[Found in the Cloud] #2 Pedro Caldas – Kyrie Eleison

September 24th, 2009

Kyrie Eleison by petersauces

Once I received a Souncloud message saying:

Seems like every user I check out is making minimal techno. [Your music] was a breath of fresh air. Danke schön!

Of course this is the stuff I like to hear. :) But this is also what came to my mind stumbling across Pedros music. Just some freshness in that ocean of tracks that all follow the same scheme. When you listen to some of Pedros work, you can hear, that this guy is classicly trained, but practices electronic. For me, it feels good not being the only one between the lines of genres. He has also similar feelings towards his music.

[It's] hard to find a place I “belong” these days…

Could sign this statement. All the established genres have their own rule-sets. How you produce, how you perform. What is most likely to make your track big. They have big word-leaders who are the scenes darlings. What they recommend will be heard.
None of that holds true if you try to go new ways. Of course every position has pros and cons, but this feeling of being a bit lost, although doing great craft, is one of the cons – i guess. Though never met, Pedro from Brazil has won my sympathy. Totally.

This is what says about “Kyrie Eleison“:

Song made in 2004, when I started experimenting with counterpoint composition and electronic music. Very intriguing yet evolving atmosphere that ponders antique music in today’s times.
My own voice recorded many times for each layer. I used counterpoint, that’s a composition technique from the 16th Century. So what I did is I wrote a piece for 5 voices and recorded all of them myself… pretty tiring ater a while…

My friend and former band-mate AK (design student) said something, that holds true with this work also:

Always try to bring ideas from outside into your production. Don’t reference the status-quo of the scene. When you do digital bring in inspiration from analog.

This translates to: Bring in your acoustic understanding, sound and ability into electronic composition. This is what Pedro does. Or: bring your aesthetics from electronic music into acoustic music. This is what Hauschka does. Either way you choose, it is a good way of staying original.

Funny, Pedro manages to undust that image of old men singing church songs in a choir. He has a original way of creating tension within the track and surprises the listener several times. The way I like it.

Don’t miss to check out some of his other works over at Soundcloud. I recommend  Harmo and 7 Onions. He also has a blog, which is in Portugese, unfortunately (for the most us). Google translate could help ;)

Disclaimer:
the idea of this series is to have a conversation. On single pieces of music and through them on musical aspects in general. Imagine the time you were putting up vinyl, drinking red wine, discussing with your friend about things you hear at this very moment. When was the last time you listened to music and did nothing else? Really concentrated?
So if the track above triggers anything, just share it. A picture, a small thought, a general impression you have, please share it in the comments. If not, maybe next time.  It’s an experiment, I know. Thanks again!

Acoustic Sketches Free Download

August 5th, 2009

In Summer 2008 I first explored, how noises and random sounds can form to rhythm and go along with calm acoustic sounds. That concept took hold on me for some time. Now and then I did some small sketches, that would fall into that category. I had two of them already on Soundcloud, Cleansing and Ursulurn. Recently, I uploaded this early first piece (Morgenschillgit) and decided to make them all free to download. I won’t put work into these anymore and they won’t appear in future releases. So if you like them, go grab!

Status and a small piano piece

July 26th, 2009

It’s been now already two weeks living off my daily routine trying to focus on music. It feels really great to just make yourself room for what you call your passion.

Nevertheless, it was of course (again) a bit naive to think, that after these 3 weeks there will be an EP to be released. Here I can let my activity circle full-time around music and sound, but I had to reconfigure myself first. Get myself on track again, after my head was dug into some other stuff for university (programming Flex/Actionscript for example).

Still, i get something done. Have ideas to follow, loose ends to connect and instruments to play. The feeling turned out to be right, that my basic musical nature is about playing “real instruments” with direct control over all aspects of musical expression. I’m falling in love with the piano more and more. It has such a beautiful and warm sound. Just hearing the sustain of a nice chord reminds me of home.

So beside my Ableton-activities I also wrote a little piano piece, which is not yet completely finished. I recorded it, all the tiny little hick-ups included. But in the end they really don’t matter, as the message lies somewhere else…

Small Piano Piece from Nicken on Vimeo.

I assure you that all of my activities will definitely lead to an upcoming EP, but there is still a longer way to go for me. 3 weeks not enough (who would have thought). So stay tuned…

  • This is the weblog of Niklas, a musician from Germany – exploring space between acoustic and electronic music.
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