Why did Easy Listening die?

[JSngry]

  On 2/20/2023 at 2:04 PM, Rabshakeh said:

But it's pretty hard to think of a non-vocal orchestrated version of, say, the Beatles, that isn't substantially worse than the Beatles.

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I find that The Hollyridge Strings records have an ineffable air of peppiness that I continue to enjoy. 

[Teasing the Korean]

  On 2/20/2023 at 2:04 PM, Rabshakeh said:

I think that disappears once popular music hits the rock/soul/funk era. Orchestration tends to remove the perceived spontenaity and energy that is what makes those genres work, so you'd have to be very careful or inspired to make orchestrated pop come off as something other than watered down in those contexts.

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Oh, there was lots of great orchestral rock/soul/funk stuff from the late 1960s/early 70s.  It was great chill-out music, and there were usually no vocals to distract.  Johnny Harris's Movements album is one great example, and based on second-hand prices, I must not be alone in this assessment.  I would also highly recommend Percy Faith's Black Magic Woman album.

I would add that a huge amount of this kind of thing was going on in film and TV scoring from the late 1960s and early 1970s, particularly in films with an urban setting.  Some of those film score albums by the likes of Roy Budd, Lalo Schifrin, Oliver Nelson, Dave Grusin, Pat Williams, Quincy Jones, Jerry Fielding, Billy Goldenberg, Piero Piccioni, Piero Umiliani, are masterpieces of orchestral/funk fusion.

Edited February 20, 2023 by Teasing the Korean

[Teasing the Korean]

May I present Henry Mancini's update of his classic "Lujon," a.k.a. "Slow Hot Wind," as arranged for his 1975 LP Symphonic Soul.  When the strings come in at the second bridge, it is positively orgasmic.

 

Edited February 20, 2023 by Teasing the Korean

[Teasing the Korean]

  On 2/20/2023 at 2:37 PM, JSngry said:

I find that The Hollyridge Strings records have an ineffable air of peppiness that I continue to enjoy. 

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This was a favorite from my DJ days:

 

I am obsessed with this track from 1961:  "Image," a pop/orchestral/soul/jazz track, by Hank Levine.

 

[Teasing the Korean]

  On 2/20/2023 at 2:37 PM, JSngry said:

I find that The Hollyridge Strings records have an ineffable air of peppiness that I continue to enjoy. 

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From the other end of the peppiness spectrum comes Stu Phillips's 1965 Capitol album Feels Like Lovin', which sounds as if it may have been intended as a Jackie Gleason album.  It is lugubrious in a most irresistible way.

 

[Rabshakeh]

  On 2/20/2023 at 3:01 PM, Teasing the Korean said:

 

I would add that a huge amount of this kind of thing was going on in film and TV scoring from the late 1960s and early 1970s, particularly in films with an urban setting.  Some of those film score albums by the likes of Roy Budd, Lalo Schifrin, Oliver Nelson, Dave Grusin, Pat Williams, Quincy Jones, Jerry Fielding, Billy Goldenberg, Piero Piccioni, Piero Umiliani, are masterpieces of orchestral/funk fusion.

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You've named some great composer/ arrangers but I hardly think that they are Easy Listening. 

Mod stuff and funk with strings (including so many soundtracks) obviously do create some really good records.

[Teasing the Korean]

  On 2/20/2023 at 6:50 PM, Rabshakeh said:

You've named some great composer/ arrangers but I hardly think that they are Easy Listening. 

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Well, therein lies the problem with the phrase.  If a jazz artist does an easy listening album, is it not an easy listening album?  Lots of names associated with easy listening came from the worlds of classical, big bands, jazz etc.  And many of them were not thinking in terms of genre, unless it was a work made for hire with certain parameters.  They were simply trying to write nice arrangements.  There was an awful lot of crossover between genres during that time.  I think that when "easy listening" is used to describe the schmaltzy or corny orchestral music of that era, the better artists either get lumped in and dismissed, or overlooked.  An album like Les Baxter's The Passions is in a completely different universe from Mantovani.  

[JSngry]

Pizzicato easy-listening strings drenched in reverb are certainly psychedelic. 

[Teasing the Korean]

  On 2/20/2023 at 8:22 PM, JSngry said:

Pizzicato easy-listening strings drenched in reverb are certainly psychedelic. 

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Check out the tape delay on the pizzicato strings and snare drum!