Environmental
Also known as environmental music, environmental ambient
A softly defined but well-documented corner of ambient music, environmental leans toward natural sounds and designed atmosphere. The strongest historical anchors are early-1970s ambient/new age experimentation in the West and Japan’s later, explicitly named environmental-music scene.
Origins and context
AllMusic places the style’s early development in the 1970s around the naturalistic edge of new age, while the Kankyō Ongaku documentation shows a parallel Japanese environmental-music scene built around music meant to coexist with everyday surroundings.
How to listen
Start here
- Hiroshi Yoshimura’s Music for Nine Post Cards, then the Kankyō Ongaku compilation for broader context.
Listen for
- Listen for quiet motion rather than melody-first writing: small repeating figures, long fades, and the way environmental sounds sit inside the music instead of decorating it from above.
History
The label is most clearly documented as part of the broader ambient and new age wave that took shape in the early 1970s. AllMusic traces environmental music to the naturalistic edge of new age in that period, with later growth in the late 1970s and early 1980s led by figures such as Bernie Krause and his Wild Sanctuary work. A second important strand appears in Japan, where environmental music was used for daily life, shopping, relaxation, and even product contexts. The 1980–1990 scene documented by the Kankyō Ongaku compilation helped give the style a distinct identity: not just atmosphere, but designed atmosphere, made to live alongside ordinary life. Hiroshi Yoshimura is one of the clearest documented names in that lane.
Notable artists
- BKBernie Krause
- HYHiroshi Yoshimura
- DGDan Gibson
Essential listening
- 1
- 2
Explore connected genres
Sources and further reading
- Environmental Music Style Overview
- allmusic.com
The Kankyō Ongaku compilation documents Japanese environmental music made to soundtrack daily living, shopping, relaxation, and product use.
- Hiroshi Yoshimura artist page
- Hiroshi Yoshimura artist page