February 10th, 2018
Johann Johannsson died on Friday, February 9, 2018.
Devastating.
I absolutely adored his compositions.
I am at a complete loss for what to say about his music. So rather than try I made this mix.
Because I cross post all these mixes over on Mixcloud I am not able to make a mix with nothing but Johannsson music. Mixcloud has a policy of only 4 tracks from a single artist per mix. So I used 4 Johannsson cuts, some of my favs, and music from other artists that I have always grouped together with Johann.
I hope you will listen to this mix and also go seek out Johannsson's awesome library of music that is keeping his memory alive in this world.
Johann Johannsson Complete on Spotify
T R A C K L I S T :
- 00:00 Johann Johannsson - The Sun's Gone Dim and The Sky's Turned Black
- 05:33 Henryk Gorecki - Symphony No. 3 Lento(exerpt)
- 08:30 Johann Johannsson - Flight from the City
- 14:35 Max Richter - On The Nature Of Daylight
- 20:43 Johann Johannsson - Kangaru
- 23:22 Craig Armstrong - Choral Ending
- 25:54 Just a Human - Johann
- 28:15 Olafur Arnalds - Öldurót
- 32:22 Clint Mansell - Together We Will Live Forever
- 37:05 Johann Johannsson - IBM 1403 Printer
- 44:05 Christopher Spelman - The Final Journey
- 51:27 Hildur Gudnadottir - Unveiled
- 54:48 Olafur Arnalds - Dalur
- 58:31 lowlight - Memories of JJ
- 62:07 end
May 16th, 2017
I'm not sure where this mix originated. It may have started with Johann Johannsson's Kangaru from the Arrival soundtrack, God knows I listened to that a ton over the last 6 months. Maybe it was Max Richter.
Whatever it was I found myself collecting vocal tunes. The kind of tracks that have vocals but many times no words or lyrics. If there are words it's usually unintelligible or a language like Latin. Once I gathered enough music then wa-lah here's an ethereal vocal mix.
Cheers!
T R A C K L I S T :
- 00:00 Max Richter - Sketch for a Portrait #1(Morgan OST 2016)
- 01:06 Olafur Arnalds - Raddir(Island Songs 2016)
- 05:00 Ashera - Lullaby for Mother Earth(Ambient Selections 1997)
- 08:00 Tim Hecker - Utropics(An Imaginary Country 2009)
- 08:53 Jonsi & Alex - Boy 1904(Riceboy Sleeps 2009)
- 11:30 Jim Cole - Astral(Godspace 2002)
- 15:18 Jim Cole - The Way Beyond #10(The Way Beyond 2003)
- 17:30 Brian Eno - 2-1(Music for Airports 1978)
- 22:30 Melanie Pappenheim and Jocelyn Pook - Blow the Wind/Pie Jesu(Deluge 2009)
- 24:50 Max Richter - Path 5(Sleep 2016)
- 31:00 Johann Jphannsson - Odi Et Amo(Englaborn 2002)
- 33:50 Murcof & Vanessa Wagner - Farewell, O World, O Earth(Statea 2016)
- 41:00 Peter Gabriel - Dressing the Wound(Birdy 1985)
- 44:20 Alio Die & Amelia Cuni - Churning the Ocean(Apsaras 2001)
- 49:20 Johann Johannsson - Kangaru(Arrival 2016)
- 51:50 Jon Anderson - Bless This(Global Communication Remix)(The Deseo Remixes 1995)
- 57:44 Trio Mediaeval & Arve Henriksen - St. Birgitta Hymn(Rimur 2017)
- 61:48 Voces8 - Vasks: The Fruits Of Silence(Winter 2016)
- 66:30 end
September 28th, 2016
Two of my favorite albums this year are from Icelandic composers, Jóhann Jóhannsson - Orphée and Ólafur Arnalds - Islands. How does the tiny country of Iceland produce so many incredible artists? I don't know how but I'm happy every time new music comes from that mysterious place.
The moment I heard these two recordings I knew I'd have to make a new modern classical mix. All of the music here is fairly new and most of it has an accessible classical take with an ambient touch.
http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/us/artist/johannsson/
http://olafurarnalds.com/works/
Cheers!
T R A C K L I S T :
- 00:00 Johann Johannsson - Flight From The City
- 06:06 Ólafur Arnalds - Oldurot
- 10:27 Kenneth James Gibson - Poured Semi Silently Upon You
- 16:27 Matt Dunkley - Cycle 6
- 21:12 Johann Johannsson - A Sparrow Alighted Upon Our Shoulder
- 23:36 A Winged Victory for the Sullen - Atmos VII
- 26:00 Ólafur Arnalds - 1995
- 29:48 Sarah Neufeld & Colin Stetson - And Still They Move
- 32:23 Nick Cave & Warren Ellis - Casino
- 34:00 Kenneth James Gibson - Long Gone Canadian Summer
- 40:30 Johann Johannsson - Good Night Day
- 44:22 Matt Dunkley - Cycle 5
- 48:06 Ólafur Arnalds - Doria
- 51:11 Dustin O'Halloran - We Move Lightly
- 54:02 Nils Frahm - The Shooting
- 58:26 Ryuichi Sakamoto - Hell Ensemble
- 61:01 end
December 11th, 2012
The awesome folks over at Headphone Commute asked me to do a special mix for them and of course I could not refuse.
