[CP 142 CD] Jean-Jacques Perrey; Prelude au Sommeil

Timely Creel Pone of this incredible 1957 “Institutional Issue” LP (literally, pressed by a French “Sleep Institute” and given out to hospitals - mental & otherwise - to aid in their patients’ acquisition of sleep) featuring two “takes” of a piece composed & performed by Jean-Jacques Perrey, consisting of lulling Ondioline (George Jenny’s 1941 vacuum-tube based, spring-loaded electronic instrument) figures.

Aside from being Perrey’s first issued solo recording (he debuted as a sideman, on the same instrument, in 1951, on Charles Trenet’s “Song of the Poets,”) this is remarkable on a number of levels - namely that Perrey appears to have single-handedly invented Ambient Electronic Music (in that the intended purpose is to elicit an alpha-state) in 1957.

This Creel Pone issue (which replicates the “spec” of the often sleeve-less record on a nice pearlized booklet) issues both side-length “takes” of the piece. It’s a major revelation whose existence essentially rewrites the chronology of “Electronic Pop Music.”