Urizen music

The Music of Urizen

Style summary

The Urizen musical tradition mirrors their tranquil, philosophical approach to life. More in meditation than performance, traditional Urizen musicians gather to improvise fluid, shifting melodies and harmonies around a series of repetitive themes, usually choosing a concept such as 'tranquility', 'hope' or 'grief' around which to base their compositions. They favour picked strings, tuned percussion and light, breathy woodwind, though any instrument can be played as part of the soundscape.

Real world inspiration includes gamelan, minimalists such as Phillip Glass and Ludivico Ianoudi, Vangelis and Mike Oldfield, though with acoustic rather than electric instruments.

A musical tradition

Urizen does not have a popular concert tradition. However improvised musical themes are sometimes included in philosophical meditation sessions or magical rituals with the magician either playing or surrounding herself with players if she is not a musician, in order to focus the mind and senses on the task at hand.

Further examples

Songs

Urizen does not have its own song tradition, although bards will happily purloin the songs of other nations to sing in bars and around campfires. See Music for songs known throughout the Empire.

Children still sing songs and nursery rhymes, such as the following: Hungry Goat

Instrumentation

Bells, glockenspiels, Hand pans, hammer dulcimer, soft pipes, long notes from bowed instruments or drone instruments such as singing bowls or wine glasses.

Other performance traditions

Performers in Urizen more commonly recite poetry than sing. There is more information about Urizen art here.

How to adapt your repertoire

• Take any tune and repeat a phrase over and over, allowing others to improvise around it.

Our sources

Any gamelan, Philip Glass and other minimalists but preferably played on tuned percussion, Michael Nyman.

Here is a youtube playlist of appropriate or inspiring music for Urizen.