World News – AU – Harold Budd’s sublime music was a gateway to a brighter world

The work of the composer, who died of Covid-19 at the age of 84, cannot be labeled with the term’ Ambient ‘. – It is a guide to dream worlds and an oasis in difficult times

It is no coincidence that so many people discovered Harold Budd’s music this year. Restrained and calm – soothing even – the disembodied drones and ecstatic minimalism of 1978 The Pavilion of Dreams and 1984 The Pearl feel like they’ve been made to face troubled times. His albums are a gateway to the afterlife and an invitation, however short they may be. While he continues to be added to playlists curated to help listeners focus, relax, and navigate « unprecedented times, » the musician who died this week at the age of 84 is the contemporary one Closest to music to create sheer comfort in sound.

An avant-garde composer since the early 1960s, Budd spent six decades as a master at combining the majestic and the meticulous. Alongside Hiroshi Yoshimura, Steve Roach, and Brian Eno, with whom he teamed up on multiple releases, including Ambient 2: The Plateaux of Mirror from the 1980s, his music has broken down empty space to reveal huge scenes of grandeur. As if walking through a city in rush hour listening to William Basinski’s The Disintegration Loops, or settling into Eno’s Airport Music while you sit at a gate, his music invites solipsism: look at the world through your own private joys and fears.

The core Budd sound of yearning piano motifs and reverberant impressionism is often referred to as minimalism. But compared to the cyclical craft of Steve Reich and the early Philip Glass, his low-key, expansive forays felt dexterously maximalist. This has made Budd’s craft synonymous with the dream world. As heir to Satie and Debussy, his music was treated and poetic, never tricky or careless. Lovely Thunder’s disembodied mantras from 1986, for example, have led countless listeners through the nebulous no-man’s-land between consciousness and sleep.

Budd was not interested in the « ambient » mantle with which he is so strongly associated. “The word ‘ambient’ doesn’t ring my bell,” he said. « It’s supposed to mean something, but it is in fact meaningless. It is not relevant to me. My style is the only thing I’m good at. I don’t think of genres. I don’t think of labels, they don’t mean anything. Like Jung, Buñuel, or Dalí, Budd knew that the unspeakable quality of being human in the world meant much more than any label or ascription.

Though supposedly secular, his best work was remarkably blissful. Take the Avalon Sutra from 2005 / As long as I can hold my breath, or Madrigals of the Rose Angel, his 14-minute work from the Pavilion of Dreams. The latter with harp, piano and celeste with choral singing is a feat of melancholy that feels like a template for Radiohead at its best. Managing all of this was Budd’s intuitive understanding of thrift and counting every gossamer phrase. As he traversed vast oceans of feeling, each passing depth seemed worth particular consideration.

The collaboration has helped uncover the sheer breadth of Budd’s talents. Working with Eno, Cocteau Twins, Andy Partridge of XTC, and countless others from the late 1970s who grew up with a taste for jazz trailblazers like Lennie Tristano, revealed swaths of new colors in an already polychromatic palette. Although he retired in 2004 at the age of 68, he couldn’t stay away. Just last week, his last collaboration with Robin Guthrie, Another Flower by Cocteau Twins, was a farewell declaration from an artist who had been breaking new ground until the end. After Budd once said, « Risk-free art is not art, » he devoted his life to progress rather than wasting valuable time on nostalgia.

When discussing his debut collection of poetry Colorful Fortune in 2009, he noted that his occasional writing in the past has been « something like poetry, but not the same thing » – he had an almost Zen-like regard for what is not so much like what is. His music will remind many of us to try to silence the static charge at the end of the day while standing still, but even as we progress together towards less troubled times, the same genius will remain a haven for the soul.

Before you post, we’d like to thank you for participating in the debate. We are pleased that you have decided to participate and value your opinions and experiences.

Please choose your username under which all your comments should be displayed. You can only set your username once.

Please keep your posts respectful and adhere to the community guidelines. If you find a comment that you think is not in line with the guidelines, please use the « Report » link next to it to let us know.

Harold Budd, Brian Eno, Robin Guthrie, Cocteau Twins, Minimal Music