1960-1963India / New York City, United States

Drone

A concise genre entry that keeps drone grounded in documented roots: Indian sustained-tone practice, 1960s New York experimentalism, and later rock/ambient spillover.

Origins and context

The term draws on long-held sustained tones in Indian classical music and on the 1960s New York experimental scene associated with La Monte Young and related avant-garde artists.

IndiaNew York City, United States

History

Drone music has deep roots in older musical traditions, especially in Indian classical music, where sustained tonic support from instruments such as the tanpura creates a continuous sonic bed. In the 1960s, the idea took on a modern experimental life in New York’s avant-garde scene, where La Monte Young and his circle explored extended duration and electronically produced drones; his own artist page describes his work as central to the development of just intonation, rational-number tuning, and long-form drone-based performance. From there, drone spread into rock and experimental music. The Velvet Underground’s official and Apple Music pages both point to the group’s New York origins and the way John Cale’s minimalist, sustained tones helped shape the band’s early sound; later writing on the band repeatedly treats that drone-inflected texture as one of their major legacies.