Twenty Fascinating One-Instrument Albums
(Here are twenty albums composed around a single instrument—sometimes processed, sometimes not; sometimes performed by a lone musician, sometimes several—in alphabetical order alphabetically by instrument.)
acoustic guitar: Live Book by Andy McKee
beat box: 10th Anniversary by Incredibox
classical guitar with electronic processing: Bachanalia by Patrick Higgins
drums: Hái! (Náma) by The Creatures
empty samplers: Nothing by System Error
hammered dulcimer: Songs from the Orchard by Ted Yoder
hyper(sonal) piano: Personal Piano by Morten Qvenild
modular synthesizer: Traditional Synthesizer Music by Venetian Snares
Moog synthesizer: Country Moog by Gil Trythall
music box: Colleen et les boîtes à musique by Colleen
percussion: Music for Percussion by Ryoji Ikeda*
piano: Playing the Piano by Ryuichi Sakamoto
piano processed through 1-bit electronics: Tristan Perich: Surface Image by Vicky Chow
pig: One Pig by Matthew Herbert
spoken word, transformed through resonance and repetition: I Am Sitting in a Room by Alvin Lucier
stalacpipe organ (i.e. stalactites played with rubber mallets): Midnight in the Caverns by Monte Maxwell
viola: J.S. Bach, Six Suites for Viola Solo by Kim Kashkashian
voice, sampled and manipulated: Fountain by Lyra Pramuk
washing machine: Ultimate Care II by Matmos
wooden simantras (aka 2x4s): Michael Gordon: Timber by Slagwerk Den Haag
* each of this album’s four movements features a different percussion instrument: handclaps, triangles, crotales, and cymbals
— December 5, 2020