The mix is special because it is helping promote a fantastic new compilation they have put together. It's called "...and darkness came" and you can find out about it here...
Headphone Commute ...and darkness came.
The compilation features 80 tracks(yes, 80 tracks!) from great artists in ambient, modern classical and experimental music. Artists like Max Richter, Clint Mansell, offthesky, Julien Neto, Ólafur Arnalds, Dakota Suite, Christopher Willits, Loscil, Lawrence English, Maps And Diagrams, Jóhann Jóhannsson, Nils Frahm, Talvihorros, Bersarin Quartett, Antonymes, Simon Scott, Dustin O’Halloran, Machinefabriek, :papercutz, and many, many, more.
100% of the proceeds are donated to two charitable organizations, Doctors Without Borders and The Humane Society, to help all those affected by Hurricane Sandy. Please head over to Headphone Commute and think about picking up this excellent compilation.
T R A C K L I S T :
- 00:00 Yuki Murata - Prologue
- 04:34 James Murray - Still Waters Rise
- 08:55 Monolyth & Cobalt + Évo Lüthi - Dust Off
- 13:25 riverrun - Maallinen Kuu
- 16:00 Antonymes - Elegy IV
- 20:05 Julien Neto - Los Cien Enamorados
- 23:15 M.Cadoo - a.m.
- 26:45 Jóhann Jóhannsson - Melodia (iv) (Live at Ancienne Belgique)
- 28:15 Brambles - Reflected Consciousness
- 30:45 Tomoyoshi Date, Corey Fuller, Marcus Fischer and Simon Scott - Quartet(intro)
- 33:20 Simon Scott - For Betty
- 35:15 offthesky - Still Breathing
- 38:50 Dakota Suite - Now I Am Lost
- 44:20 Christoph Berg - Silence
- 46:56 Erik K Skodvin - Amber & Glass
- 49:05 Honig + Templeton - Reginald Cousins
- 52:10 Takahiro Kido - Sweet Silince
- 55:45 Minus Pilots - Illuminating The Dark Fields
- 58:30 Dustin O'Halloran - Fragile #2
- 1:01:15 end
February 23rd, 2012
I guess you could say that all the music I listen to is a soundtrack of one sort or another. Soundtrack for cleaning the house, soundtrack for sleeping, for biking, for reading, for living. Most of my mixes could be considered to be mini soundtracks.
So what makes this one different? I guess the tracks collected here just sort of had that "soundtrack" feel when I first heard them. I imagined a scene from a film with the tune as the soundtrack. The tracklist then becomes a set of "imaginary soundtracks."
Some of the cuts, such as those from Cliff Martinez & Clint Mansell, are from actual soundtracks. The others just seemed to fit the mood.
Enjoy.
T R A C K L I S T :
- 00:00 Cliff Martinez - First Drive Home
- 00:40 James Murray - Greenlands
- 04:25 Vieo Abiungo - Insincerity peeked through Cloudlessly...
- 06:51 Roly Porter - Caladan
- 09:20 Jacaszek - Orszula
- 12:22 Olafur Arnalds - lag fyrir oemmu
- 15:45 Craig Armstrong - Starless
- 20:00 Max Richter - Fictions & Data
- 21:40 Popol Vuh - Grab der Mutter
- 23:55 Jon Hopkins - Opalescent
- 25:10 Emanuele Errante - Memoirs
- 30:25 Ryan Teague - Cell Cycle
- 34:16 Clint Mansell - We're Not Programs Gerty
- 36:55 Peter Broderick - No More Space
- 37:36 Johann Johannsson - They Being Dead yet Speaketh
- 40:35 Biosphere - Iberia
- 44:07 Maya Beiser - Only Breath
- 45:50 Cliff Martinez - See You in Four
- 47:33 Jon Hopkins - Fairytale
- 52:15 end
December 18th, 2011
For some reason,when I think of falling snow, the instrument that comes to mind is the piano. Maybe it's from years of listening to Vince Guaraldi's Charlie Brown Christmas album. So it's no surprise that there is a fair amount of piano music in this "snow" mix.
We didn't have any snow yet but I had been thinking about doing a "first snow" mix for awhile & decided to throw one together Friday night. Then I woke up Saturday morning to a light dusting of snow on the ground. Maybe next I should do a mix for winning the lottery. 
