Brian Eno is MORE DARK THAN SHARK

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The Financial Times DECEMBER 29, 2016 - by Ludovic Hunter-Tilney

BRIAN ENO: REFLECTION

A series of musical algorithms is triggered to produce constantly unfolding patterns of sounds

Brian Eno's new piece of ambient music, the latest in a series dating back to the 1970s, continues his experiments with generative composition.

A series of musical algorithms made with musician and software designer Peter Chilvers is triggered to produce constantly unfolding patterns of sounds. The app version of Reflection goes on forever, or as long as you keep your computer switched on.

The album recording is limited to one of the many possible permutations of notes that the algorithms might produce, a fifty-four-minute passage of music whose shimmering, contemplative grace perfectly suits its arrival on the first day of the year.

Electronic chimes and drones slowly fade towards silence; muted tinkling resonates like the sounds of distant activities; unhurried movements up and down the scale resemble the gentle thought processes of a musical brain. It is regenerative in a deeper sense than the composing method. The listener is given space to think and feel, a pause before the world starts up again.