"Exploring the Library" - A look at Anthony Phillips' library music by Neil Warwick. Illustrations: TWR Archive.
Many years ago I picked up an an album of library music called “Electronic Music”. I only had a passing interest in library music but the inclusion of a couple of famous names on the album intrigued me: particularly names like Geoff Downes and Anthony Phillips.
Though undated, the album sounded like it was from the late 1970’s or the very early 1980’s and as I already knew albums by Anthony Phillips such as The Geese & The Ghost I was hoping for more of his exquisite compositions.
It turned out that Ant’s pieces were thin, atmospheric works, obviously intended as atmospheres for TV documentaries and the like, and the album went on to my “for sale” pile. Luckily it never got sold!
Time fast forwards to a year or so ago when I spotted Alan Hewitt’s article about Ant’s library music on a website called The Waiting Room (Who? Us? AH). I had a friend who was registered with eBay and just by chance I spotted a seller who had around fifty CDs for sale on the Atmosphere label. Cross-referencing with Alan’s piece and other sources I found that a number of these discs had Ant’s music on them. I won’t upset anyone by saying how cheaply I got them but for a modest outlay I was suddenly the proud owner of all of them.
Since then I have bought up the majority of the CDs and LPs hat Ant appears on from that first LP (1979? 1980?) To CDs from 2009.
I have started to cross-link these releases with commercially available CDs and though incomplete and prone to the occasional error, I am in a position to list the Atmosphere releases, identifying Ant’s pieces and indicating where they may be found elsewhere. Many tracks have been edited many times to fit the 10 second, 20 second, 30 second and 60 second formats as well as the occasional “sting” - a brief snatch of music of less than 10 seconds’ duration for linking into a commercial break or punctuating the end of a dramatic scene. Sometimes different titles are used, either to disguise the “other life “ that a piece of music may have, or to fit in with an overall theme of a release; many library albums are themed for subjects such as “Sport”, “Leisure”, “Gardening”, “Travel” you name it, there’s a library album somewhere dedicated to that topic.
Atmosphere is not the only label that Ant has recorded for but as his work for that company represents the largest part of his library output I thought that this would be the best place to start. So, for starters, I would like to discuss the L Ps released by Atmosphere. As far as I can tell, they released 25 albums over a period of about seven years but they soon switched to the CD format where they were able to release up to 74 minutes of music on one disc rather than the 40-50 minutes that the LP was able to carry successfully. Of these L Ps I know that five contained Ant’s music. There is possibly a sixth LP ( a Christmas collection no less!) but I have no evidence yet that Ant’s music is on it. However, a subsequent Christmas CD contained arrangements by Ant of “Jingle Bells”, “Deck The Halls” and “Good King Wenceslas” and I have strong suspicions that these pieces also appeared on the Christmas LP (indeed they did - AH). I won’t include the Christmas album in this list.
The albums I know about are as follows:
Electronic Music
ATMOS 001
Abstract Atmospheric.
Also on the Atmosphere CD ATMOS CD 7 (“Soft Science And Deeper Mysteries”)
and on the commercial CD Archive collection Volume 2 with the title “Polar
Lights”.
Ice
Arctic Waste (two versions of this track)
Gliding
Landscape
ATMOS 005
Soft Landscape
Also on the Atmosphere CD ATMOS CD 117 (“English Pastoral”) and on the commercial CD Archive Collection Volume 2 with the title “Boulevard Of Fallen Leaves”
Animal Life
Also on the Atmosphere CD ATMOS CD 4 “Classical Spirit”
Malvern Hills
Also on the Atmosphere CD s ATMOS CD 4 “Classical Spirit”, ATMOS CD 24 “Travelogues 2”, and ATMOS CD 117 “English Pastoral”
Autumn Woods
Moorlands
Bright Guitar Theme
Highland Melody
Also on the Commercial CD Archive Collection Volume 2 with the title “Highland Fling”.
Deeper Mysteries
ATMOS 011
Light Reflection
Also on the Atmosphere CD ATMOS CD 7 “Soft Science And Deeper Mysteries” and on the commercial CD Missing Links Volume 1 Finger Painting with the title “ Between The Rings”.
Time Lapse
Also on the Atmosphere CD ATMOS CD 7 “Soft Science And Deeper Mysteries”
Mirage
Icicles
Caves
Also on the Atmosphere CD ATMOS CD 7 “Soft Science And Deeper Mysteries”
Rapids
Also on the commercial CD Missing Links Volume 1 Finger Painting with the title “Streamer”
New Dawn
Also on the commercial CD Missing Links Volume 1 Finger Painting with the title “Evening Ascent”
Majestic
Also on the Atmosphere CD ATMOS CD 7 “Soft Science And Deeper Mysteries” and on the commercial CD Missing Links Volume 1 “Finger Painting” with the title “Rottweiler”
Around The World
ATMOS 018
Modern China
A version of this appears on the Atmosphere CD ATMOS CD 23 “Travelogues 1” with the title “Land Of Dragons”
Classical Spirit
ATMOS 022
Summit Of Power
Two full performances of this three minute track plus two edits one at 60 seconds and one at 30 seconds. These tracks can be found on the Atmosphere CDs ATMOS CD3 “Short Cuts” and ATMOS CD 4 “Classical Spirit”.
Fascinating stuff, more on this subject next time.