, Joseph Lanza sings seriously, with healthy doses of humor and wit, the praises of this misunderstood musical genre. Lanza traces mood music's mystifying presence from the mind-altering sirens who lured Odysseus to the harp David played to soothe King Saul, but the tale gets more intriguing in the early twentieth century, with Erik Satie's "furniture music" experiments, the birth of the Muzak® Corporation, and various science fiction stories that featured mood music as a futuristic staple.
Lanza also chronicles the parallel development of the "easy listening" instrumental, discussing such "mood maestros" as Ray Conniff, Percy Faith, Andre Kostelanetz, and Mantovani. More recent "ambient" soundscapers like Brian Eno and practitioners of what some still call New Age also enter the picture. Along the way, Lanza addresses mood music's social and even governmental uses, raising questions about music's role in modern life while challenging aesthetic assumptions.
This revised and expanded edition delves deeper into the surreal phenomenon of "metarock"—the art of reinterpreting rock songs into dreamlike, string-laden, easy-listening alternatives. The author also adds an afterword about some of the actual musicians who arranged and conducted Muzak® sessions—respected names like Nelson Riddle.
Elevator Music confronts the criticisms of elites who say that elevator music is "dehumanizing" or less than music. These reactions, Lanza argues, are based more on cultural prejudices than honest musical appraisal. In a current climate where the noises are louder, and the background beats are ever more aggressive, this history of music intended as a pleasing background makes for a captivating read.
Joseph Lanza is currently writing an impressionistic history of romantic pop ballads. He has served as an independent consultant for Time Life Music and was executive producer for the two-disc collection Music for TV Dinners (Caroline Records). His most recent book is about the legendary crooner Russ Columbo.
Praise / Awards
—Wendy Carlos, composer, soundtracks for "A Clockwork Orange" and "The Shining"
—Errol Morris, director of "The Thin Blue Line"
—J. G. Ballard, author of "Crash" and "Empire of the Sun"
—Choice
—Washington Post
—Entertainment Weekly
—Phil Patton, author of Made in the U.S.A.: The Secret Histories of the Things That Made
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Note from the Blog Author
Lanza’s book is at times astonishing. Musicologists, and serious music fans who hate soundtracks, will not like what Lanza has to say. The key to Lanza’s message involves the intense and shrewd thinking that went into the the key developers of easy listening and light music. Lanza offers brief biographies of such important figures as Jackie Gleason, Mantovani and Angelo Badalamenti that are, themselves, worth the price of the book.
Elevator music has been on the front lines of a culture war for decades. The combat continues.
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