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


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