Mugen

Mugen is the name used by Alessandro Canova, an Italian sound-art project that develops in the second half of the 1990s from work on digital and analogue platforms in relation to visual design techniques. From 1999, Canova begins using sine waves and white noise as his only sound sources, and his work develops around a minimal aesthetic and a meditative approach to listening, shaped in part by his interest in Asian arts.

Sound-art project

The project focuses on the refinement of frequency and on sound as contemplation rather than conventional song structure. Canova performs these works live in Italy, France, the UK and Japan.

Other act with the same name

The name also refers to a Japanese progressive rock band formed in 1978 around keyboardist Katsuhiko Hayashi and singer Takashi Nakamura. That group builds a lush, keyboard-led symphonic style with clear references to Genesis and The Enid. Its first album, Sinfonia Della Luna, appears in 1984 after initially being privately released, then issued for distribution by Made In Japan and later reissued by Muséa. The band follows it with Léda et le Cygne in 1986 and The Princess of Kingdom Gone in 1988 before splitting up. Hayashi later forms the progressive supergroup 夜来香 (Ie Rai Shan).