As I said there is a lot of piano music in here. Led by Nils Frahm, from his excellent Felt album. A release that will end up on my best of the year list & one which everyone needs to hear. I think this mix works well as an early season "snow" mix versus the more bleak mid winter drones that will show up later.
I expect to crank out at least one more mix before the end of the year. Plus I'll have a year-end top 20 list, so start thinking of your own lists if you'd like to contribute.
Enjoy.
T R A C K L I S T :
April 19th, 2011
On the heals of the last mix, which was sort of modern classical, comes another neo-classical type mix.
I started collecting tunes for this mix after I heard Alva Noto's "Argonaut Version" in a Quiet Sounds mix. I like that song & wanted it to find a home in a mix.
Speaking of Quiet Sounds, there are some excellent mixes available for download there. I wish Brian would crank them out more often.
I stole the title for this mix from a song by The Tumbled Sea, which is next to last in the mix. It just sounded like a good title & it fit with the crappy weather we've been having here.
The mix ends with a sort syrupy tune from Anthony Phillips. It may be a bit too sweet but it's one of those tunes that I have always liked, goes back to college days. i don't know if I was hearing it for the first time now, whether I would like it as much. I'm sure a big part of the song's attraction is it's nostalgic significance. Anthony Phillips is the original guitarist for Genesis and back in high school & college I was a HUGE Genesis fan. Actually I still am, but that was how I came to Phillips' music back then. It was nice to sneak that track into a mix.
Make some tea or coffee & enjoy "songs for staying in".
T R A C K L I S T :
April 2nd, 2011
I love soundtracks. And if you look at the tracklist for this mix, you'll see that I have a few favorite composers.
At the top of that list are Clint Mansell & Cliff Martinez. They are responsible for two of my favorite soundtracks, The Fountain & Solaris.
Jon Hopkins, a new composer on the soundtrack scene, could soon join those two as a favorite. His soundtrack for the movie Monsters, got a lot of play here. I ended up using three tracks from that album in this mix, I just couldn't resist.
Actually I doubled up a few artists in this mix, Martinez, Hopkins, Sigur Ros, Nick & Warren Ellis, Underworld. Normally I don't like to do that but it just sort of happened that way. This is a relatively short mix but I think it works. Sometimes I don't make it to the end of some mixes, this way hopefully listeners are still in to it & focused at the end.
Enjoy this "undiscovered soundtrack".
T R A C K L I S T :
- 00:00 Clint Mansell - Winter Ghosts of a Future (Requiem for a Dream)
- 01:45 Jon Hopkins - Candles (Monsters)
- 03:35 Cliff Martinez - And We're Here to Listen (Traffic)
- 05:15 Thomas Newman - Still Dead (American Beauty)
- 07:55 Nick Cave & Warren Ellis - The Road (The Road)
- 11:30 Underworld & John Murphy - Searle Finds the Crew of Icarus (Sunshine)
- 12:20 Explosions in the Sky - An Ugly Fact of Life (Friday Nigh Lights)
- 14:10 Sigur Ros - síðasta ferð (hlemmur)
- 16:33 Craig Armstrong - Main Theme (The Clearing)
- 17:40 Ennio Morricone - Tema di Ali (The Battle of Algiers)
- 21:32 John Zorn - Family Found(cello) (Family Found(Filmworks XII))
- 23:50 Nick Cave & Warren Ellis - Micro Sucker (White Lunar)
- 24:25 Underworld - Capa's Last Transmission Home (Sunshine)
- 26:10 Sigur Ros - fyrsta ferð (hlemmur)
- 28:25 Hilmar Hilmarsson - I Flew (Angels of the Universe)
- 30:25 Cliff Martinez - First Drive Home (First Snow)
- 30:50 Jon Hopkins - Water (Monsters)
- 31:55 James Newton Howard - I'm Sorry (I am Legend)
- 33:50 Jon Hopkins - Campfire (Monsters)
- 36:11 end
March 11th, 2011
I am very excited to present this next mix. It's a guest mix by longtime listener/downloader, Ron Sylvester.
Ron was the inspiration for a couple of my mixes that used old 78rpm recordings as a basis for the mixes "Sustain & Decay" and "Revenants of the Past". Ron sent me some mix cd's which I really enjoyed & I told him he really should do a proper mix someday.
Well I am delighted that Ron has allowed me to present his first mix here for everyone to enjoy. I'll let Ron describe the mix...
