condition (record/cover): NM / NM
Insert included.
Commissioned to mark the 1985-86 return of Halley's Comet and premiered with an accompanying planetarium sky-show at the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles in 1986. Return is a 36-section electronic score realised entirely on the YCAMS (Yamaha Computer Assisted Music System) at Yamaha's R&D facility in Glendale, California, where Subotnick had research access during the system's development.
The piece is a chronological journey: the first half traces creation from the beginning of the universe to 1758 (the year Edmond Halley correctly predicted the comet's return); the second half follows the comet's appearances from 1758 to the projected 1986 return and beyond. Sections include Earth: The Beginning of Our Solar System, 12 B.C., 1066 (the comet's appearance recorded on the Bayeux Tapestry), Giotto (after the Giotto di Bondone Adoration of the Magi in the Scrovegni Chapel, with the comet as the Star of Bethlehem), 1682=Halley, 1910, 1986 and Future. Foster Reed's San Francisco label New Albion, which had launched in 1984, released the recording in glossy picture sleeve with insert interview.
