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PGM 923R 'PIANOSPHERES' : sept. 17-24

This week we pass through one of the yearly waypoints on our journey around the sun. The Autumnal Equinox, with day and night of equal length, marks the start of the Fall season in many countries. As the air cools and the shadows lengthen here in the Northern Hemisphere, it's a good time to return to the sublime world of the contemplative piano.

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, a program of solos and duets, acoustic and electronic keyboards and rare ambiences called PIANOSPHERES. Music is by KJETIL BJERKESTRAND, RALPH ZURMUHLE, HAROLD BUDD, LUDOVICO EINAUDI, BRUNO SANFILIPPO, DAVE EGGAR, RYUICHI SAKAMOTO, KETIL BJORNSTAD & DAVID DARLING.

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PGM 1294 'DEVOTION 2' : sept. 10-17

Over the last 30 years, the gentle world of Indian devotional music has been updated and transformed by an international group of ambient musicians. Inspired by this venerable heart-centered tradition, often working with authentic Indian musicians, they've stretched the boundaries and expanded the atmospheres of the genre with electronic drones, echoes and reverberations, overdubs, and studio magic. Slow, deep, and meditative, you don't have to know anything about Indian music or religion to enjoy it.

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, ambient excursions in Indian devotional music—on a program called DEVOTION 2. Music is by HANS CHRISTIAN, GARY STROUTSOS & STEVIN McNAMARA, BEN LEINBACH, CRAIG PRUESS & ANURADHA PAUDWAL, MARK SEELIG, and AL GROMER KHAN.

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PGM 1293 'SYMMETRY' : sept. 3-10

Across the spectrum of Ambient, Electronic, New Classical and New Age music we find a common metaphor: the journey. It's music for virtual travel, for progressive ascent towards a goal, arrival at an apex, descent, and return.

New York composer ZENON MARKO has given classic architectural form to the experience by making it rigorously symmetrical. His album SYMMETRY, he says, "is a musically symmetrical journey — whether physical, intellectual, imaginary, emotional, psychological, or spiritual." As if serious music wasn't already difficult enough, the entire album is symmetrical, with the descending sections as actual reverses of the ascents.

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, the power of form, and the powerful sound of heroic ambient electronics, on a program called SYMMETRY. Music is by ZENON MARKO, SENSUALISM, KEVIN KELLER, CHRONOTOPE PROJECT, HAMMOCK, MAX RICHTER, and TOM EATON.

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PGM 1292 'SUFI SOUL 3' : aug. 27-jun.3

The mystical, inward-facing order of Sufism goes back to the very beginning of the Islamic religion in the 8th century. It has parallels to the venerable traditions of Buddhist and Hindu mysticism, and aims for direct union with God by purifying the heart. The work of the Persian Sufi poet RUMI has achieved worldwide popularity for its beauty and insight, and a body of Sufi music evolved to accompany religious practices and meditation—most famously the "whirling dervishes" of the Mevlevi order in Turkey—creating a genre that's not only alive today, but producing new strains of spiritual music.

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, we revisit the contemplative heart of Middle Eastern music, on a program called 'SUFI SOUL 3.' Music by ZIKR PROJECT, DHAFER YOUSSEF, ANOUAR BRAHEM, ELIYAHU SILLS, ALEX KHASKIN, MICHEL BANABILA with MEMET POLAT, ÜMLAUT, & SALAR ASID, DEREK & BRANDON FIECHTER, ABE HATHOT, and PAUL AVGERINOS & OMAR FARUK TEKBILEK.

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PGM 1186R 'TRIBAL AMBIENT' : aug.20-27

It's not all that often that a new strain of popular electronic music arrives in the culture fully formed, but it happened in 1988 in the wake of STEVE ROACH's ground-breaking album DREAMTIME RETURN. Like Stravinsky 75 years earlier with The Rite of Spring, Roach realized that electronic music needed a dose of primitive energy and physicality — and he found it in the trance-inducing music of the aboriginal tribes of Australia.

The new genre was called "Techno-Tribal" and it combined electronic atmospheres with primitive rattles, drums, rocks, and the aboriginal didgeridoo. If our current political tribalism is an index of popularity, tribal music should be all the rage. But most electronic artists are urban, and have been influenced by Electronic Dance Music.

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, ethnotronic atmospheres meet trance percussion, on a program called TRIBAL AMBIENT. Music is by STEVE ROACH, BYRON METCALF & JENNIFER GRAIS, INLAKESH, FRORE & SHANE MORRIS, JOHN VORUS, D LOOP and KEVIN BRAHENY FORTUNE.

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PGM 919R 'BAYOU MOON' : aug.13-20

Gather 'round all you swamp fans. This one's for you.

Yes, the great Mississippi Delta, home of deep Southern Blues, Cajun, Dixieland, jazz, funk — and let's-not-forget "sludge metal" — is callin' you, on a program called BAYOU MOON.

