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#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Coronavirus OutbreakliveLatest UpdatesMaps and CasesThe Latest Vaccine InformationU.S. Deaths Surpass 300,000F.A.Q.AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyThose We’ve LostHarold Budd, Composer of Spaciousness and Calm, Dies at 84Known for his collaborations with art-pop artists like Brian Eno and Cocteau Twins, he created a signature sound suspended in reverberation and drone.The composer and pianist Harold Budd in Birmingham, England, in 2011. His music was known for its unhurried, organic spontaneity.Credit…Steve Thorne/Redferns, via Getty ImagesDec. 17, 2020Updated 5:45 p.m. ETHarold Budd, a composer and pianist known for the preternatural spaciousness and melancholy calm of his music, and for his collaborations with art-pop artists like Brian Eno and Cocteau Twins, died on Dec. 8 in a hospital in Arcadia, Calif. He was 84.The cause was complications of Covid-19, which he contracted at a short-term rehabilitation facility while undergoing therapy after suffering a stroke on Nov. 11, his manager, Steve Takaki, said in an email.Born in Los Angeles, Mr. Budd grew up close to the Mojave Desert, a likely inspiration for the sparsity and vastness his music could evoke. Engaged initially by free jazz, John Cage’s avant-garde innovations and early minimalism, he broke with all of those styles to create a signature sound that centered on the piano, soft-pedaled, sustained and suspended in a corona of reverberation and drone.That sound, which Mr. Budd began to develop in 1972, found its initial fruition on “The Pavilion of Dreams,” a 1978 album produced and released by Mr. Eno. In 1980, Mr. Budd and Mr. Eno jointly created “Ambient 2: The Plateaux of Mirror,” a watershed work for both artists, not least for its feeling of unhurried, organic spontaneity. For their next collaboration, “The Pearl,” released in 1984, they brought in a second credited producer, Daniel Lanois.“I just want to say one thing again clearly right now: I owe Eno everything,” Mr. Budd proclaimed in a 2016 interview with L.A. Record, a music publication. Recording with Mr. Eno in London had “opened up another world for me that I didn’t know existed,” he said, “and suddenly I was a part of it.”Mr. Budd would go on to work with other artists active in popular music, including Andy Partridge of XTC and John Foxx, a founder of Ultravox. A collaboration with the Scottish trio Cocteau Twins, whose music shared with Mr. Budd’s a quality of esoteric reverie, produced the 1986 album “The Moon and the Melodies.” An enduring bond with Robin Guthrie, the Cocteau Twins guitarist and songwriter, resulted in several film scores and duo albums. The latest, “Another Flower,” was recorded in 2013 but released this month.Mr. Budd announced his retirement from music in 2004, but within a few years he was working again, with fresh vitality and variety. “Bandits of Stature,” issued in 2012, comprised 14 succinct pieces for string quartet. By 2018, Mr. Budd was collaborating with chamber groups in concerts that amounted to career retrospectives, including a high-profile appearance at the 2019 Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, Tenn.When Mr. Budd died, Mr. Takaki wrote in an email, he had recently completed 19 new string quartets. Some had been recorded this year. Others have yet to be performed. Preparations to transcribe and edit Mr. Budd’s solo piano music and chamber works for publication began during the summer, and will continue.Mr. Budd in performance at the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, Tenn., in 2019.Credit…Jake Giles Netter for The New York TimesHarold Montgomery Budd was born on May 24, 1936, to Harold Budd, who worked in the textile industry, and Dorothy (McNeill) Budd, a homemaker. His father died when he was 13, resulting in financial hardship that prompted the family to move to Victorville, on the edge of the Mojave Desert.An early interest in jazz led Mr. Budd to take up the drums. He played nightclub dates in Los Angeles while working days at Northrop Corporation, the aircraft manufacturer, to support his family, and later attended Los Angeles Community College. Drafted into the Army, Mr. Budd performed in a band with the saxophonist Albert Ayler, who would later achieve renown as a free-jazz firebrand.The Coronavirus Outbreak More