Karl Jenkins & Mike Ratledge

[Trane]

Actually, it was originally released as a DeWolfe library music album without his name on the cover! A SURPRISING number of British musicians went this route in the '70s -- Neil Ardley, Ron Geesin, Darryl Way, John Mealing, Richard Harvey, Brian Gulland Chris Spedding, John Leach, Chris Blackwell, Martin Cook, Ian Boddy, Erik Wøllo, Andy Clarke, etc. It was easy money up front I guess.

Some I wasn't aware (Way & Spedding for ex), but I'm surprised Ant Phillips wasn't on your list
From the few examples I tried, I found no thrills in library music all borrowed from my library system ), even from musos I respected highlly

I still have ALL my Urban Sax albums except this one - I think they are tremendous. That's why I went through the trouble and expensive of buying this library music thingy for my personal collection 30 years ago from France, without the benefit of hearing it first....

oh well! can't win them all!

I tried a couple of Urban Sax because of Gilbert Artman (Lard Free), but for some reasons it didn't hit the spot back then.
Tipme to reinvestigate soon, I suppose, but I fail to see or class that as "Library Music"... Or am I missing something here?

I like their Adiemus albums for a while, then it got boring real quick and that was that.

shiiiiit, while I loved what Jenfkins did with Nucleus and Softs, I can't stand any of the stuff he's done since...

not that I can't suffer it, but a total snoozefest to my ears.

[Yeswave]

“while I loved what Jenfkins did with Nucleus and Softs, I can't stand any of the stuff he's done since”

A lot of people love it and he seems to be the saviour of modern classical composition in the UK. I like to think he gets the clarinet out occasionally and plays along to some of the old tunes.

[Steve F.]

He has been totally nice and helpful and accomodating about all the archival things of ours that he's been involved with [Nucleus, Graham Collier, Soft Machine] for which I am very grateful.

[Trane]

A lot of people love it and he seems to be the saviour of modern classical composition in the UK. I like to think he gets the clarinet out occasionally and plays along to some of the old tunes.

Well, maybe I was too harsh on the Adiemus stuff, but I find it soporific, to the same extent I find Wim Mertens a snoozefest as well (sorry Renate)

I hear Rondo Veniziano did a lot of good for classical music as well

He has been totally nice and helpful and accomodating about all the archival things of ours that he's been involved with [Nucleus, Graham Collier, Soft Machine] for which I am very grateful.

I've no doubt about it, but how did he have access to recorded material (masters or others) when the bosses were Ian Carr, Graham Collier and Hopper/Ratledge and ownership issues ?

[Steve F.]

I've no doubt about it, but how did he have access to recorded material (masters or others) when the bosses were Ian Carr, Graham Collier and Hopper/Ratledge and ownership issues ?

He didn't have ownership of anything other than as part of the Soft Machine partnership, but he (along with everyone else) had to say ok to everything we did, except for Collier, where I only dealt with Collier.

[Trane]

He didn't have ownership of anything other than as part of the Soft Machine partnership, but he (along with everyone else) had to say ok to everything we did, except for Collier, where I only dealt with Collier.

That's more or less what I figured (especially for Collier), so thanks for confirming.

[Progbear]

Well, maybe I was too harsh on the Adiemùus stuff, but I find it soporific, to the same extent I find Wim Mertens a snoozefest as well (sorry Renate)

I personally find pretty much everything Karl Jenkins was involved with to be a snoozefest. I guess Nucleus are a little too “straight jazz” for my tastes, and I thought SM were already on a downward spiral by the time he joined up.

I hear Riondo Veniziano did a lot of good for classical music as well

The animated music video for “La serenissima” [sadly] has a little bit of resonance with contemporary events:

[rcarlberg]

Looks like there are several other library music releases I need to seek out. Of the ones I found yesterday, at least one, "The Ancient World," is a fully-developed fully produced, and equally valid solo album. All of the others have at least a couple of tracks that redeem them.

I have searched through all 48 "library music" releases by Dirk or with tracks by Dirk on them, and a handful of them are not worthy of further attention -- short sketches or music cues which really don't stand-up on their own as "compositions." Most of the rest are a very welcome addition to my Kampbell Kollection™.

Karl Jenkins OTOH... he also has a number of library music releases. I've yet to find anything on any of them -- "Rubber Riff excepted" -- worth burning to CD.

[Udi Koomran]

https://mikeratledge.bandcamp.com/releases

[rcarlberg]

Wow. Even further removed from SM than Karl Jenkins. This stuff sounds like Terry Riley!

[Trane]

Wow. Even further removed from SM than Karl Jenkins. This stuff sounds like Terry Riley!

Ratledge allways had minimalism in him and I believe he looked up to Riley
This bandcamp album (apparrently recorded in 77) makes me think of thie first and last parts of Out-Bloody-Rageous on Third

[Udi Koomran]

Ratledge allways had minimalism in him and I believe he looked up to Riley
This bandcamp album (apparrently recorded in 77) makes me think of thie first and last parts of Out-Bloody-Rageous on Third

And Soft Weed Factor

[arturs]

https://mikeratledge.bandcamp.com/releases

Wow x 2! Where did this come from??! In all my years of Softs/Ratledge fandom and completism, I have never once heard of this. And it's good, too. Really good.

Someone on the Bandcamp site posted that this is the birth of Boards of Canada. That isn't a stretch.

[Zeuhlmate]

And Soft Weed Factor

[rcarlberg]

What's this Kalamus - "Bronze"? I don't see any other references to it online, except that Mont describes it as "mostly flute and bagpipe, with some percussion." Never heard of it before.

Just about the ONLY reference to this is by Dirk on his own website, and the cover image there (200 pixels square) is the *only* one online.


So I wrote to him (at dirkcampbell.co.uk) and he sold me the tracks (and a better cover image) for £15. If you enjoy the music in the video posted above (#19) by Walt -- as I do! -- you would find "Bronze" to be in the same universe. Dirk indicated the CD (2011) is long out of print, long out of stock, and long out of circulation so probably the only way to get it is from him.

[Dave (in MA)]

It never hurts to ask. I once contacted a fairly well-known not-to-be-named artist's (not exactly famous, but probably about as famous as Mont) site and mentioned that I was having trouble buying a listed download from their site and he e-mailed me back Cc:ing the webmaster with instructions to send me the download code and not to charge me anything. He might be on here, so I won't identify him. I subsequently bought quite a few other items there.

[rcarlberg]

These days, even extremely well-known musicians (viz. Peter Gabriel and Rick Wakeman) are finding peer-to-peer file sharing services viable.