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, we wade into a hot and humid zone with a unique culture and a sense of place you can feel on your skin. Like a thick mist drifting out of the marsh, wetlands and barrier islands, bayou country has its own ambience, a sound that blends blues, creole, Indian, Cajun and jazz — and seasons it with a heavy coat of swamp sauce. It's one of the most distinctive cultural blends you'll find anywhere.

Music is by TOM NEWMAN, MICHAEL BROOK, RY COODER, DANIEL LANOIS, PATRICK O'HEARN, TINO IZZO, and HAMMOCK.

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PGM 1291 'GONG-CHIME IMMERSION' : aug. 6-13

The traditional Gamelan music of Indonesia originated almost two thousand years ago. It has a sound and spirit all its own, with influences from bronze age metallurgy, Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam. The complex rhythms and shimmering sound of the metallophone orchestra of bells, gongs, chimes, cymbals and xylophones — plus skin drums, bamboo flutes, strings and vocals — has fascinated Europeans since Gamelan ensembles performed at the Paris Exposition of 1889.

In the 20th century, an elite group of western composers including ERIK SATIE, JOHN CAGE, LOU HARRISON, HARRY PARTCH, STEVE REICH, PHILIP GLASS, and others took the traditional gamelan sound in new directions, creating new instruments and orchestrations and later adding the ethereal dimension of electronics.

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, ambient hybrids inspired by the gamelan music of Indonesia, on a program called GONG-CHIME IMMERSION. Music is by LOREN NERELL, DAVID PARSONS, JON IVERSON, DANIEL SCHMIDT and THE BERKELEY GAMELAN, EVERGREEN CLUB CONTEMPORARY GAMELAN, and JALAN JALAN.

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PGM 1290 'ELECTRONIC FOSSILS' : july 30-aug 6

Electronic music is everywhere today, so it's surprising to learn that as a popular genre it's only about 50 years old. While the earliest examples go back to the late 19th century, until the 1960s electronic music was rare, expensive, and almost exclusively the domain of obscure academic and experimental musicians.

These early theorists realized that electronics would vastly expand the tones and timbres available to composers. This led to popular electronic versions of Bach and Debussy, and electro-acoustic combinations of conventional and electronic instruments. More seriously, it led to a revival of so-called "tone color" music, an evolution of the Romantic "tone poems" of Richard Strauss, Liszt, and Wagner — while more radical artists used electronics to create new forms of music that had never been heard before.

It all came together in the 1970s, when the advent of relatively affordable electronic synthesizers, drum machines, effects processors, and recording equipment fueled an era of rapid discovery, invention and innovation, and the beginning of popular electronic music. On this transmission of Hearts of Space, we look back at the sound of electronic music in the 1970s, on a program called ELECTRONIC FOSSILS. Music is by DOUG McKECHNIE, MICHAEL GARRISON, JEAN-MICHEL JARRE, TANGERINE DREAM, DEUTSCHE WERTARBEIT, LAURIE SPIEGEL, KLAUS SCHULZE, and ROBERT RICH.

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PGM 1289 'JON HASSELL RETROSPECTIVE' : july 23-30

American avant-garde composer JON HASSELL died in June 2021 aged 84. Of all the artists that have been featured on Hearts of Space, due to his wide influence, theoretical brilliance, and open-minded innovation, no one deserves a retrospective more than JON HASSELL.

His 1978 debut album VERNAL EQUINOX set out his vision of what he called "Fourth World" music, which he defined as "a unified primitive/futuristic sound combining features of world ethnic styles with advanced electronic techniques." It's a vision that was influential with other musicians because it opened up new creative vistas rather than just rearranging the elements of old ones.

His embrace of exotic cultures was always respectful and creative, never casual or exploitive. He saw less developed countries as places where tradition was still alive, and spirituality was inherent in their music. His principal instrument was the trumpet — electronically softened, harmonized and spatialized into what one writer said "sounded as if it were played by a Berber on a distant sand dune, or from a minaret in a deserted city."

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, a JON HASSELL RETROSPECTIVE.

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PGM 1141R 'PRANA PULSE' : july 16-23

One of the truly improbable results of 20th century cultural openness and experimentation has been the international success of yoga. From its origins as a means of physical support for Indian meditation practice, yoga came west with counterculture explorers in the 1970s, took root, and against all odds became a standard of the western fitness industry.

Today, yoga fuels burgeoning spin offs in clothing, fashion, video and accessories — as well as a hyperactive genre of India-inspired electronic music — not only for yoga practice and meditation, but for so-called "ecstatic dance" and other group activities. Over the last 20 years, the international yoga community has come together to create dozens of "transformational festivals" every summer, which provide live performance opportunities for the musicians, along with exercise and spirituality.

On this transmission of Hearts of Space, groove-centric, globally percussive, tribal-electronic, Indo-Ambient sounds for transformational festivals, ecstatic dance, yoga and meditation, on a program called PRANA PULSE.

Music is by SHAMAN'S DREAM, MOLLONO.BASS, DESERT DWELLERS, AL GROMER KHAN, ANUGAMA, DEUTER, and RAJENDRA TEREDESAI.

 [ view playlist ] [ view Flickr image gallery ] [ play 30 second MP3 promo ]