The British composer Max Richter has written what is probably the longest piece of classical music ever recorded in one piece.
Sleep lasts eight hours - and is intended to lull the listener to sleep. ‘It's an eight-hour lullaby,’ explains Richter.
The work is written for piano, strings, electronics and vocals and is Richter's ‘manifesto for a slower pace of life’.
On the one hand, Sleep is an experiment with which Richter wants to find out ‘how the brain can be a living space for music when our consciousness is on holiday’.
During the composition, Richter consulted the renowned American neuroscientist David Eagleman to find out more about brain functions during sleep. Musically, the length of the work places it in the tradition of John Cage, Terry Riley or LaMonte Young; as a lullaby, the work looks back on a centuries-long history, starting with Bach's Goldberg Variations, which were written for a sleepless count, to Gustav Mahler's Nachtmusik 1 and 2 from the 7th Symphony, to name just a few prominent examples.

Tracklisting:

CD 1
1.    Dream 1 (before the wind blows it all away)
2.    Cumulonimbus
3.    Dream 2 (entropy)
4.    Path 3 (7676)
5.    whose name is written on water
CD 2
1.    Patterns (cypher)
2.    Solo
3.    Aria 1
4.    Return 2 (song)
5.    nor earth, nor boundless sea
6.    Dream 11 (whisper music) 
CD 3
1.    moth-like stars
2.    Path 17 (before the ending of daylight)
3.    Space 26 (epicardium)
4.    Patterns (lux)
CD 4
1.    Constellation 1
2.    Constellation 2
3.    Space 2 (slow waves)
4.    Chorale / glow
CD 5
1.    Dream 19 (pulse)
2.    Cassiopeia
3.    Non-eternal
4.    Song / echo
CD 6
1.    Aria 2
2.    never fade into nothingness
3.    Return 16 (time capsule)
4.    if you came this way
CD 7
1.    Space 17 (chains)
2.    Sublunar
CD 8
1.    Dream 17 (Alpha)
2.    Dream 0 (till break of day)

BluRay Audio
1.    Dream 1 (before the wind blows it all away)
2.    Cumulonimbus
3.    Dream 2 (entropy)
4.    Path 3 (7676)
5.    whose name is written on water
6.    Patterns (cypher)
7.    Solo
8.    Aria 1
9.    Return 2 (song)
10.    nor earth, nor boundless sea
11.    Dream 11 (whisper music) 
12.    moth-like stars
13.    Path 17 (before the ending of daylight)
14.    Space 26 (epicardium)
15.    Patterns (lux)
16.    Constellation 1
17.    Constellation 2
18.    Space 2 (slow waves)
19.    Chorale / glow
20.    Dream 19 (pulse)
21.    Cassiopeia
22.    Non-eternal
23.    Song / echo
24.    Aria 2
25.    never fade into nothingness
26.    Return 16 (time capsule)
27.    if you came this way
28.    Space 17 (chains)
29.    Sublunar
30.    Dream 17 (Alpha)
31.    Dream 0 (till break of day)