New Age Music World

If one takes a minute to listen close enough, beautiful ambient music is all around us. It’s only natural those who live in the countryside have more time available to enjoy the serenity of a peaceful atmosphere verses those who live in an urban environment. Regardless of where you live, undesirable noise can strike any time of the day or night just like clockwork.

Coburn Tuller from the Springfield Missouri area, truly enjoys the best of both worlds. Not only does he live on the outskirts of a metropolitan area where annoying noise is at a minimum, but he also invented a musical instrument that produces peaceful and relaxing timbres any hour of the day or night he desires. The inherently unique musical creation he fabricated is named The Tones, and the relaxing qualities produced from this innovative instrument are the foundation for his first exclusive new release titled Butterfly Tones.

Coburn Tuller is first and foremost a talented musician, having reached a level of expertise on numerous instruments over the years including acoustic and electric guitar, dulcimer and piano. Coburn conceived the idea for his music innovation during walk around midnight back in 1996, when he heard wind chimes lightly touching in a gentle breeze.

While most of us are familiar with the sound of various wind chimes, and would think nothing further about this blend of manmade and natural ambience, the random series of sound fascinated him and sparked his imagination. Coburn then theorized this ambient sound could be taken to a whole new level, and determined that aluminum tubing of accurate length, diameter and dimension would produce an original sound modulation when struck with a mallet. He then accepted the challenge and spent the next 15 years perfecting his one of a kind instrument – The Tones.

Butterfly Tones features 9 songs of melodic bell timbres that are without a doubt one of the more unique forms of music I have ever heard. The Tones itself is a musical instrument that stands over 8 foot tall, and consists of 3 pyramid structures supporting 90 aluminum and brass tubes of various size and dimension, which range from 7 inches to over 6 foot in length.

If one were to classify the musical invention, I would imagine it would most likely be categorized as a directly struck idiophone like tubular bells or a xylophone, both of which are percussion instruments most often used in an orchestra arrangement. But their distinctive sound also enables the creation of an independent melody.

The 9 songs on Butterfly Tones highlight this instrumental freedom of expression to create some beautiful pieces. During Coburn’s performance you will notice like I did that every note struck produces a clear and precise harmony rather than a series of arbitrary sounds. One of the most interesting effects is the natural tone reverberation in every octave of the bells which can linger for minutes during a song.

This natural resonating characteristic of bell tones is apparent on every piece, where multiple layers enhance a distinct harmony while Coburn ascends and descends through the scales using select octaves and tempos. I also noticed the array of notes struck in the bass range often transfer the background theme for each song in the treble range, but the delivery of treble notes likewise act as a counterbalance for bass notes during each arrangement. I would also say the vibrant resonating sound produced is either close to, or the equivalent of the same note intervals and harmonic pitch found on the diatonic scale. Regardless of which musical scale is used, the tones sound perfect in pitch on every octave and ring true.

Coburn Tuller has discovered a steadfast new source of peaceful ambience whose finely balanced sound qualities are available day, night, or anytime the bell tolls. If you listen for yourself I am sure you will agree this exclusive album presented on CD or MP3 has an elegant rhythm and symmetry for relaxation you can count on, just like clockwork.

Visit the butterflytonescd.com homepage and sample or purchase at Coburn’s CDBaby.com page or Amazon.com page.

Photos are courtesy butterflytonescd.com.

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