You might think of the final playlist in our Ambient 101 series as a catch-all: Here weve gathered everything that didnt fit in another category, such as Hiroshi Yoshimuras wonderful Music for Nine Post Cards. (In an ideal world, wed have an entire playlist dedicated to Japanese ambient and environmental music, and another one for Italian artists like Giusto Pio, but sadly, little of either genre is available on Spotify.) Here, too, weve put the American-primitive guitarist Chuck Johnsons ethereal Balsams and the modular-synth sound-sculptor Emily A. Spragues Water Memory. But as the songs came together, a theme suggested itself: a buoyant, rosy sort of bliss, the kind promised by new age but without the spiritual trappings. Its a playlist for Sunday mornings with coffee, for early morning on the river, for being in the moment or being outside the moment entirely. It goes to the heart of ambient musics simple pleasures.
