18 thoughts on “New Music From Lisa Bella Donna, ‘Dawn Of A New Age’”

1. great, as always.

2. Part of me really wants to do a crazy modular setup, but damn I hate not having patch memory… but at the same time it seems so inspiring? I had some semi-modulars before, but now I am back to using a Push 3 Standalone which is awesome.

3. I am sure I am in the minority when I say I do not understand these arrangements. When you start with one of her songs, it is a specific sequenced note, then a drum pattern is added, and both do not change for the duration of the song. No key changes, no modulations, no actual melodies. Just fiddling around over patterns. It’s not music, certainly sounds variations, but to me I cannot fathom listening to it in an entire evening performance

   1. Joseph

      You’re a musician with two followers on your Youtube channel:

      https://www.youtube.com/@ODMUSICMAN64

      You might want to expand your musical knowledge and tastes so that you can understand why people listen to music.

      1. Oh wow! Wicked Burn. And you are right. A little more than fiddlin’ goin’ on here. Lisa rocks!

      2. This is just an ad hominem attack. I would like to hear someone dispute this, with facts & examples:
         “It is a specific sequenced note, then a drum pattern is added, and both do not change for the duration of the song. No key changes, no modulations, no actual melodies.”

         I find this true of the majority of electronic music, especially modular/semi-modular. Personally, I couldn’t care less about how much of it is done live, though; I care about a well-crafted song/composition that has a clear sense of direction, harmonic interest, unity and coherence, variety and contrast, effective use of tension and release, and movement with convincing transitions, as well as saying something new and interesting.

         Her music doesn’t need my approval to exist; it’s not for me, but I did listen to this and I’ve heard about half a dozen of her other works. Joseph’s is a factual argument, though, backed up here by someone with both a bachelor’s and master’s in music, the latter in music composition (electronic emphasis, at that).

         1. Not weird to see someone who studies music so hard be so locked inside boxes.
            Music can be 2 hits of a drum repeated for 2 hours. Just like Joseph’s argument, music is free.

   2. I don’t know a whole lot, but I believe the genre is called Berlin School

   3. My experience of seeing Lisa play live includes key changes, modulations and melody. Sequences, live playing, live control of arpeggiators. Maybe you’re in the minority but that’s ok. There’s no law which says we have to like everything. You might be missing out though which is a shame.

   4. You were right about one thing at least.

4. It almost seems as if, I don’t even mean Stockausen, but even Aphex Twin or even Kraftwerk never existed. It’s a festival of banalities. Plus, all this focus on the “instrument,” as if that were enough to justify the music.

   1. Lisa is a highly skilled musician and synthesist who listens mainly to 70s prog rock, jazz fusion, and heavy metal. I don’t think I’ve ever seen or heard her mention the more avant-garde end of synth music, though she has released a few things that sounds more like Eliane Radigue than Tangerine Dream.

      You can argue that the music she makes isn’t breaking new ground, but I don’t think that’s the point any more than it would be with yet another recording of classical music or a band of 20-somethings who make garage rock, post punk, or shoegaze, or perhaps electronic musicians making house or techno that sounds like something released 30 years ago.

      Sometime music is just nice to listen to.

   2. Sounds like you’re interested in novelty, over mastery.

      For most of us, music is not a race to be the first to do something weird and avant garde, but its about having listening experiences that take you some place.

      I go to a lot of live jazz shows, because a good jazz show keeps you on the edge of your seat, even if they are using a 60 year-old template, because they are improvising in the moment.

5. > Sometimes music is just nice to listen to.

   Dylan for the win! I enjoy Lisa’s work for its own sake. She takes her tangents, but she’s holding up the Berlin banner like Kebu and others. Its a natural part of a synthesizer’s language.

   1. ^ this 100%.

      I’ve seen electronic music evolve from being futuristic in the ’60s and ’70s, to now having styles that are very retro-focused. I loved when electronic music was the sound of the future, but also love the sort of ‘retro future’ that bands like BoC explores.

      Bella Donna deserves credit for being one of the people pioneering real-time composition with synths. Her style is definitely influence by the classic ’70s synth pioneers, but it was extremely rare for those artists to release albums of live improvisation. Suzanne Ciani may be a rare exception.

      But groups like Tangerine Dream and Jean-Michel Jarre were sort of notorious for faking it live, in those days, and releasing ‘live’ recordings that were studio creations.

      Bella Donna is doing it 100% live, and at a very high level. The current Tangerine Dream lineup is regularly doing this, too.

      It’s not the same as what the pioneers of the 70s were doing, but I think it’s just as ambitious and worthy of attention.

6. Her music is always so good

   1. “plays 100% live” – well, this is not true – she clearly plays over pre-programmed sequences and drum-patterns, which do all the heavy lifting. While not 100% live, its just 100% advertisement for Moog – just watch how the camera goes over the controls of the keyboard. and of course the branding of the video itself. If anything, the music is overloaded with all kinds of gimmicks to show-off the setup.

      1. PS: if you like this style of music, I can recommend Mrs. Bella Donna’s album “Appalachian Wilderness”, which is one of my favorites.