Brendan O’Hare & Cory Snearowski created this music video, Playdate, for the Raymond Scott track The Music Box, from his album Soothing Sounds For Baby, Volume 1.

Raymond Scott is a unique character in electronic music history. He’s described by his heirs as a “Composer, inventor, visionary, pianist, engineer, electronic music pioneer, control freak.”

Scott was initially known as a composer and band leader, and is probably best for his complex “descriptive jazz” compositions from the ’30s, which became the classic sound of cartoons, when his compositions were adapted to score Looney Tunes animations. Scott also found success writing music for Broadway, popular song and lounge and exotica records.

Scott was fascinated with using electronics to make music, and founded Manhattan Research in 1946, to create tools for electronic music, including the Clavivox, Electronium, drum machines and early sequencers.

In 1964, Scott released a series of albums of electronic music for infants, the three-volume collection of Soothing Sounds For Baby. It’s questionable how much insight Scott had into infants, given that he was reportedly a hands-off and even distant parent.

Soothing Sounds For Baby is a collection of quirky electronic pieces that Scott apparently thought would be soothing for infants. In 1964, though, nobody was interested in a three-album collection of weird electronic music for babies. The albums were rediscovered by electronica fans decades later, though, and are now seen as way ahead of their time, both technically and musically.

The Brendan and Cory music video for The Music Box seems odd, naive and maybe a little disturbing, which seems like a perfect match for Scott’s music.

Is this music Soothing Sounds For Baby? Check out the video and share your thoughts in the comments!