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NTS Guide to: Tearoom Ambient
16.06.25 · Prague

NTS Guide to: Tearoom Ambient

Tearooms in post-revolution Czechoslovakia symbolised places through which new spiritualities were flowing, and the influx of largely uncharted ways of life closely intertwined with new age, ambient, folk and minimalism. With their minds altered thanks to smuggled records by Fripp & Eno or Steve Reich, this loose network of musicians had begun composing meditative music, using loops and handmade instruments, with a different sensibility. Compared to the boisterous Zappa-adjacent and booze-soaked underground movement, which was led by Plastic People of the Universe and provoked the state authorities, this music was meant instead for tea rooms and spiritual sites like churches or monasteries, as if occupying some place where time flows anticlockwise. Music journalist Pavel Klusák dubbed this 1990s scene a “tearoom alternative”. Experimental folk singer Oldřich Janota, Jaroslav Kořán’s various ensembles like Modrá or Orloj Snivců (The Horologe of Dreamers) or Irena and Vojtěch Havlovi were drawn by the light and composed music that didn’t match the fast pace of newly imported capitalism.

Mix created by: Miloš Hroch

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Tracklist

  • 0:00:50
    Jaroslav Kořán
    Jarní Píseň
  • 0:04:09
    Pavel Richter Band
    Čínský Potůček - Poloviční Chytání
  • --:--
    Vlastimil Marek
    Závěje Hlasů
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  • Oldřich Janota, Vojtěch A Irena Havlovi
    Ozářený Sluncem, Mrakem Zastíněný
  • Irena & Vojtěch Havlovi
    Mysterious Gamelanland IX.
  • Modrá
    Morning Azure
  • Vlastislav Matoušek
    Shapes Of Silence IV
  • Orloj Snivců
    Jde
  • Jiná Rychlost Času
    Klášter Na Vodě