"A week or so ago I stumbled upon the album Salicornie Areavirus by Enrico Coniglio; his website says the album is meant to be a sort of ‘collection of "sound tales" dedicated to Venice’. I thought I recognized his name from somewhere, and back-tracked it to a Lost Children netlabel release featuring Italian artists entitled Underwater Noises, which had been curated by Coniglio. Two other Lost Children Releases featuring Italian artists, Con Fuoco d'Occhi un Nostalgico Lupo volumes I and II, gave me most of what I needed to complete the mix. I finished it off with work by Ulises Conti, Lodovico Einaudi, Paolo Fresu, a Sub Rosa compilation of ritual music entitled Illuminated, and a handful of ambience from Soundtransit and the storehouse of opera 78s at archive.org.
Anyhow, for me this mix is simply entitled Venice, though the musicians are not necessarily from Venice, nor are the field recordings strictly from Venice. Apart from Nguen Le, who is playing with Paolo Fresu (who is Sardinian), I think all the artists or field recording locales are at least Italian. Actually, now that I think of it, the recordings from Illuminated are not necessarily Italian. Catholic, though; that’s something. At any rate, and as usual, the mix is more about a sort of Venetian feeling: canals, Carnevale, the Grand Lagoon, a certain slow sinking. I’ve never been to Venice, though, so what do I know about it?
I was really taken by Enrico Coniglio’s album and it sort of got this mix started. Here’s his website, but as in all things ambient, you are probably way ahead of me on this:
http://www.enricoconiglio.com/
Here are the links for the Lost Children compilations:
http://www.archive.org/details/Lc-eph01UnderwaterNoises
http://www.archive.org/details/TheSilentBallet-ItalianCompilation-ConFuocoDocchiUnNostalgico
http://www.archive.org/details/TheSilentBallet-ItalianCompilation-ConFuocoDocchiUnNostalgico_90
Ron says "The track list is as follows; some editing of tracks has been done in the mix, and I processed the bejeezus out of La Traviata. There’s a lot of overlap in this mix."
T R A C K L I S T :
- 00:00 venice canal - derek holzer [soundtransit]
- 00:12 salicornie - enrico coniglio
- 03:10 bells in Fiesole - thomas andre [soundtransit]
- 03.13 chioma - obsil
- 03:57 excerpt from la traviata - lucrezia bori
- 04: 02 tocco libero - tiziano milani
- 07:14 alpen tower - enrico coniglio
- 12:35 pagetos - francesco giannico / luca mauri / matteo uggeri
- 19:15 hopeless - passo uno
- 26:15 medio evo tecnologico - folk cinema [soundtransit]
- 26:45 restless - ornitology
- 26:47 in prinicipio - unknown from illuminated
- 27:12 gloria - unknown from illuminated
- 32:18 girl from murania - enrico coniglio
- 37:00 half water - allessio ballerini
- 40:20 el dolor implicito de la belleza - ulises conti
- 43:15 palermo without hands - folk cinema [soundtransit]
- 44:00 fish market ambience - palix [soundtransit]
- 44: 05 andare - lodovico einaudi
- 50:50 salicornie (reprise) - enrico coniglio
- 54:50 hydrocoma - un vortice di bassa pressione
- 55:45 lacrima christi - paolo fresu and nguen le
- 56:10 night sea - marco caorle
- 58:45 venice canal (reprise) - derek holzer
December 31st, 2010
This last mix of 2010 is a mix that I did for Headphone Commute about 3 months ago. They were kind enough to ask for a mix & I was honored to add it to their great collection of mixes they post at their own site & at their Mixcloud site.
I realized that if I was going to post this piano mix I'd better do it now because the title is "pno 2010" so I need to squeeze it into 2010 before it's gone.
This mix starts with John Cage – “On a Landscape”, which is appropriate, because that tune is the reason I did this piano mix. I’d never heard “In a Landscape” when a friend linked to it on youtube. What a great piece of music. So I decided to build a piano mix with that as the jumping off point.
The other unusual piece in this mix is Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guébrou – “Golgotha” by an Ethiopian nun living in Jerusalem. Her music is unique, it filters the traditional Ethiopian pentatonic scale through classical technique– in the end sounding like impressionistic jazz. Wonderful music.
T R A C K L I S T :
- [00:00] John Cage – In a Landscape
- [04:15] Kyo Ichinose – Engine #5
- [05:20] Worrytrain – Hospitalized
- [06:45] Max Richter – Infra #6
- [09:35] Nest – The Twelve
- [14:00] Tanner Menard – Laws of Attraction
- [19:50] Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guébrou – Golgotha
- [24:27] Craig Armstrong – Gentle Piece
- [27:10] Ben Woods – Stare Out in Silence
- [32:25] Gavin Bryars – My First Homage
- [38:10] Kyo Ichinose – Lontano #0
- [40:00] Chris Abrams – Christmas Island
- [44:45] Arovane – Tokyo Ghost Stories
- [49:50] Christian Fennesz & Ryuichi Sakamoto – Kokoro
- [53:15] Andrey Kiritchenko – Agravic Illusion
