Associate Teaching Professor Doug Bielmeier’s third full-length album release “Ambient Works” builds off the success of his previous releases on SEAMUS, Ravello, and Noisy Buffalo Labels performed internationally and broadcasted nationally: heard by over 100,000 listeners on Drone Zone, Somafm.com. The album was developed through improvisation and studio sessions over the last 15 years in notable spaces: The Electroacoustic Studios at Bowling Green University, OH; the C.L.E.A.R. Lab at the Purdue School of Engineering, IN; Studio A in Washington, DC; Studio B at MTSU, Nashville, TN; and our own Shillman Studios at Northeastern University, Boston.
Ambient Works serves as a musical travelogue of experiments in the world of electroacoustic, ambient, and experimental music. Each piece serves to punctuate Bielmeier’s eclectic industry and academic career path, with his current destination being Boston, where Bielmeier is currently an associate professor at Northeastern University. This “best of” compilation was carefully curated to create a cohesive and fresh statement revealing the creator’s innovative process of Windowing: the manipulation, layering, and temporal placement of found sound files to create larger sonic landscapes. The album expands the ethos of commercial ambient music in tracks like “Another Pilot Down” and “No Time,” while extending the definition of a soundwalk piece in tracks such as “Photo Lab Sanctuary” and “Manumed.” The album is rounded out by a fresh take on a Schaefferian sound object montage in “St. Martin’s Summer.” Bielmeier explains, “The album reveals the context and emotion often missing in modern computer and electroacoustic music.”