Electronic Music: The History And History Of Electronic Music

If you're wondering, “what exactly is electronic music?” we can answer that question for you here, and give you examples, too. Electronic music has a general meaning that covers sounds and tones used by the instrument itself like the electric guitar, but there are specific genres that manipulate music with electronic devices. That's quite different than using electricity or electronics in an instrument to produce tones. One is used for creating while another is used for manipulation.

History of Electronic Music

Electronic devices were developed around the end of the 19th century when people began to use magnetic audio tape to record sounds. Once sounds could be recorded, they could be manipulated. As musicians across the world began to experiment

It was the first concert, but not the last. Finally after a few concerts in NYC, they were invited to demonstrate their compositions on NBC's Today Show. That was the first televised electronic performance.

Very Early Days

Around the same time, live electronics spread throughout Europe, Asia, and the U.S. Japan especially was big into electronic music with instruments they developed for the music industry specifically. Across the world, different electronic music genres started to emerge. Some are still in existence today in their same origination while others morphed into new types of music completely.

Genres of Electronic Music

These are some of the original genres of electronic music. There's experimental music and avant-garde as well as pure computer music that doesn't necessarily fit into one particular box of music. This is a type of music that is moving fluidly based on the technology brought to the industry from computers.

Ambient

Krautrock

Hip hop

New age

New wave

Neo soul

From there came MIDI technology with software and computer programming. Each advance in technology brought about a new way to manipulate sound to create music. When we talk about music today, it's hard to find any genre that doesn't include some aspect of sound manipulation, but it's not all considered electronic music.

Electronic Music Today

It's difficult to pin down music into one genre when the basics of the music is constantly changing. Is it experimental when the musician is trying new things, and being creatively challenged to provide electronic music that hasn't been heard before while mixing it with melodies? Every musician wants to push the boundaries and come up with original music that people will love. Even DJs are using electronics and sound to produce music nobody has heard before.

We invite you to listen to some indie artists who are pushing the boundaries of what's considered electronic music. Whether it's melodic trance, classic house, classic deep house, or acid.