Dan Gibson's Solitudes - Pianoscapes: The Best of Solitudes (2013)

Solitudes is a brand of music created by Dan Gibson, a Canadian photographer, cinematographer and sound recordist.

During the late 1940s, he took photographs and made nature films, including Audubon Wildlife Theatre. He produced many films and television series. It was through this film-making that Dan learned how to record wildlife sound. He pioneered techniques of recording, and also helped design equipment to optimize results, including the “Dan Gibson Parabolic Microphone”. Some of his early recordings of the 1950s and 1960s were released on LP Records, and start his Solitudes series, which was introduced in 1981. In 1994, Dan was awarded The Order of Canada for his environmental works. In 1997, Dan was awarded the Walt Grealis Special Achievement Award at the Juno Awards ceremony in Hamilton, Ontario.

In 2004, he released his first DVD, Natural Beauty, which was originally shot in High Definition. It is part of the new age genre. Many CDs have been released over the years. The music was originally designed to capture the sounds of various natural environments; sounds common to most albums include the wildlife, noise from swaying vegetation, and streams on water from a certain destination, usually indicated or implied through the theme of the specific album. In the 1990s, instrumental music was integrated into the nature sounds to create a whole new line of albums with thematic elements based on the type of music played and the instruments used.

Tracklist:

01. Literary Walk At Dawn from Central Park 7:42
02. Cascades from Piano Cascades 5:36
03. Calm the Mind from Calm the Mind 6:07
04. The Sound of Silence from Morning Has Broken 4:19
05. Hymn to the Old Growth from Forest Piano 3:10
06. Wood Thrush from Piano Songbirds 4:52
07. Silver Days from Nurturing Rain 7:06
08. Alone But For a Friend from Rhythms of the Sea 6:09
09. Drawn to the Sea from Piano Cove 5:44
10. You Are So Beautiful from Wind Beneath My Wings 4:29
11. Claire de Lune from Piano Cascades 7:13