Sunyata (album)

Infobox Album
Name = Sunyata
Type = studio
Longtype =
Artist = Robert Rich


Released = 1982
Recorded = Winter 1981 - 1982
Genre = Ambient
Length = 86:00
Label = Soundscape Productions
Producer = Robert Rich
Reviews = *Allmusic Rating|4|5 [http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:7vmtk6dxtkrh link]
*Piero Scaruffi 6/10 [http://www.scaruffi.com/avant/rich.html link]
Last album =
This album = "Sunyata" (1982)
Next album = "Trances" (1983)
Misc = Extra album cover 2
Upper caption = Alternate cover
Type = studio


Lower caption = CD release, 2000.

"Sunyata" (1982) is the debut album by the American ambient musician Robert Rich. The title refers to the Buddhist concept that all things in the material world are empty of meaning and independence.

This album was recorded during Rich’s studies at Stanford University. Its music is of a slower and more minimal format than most ambient music at that time. With an eighty-six minute running time, it is perhaps the only album to take full advantage of the length of the audio cassette format. The last track on the album is a stormy forty-three minute piece called “Oak Spirit”.

In 1994 the title track, “Sunyata (Emptiness)” was included on the two-disc compilation "Trances/Drones". Because of the length restrictions of the compact disc format, when "Sunyata" was finally released on CD in 2000 this track was omitted.

Track listing

#”Dervish Dreamtime” - 19:00
#”Sunyata (Emptiness)” - 24:00
#”Oak Spirit” - 43:00

ee also

*Robert Rich
*Ambient music
*Shunyata