Ambient music is a genre of music that emphasizes tone and atmosphere over traditional musical structure or rhythm. It is often "peaceful" sounding and lacks composition, beat, and/or structured melody. It uses textural layers of sound that can reward both passive and active listening and encourage a sense of calm or contemplation. The genre is said to evoke an "atmospheric", "visual", or "unobtrusive" quality. Nature soundscapes may be included, and the sounds of acoustic instruments such as the piano, strings and flute may be emulated through a synthesizer.
Elevator music is a type of background music played in elevators, in rooms where many people come together for reasons other than listening to music, and during telephone calls when placed on hold. Before the emergence of the Internet, such music was often "piped" to businesses and homes through telephone lines, private networks or targeted radio broadcasting.
Georges Auric was a French composer, born in Lodève, Hérault, France. He was considered one of Les Six, a group of artists informally associated with Jean Cocteau and Erik Satie. Before he turned 20 he had orchestrated and written incidental music for several ballets and stage productions. He also had a long and distinguished career as a film composer.
Incidental music is music in a play, television program, radio program, video game, or some other presentation form that is not primarily musical. The term is less frequently applied to film music, with such music being referred to instead as the film score or soundtrack.
A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film. The score comprises a number of orchestral, instrumental, or choral pieces called cues, which are timed to begin and end at specific points during the film in order to enhance the dramatic narrative and the emotional impact of the scene in question. Scores are written by one or more composers under the guidance of or in collaboration with the film's director or producer and are then most often performed by an ensemble of musicians – usually including an orchestra or band, instrumental soloists, and choir or vocalists – known as playback singers – and recorded by a sound engineer. The term is less frequently applied to music written for media such as live theatre, television and radio programs, and video games, and said music is typically referred to as either the soundtrack or incidental music.
Muzak is an American brand of background music played in retail stores and other public establishments, and also played at the World Trade Center (1973–2001).
A performance rights organisation (PRO), also known as a performing rights society, provides intermediary functions, particularly collection of royalties, between copyright holders and parties who wish to use copyrighted works publicly in locations such as shopping and dining venues. Legal consumer purchase of works, such as buying CDs from a music store, confer private performance rights. PROs usually only collect royalties when use of a work is incidental to an organisation's purpose. Royalties for works essential to an organisation's purpose, such as theaters and radio, are usually negotiated directly with the rights holder. The interest of the organisations varies: many have the sole focus of musical works, while others may also encompass works and authors for audiovisual, drama, literature, or the visual arts.
Entr'acte means 'between the acts'. It can mean a pause between two parts of a stage production, synonymous to an intermission, but it more often indicates a piece of music performed between acts of a theatrical production.
Music on hold (MOH) is the business practice of playing recorded music to fill the silence that would be heard by telephone callers who have been placed on hold. It is especially common in situations involving customer service.
Furniture music, or in French musique d’ameublement, is background music originally played by live performers. The term was coined by Erik Satie in 1917.
Music licensing is the licensed use of copyrighted music. Music licensing is intended to ensure that the owners of copyrights on musical works are compensated for certain uses of their work. A purchaser has limited rights to use the work without a separate agreement.
Light music is a less-serious form of Western classical music, which originated in the 18th and 19th centuries and continues today. Its heyday was in the mid‑20th century. The style is through-composed, usually shorter orchestral pieces and suites designed to appeal to a wider context and audience than more sophisticated forms such as the concerto, the symphony and the opera.
John White was an English experimental composer and musical performer. He invented the early British form of minimalism known as systems music, with his early Machines.
Mood Media North America is a commercial music company and a wholly owned subsidiary of Mood Media Corporation. Founded in 1999 as a small business unit (SBU) of the now defunct MP3.com, Trusonic provided background music to businesses. During the shutdown of MP3.com, Trusonic Inc, a new corporation co-founded by Joe Tebo and Dan O'Neill purchased the assets (technology/IP/etc) of the Trusonic business unit including the rights to the majority of the MP3.com independent artist catalog. In October 2007 Trusonic Inc was acquired by Fluid Media Networks. Fluid Media Networks acquired Mood Media in 2010 and Trusonic Inc changed its name to Mood Media North America in 2011. The Trusonic brand remains as the name of the primary Technology Trusonic Media Player in use today.
Production music is recorded music that can be licensed to customers for use in film, television, radio and other media. Often, the music is produced and owned by production music libraries.
Raphael is an American musician and composer of ambient music.
Nicholas Perito was an American Hollywood composer and arranger and, for 40 years, the closest collaborator of singer Perry Como.
The Cinq grimaces pour Le songe d'une nuit d'été is a set of incidental music pieces for orchestra by Erik Satie. Composed in 1915 for a planned circus-style staging of Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream, it marked the composer's first collaboration with author Jean Cocteau. The production failed to materialize and Satie's music went unperformed in his lifetime. His score was published posthumously in 1929.
The Galerie Barbazanges was an art gallery in Paris that exhibited contemporary art between 1911 and 1928. The building was owned by a wealthy fashion designer, Paul Poiret, and the gallery was used for Poiret's "Salon d'Antin" exhibitions. The gallery showed the work of avant-garde artists such as Picasso, Modigliani, Gauguin, Matisse, Chagall, and Dufy.
MTI Digital is a provider of in-store music, advertising, digital signage, and on-hold messaging and hold music for retail stores, supermarkets, convenience stores, and restaurants in the United States and Canada.
