Soothing Sounds For Baby: Electronic Music By Raymond Scott, Vol. 1, 1 To 6 Months [IMPORT]

Raymond Scott (Composer)

Product Details

• Composer: Raymond Scott
• Audio CD (December 30, 1997)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Basta Records
• ASIN: B000001YCG
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #41,717 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #29 in	Music > Classical > Instruments > Electronic
  #59 in	Music > Imports > New Age

• This is item 1 in The Soothing Sounds for Baby Series.

Track Listings

1. Lullaby

2. Sleepy Time

3. Music Box

4. Nursery Rhyme

5. Tic Toc

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Alongside apple-cheeked watercolor paintings of infants, the original cover design for the Soothing Sounds series of records bore the charming inscription, "An Infant's Friend in Sound." Composer Harry Warnow was already legendary (as "Raymond Scott") for his whimsical electronic and big-band novelty musics. With this 1962-63 series, Scott turned his astonishing array of invented and modified keyboards and recording techniques toward pure electronic music with an infant-friendly spin. Intended as "aural toys" for the nursery, Soothing Sounds' deceptively simple "tic-tocs" and unthreatening seesaw melodies play on the calming properties of repetition--much like music boxes, Fisher-Price's mobiles, and the comforting "Again!" video mentality of the Teletubbies. Despite endorsement from the Gesell Institute of Child Development, the records sold poorly. But they had a curious afterlife, prefiguring such "adult" descendents as ambient music ("invented" by Brian Eno in 1975) and the mechanical pop-tronic textures of Kraftwerk and Gary Numan. --Gil Gershman

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The worlds first 'ambient' synthesizer record, August 12, 2000

By	TUCO H. "H. TUCO" (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

Here's something to annoy your infant with. If you let your infant listen to this he's likely to think he's on another planet. Not that he knows what this planet is all about . Your job is to confuse him even more; make it hard for him to learn how to cope with the snot-nose Disney brats he's likely to meet in nursery school. This will make him a rebel of sorts in the future and unfit for the traditional type of what is called a `job.' This will be the basis of all his future happiness. Think of it as a sort of vaccination against all the bad music he's likely to hear in the future. All us grown infants who could use a bit of infant wonder back in our heads also very much dig this music. It's great stuff. In fact, I prefer this to the two ENO discs I have which tend to make things a little too lethargic. This puts you in a relaxed but demented zone, not too far from the Twilight Zone. It sounds like a PONG gone surreally melodic. This is what you put on in the background when you're ready to read `War and Peace.'

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars my baby loves it (no joking!), November 4, 2001

By	R. Delapp (Columbus, OH USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I bought this album for my six week old baby girl, hoping to find a Kraftwerk for infants. And while i have't been disappointed in the least i am actually quite surprised that she likes it as much as she does. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that my girlfriend listened to Computerwelt incessently back when that little tyke was still swimming around in the womb. Still though, some of these songs seem anything but soothing to me. One song in particular sounds like it has a alarm clock blaring continuously throughout its ten minute running time. But what did my baby do but sleep soundly through it. You may object and say that a baby that age, when asleep, would slumber through anything. But i have put this on in the middle of screaming fits and it calms her right down. We love it! Raymond Scott makes me proud to be a parent! I just can't wait now until she is old enough to appreciate Bruce Haack.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The World's First 'Ambient Electronic' albums!?, July 21, 1998

By A Customer

Composed & performed by RAYMOND SCOTT on primitive home-built electronic instruments which SCOTT began to design & build in the 1940s. As ambient electronic music, these albums predate -- yet are comparable to; BRIAN ENO/FRIPP, PHILIP GLASS, APHEX TWIN, & KRAFTWERK. The 3 vinyl albums were originally released by Epic & had been out-of-print for over 35 years!