Easy Listening
Easy listening is the light kind of music, which doesn`t require any special attention to the rhythms or melodies. The style is not only a movement, but also listeners` attitude towards it. Easy listening has its own art aesthetics with elements of retro design and French vector graphics.
Birth: 1956 Bloom: 2002
The style emerged in the 1950s when famous musician Henry Manchini has composed a score for the first episodes of «Pink Panter» and many other `50-60s films. Since that press became very interested in easy listening. The biggest record label companies began to beg jazz musicians to record and release their albums. Nowadays, different companies rerelease classical music in the easy listening style. Today we can hear easy listening music as soundtracks to different films such as « From Dusk Till Dawn», «Pulp Fiction», «Four Rooms», «Generation X», «Romeo and Juliet».
The motherland of easy listening is America or Great Britain. The difference between English and American easy listening is as huge as the difference between countries. In England musicians use musical ideas popular in the 60-70s: orchestral arrangements, organs with funk sound, electric guitars, horns. In the USA easy listening belongs to the 50s: themes from spy movies, synthetic rock and roll, swings. This music is suitable for home listening or light Sunday driving.
Our mothers and grandmothers perfectly know easy listening. There were beautiful songs in the easy listening style in the USSR. For example, Гелена Великанова (Gelena Velikanova), Майя Кристалинская (Majja Kristalinskaja), or the hit song «Черный кот» («Chernyj kot»).
Umbrellate style: Downtempo
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