The first piece I explored was Terry Riley's A Rainbow in Curved Air. The sounds of the piece lived up to the name. The synthesizers used were either smoothed out or bitcrushed, giving it a retro videogame vibe. The simplistic bassline was reminiscent of spaceship shooters from that era of gaming (Xevious, Bosconian, etc), which in turn made me think of flight. Most of the notes are in the upper registers as well, which helps give the piece a colorful and airy feel.
The next piece was John Chowning's Turenas. This piece didn't appeal to me as much as the first since the style felt a little scattered. It begins with a quiet synth with reverb that gives the impression of water dripping in a cavern, but then changes to long, drawn out synths that sound like trumpets.
The last (and my personal favorite) of the works I listened to was Steve Reich's Different Trains. I was fascinated by the sound manipulation used in this piece; steady rhythms of string instruments manipulated to sound like various moving trains. There were even whole notes distorted to sound like train whistles.
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