Gregskius
UK-based composer writing mainly electro-acoustic music and publishing primarily via www.archive.org - my stuff tends to be emotional, sometimes disturbing.... I write using a lot of chance techniques and like to manipulate amplitude for dramatic effect, as well as shifting stuff about in time... I'm into fake instruments but not used to simulate real instruments, and I'm also into real instruments and particularly the human voice. Very into audio-book type projects and the spoken word.
Tell me about your history? How did you get where you are now?
Born 1974, started playing at 10, writing at 13-14, writing stuff worth listening to (arguably) at 16. Early training was pop-music based primarily, though my taste was for those tunes which I suppose fell into the "classical" category. Later on tried some classical training and did the "university education" thing, which was great for tuition from famous composers and workshop performances of paper scores. Not so good for diversity of thought though - I think I conformed more in those years than at any other time. Now that I'm divorced from most musicians and work either alone or in long-distance collaboration, there's a lot more scope and incentive to think more radically.
Have you performed live in front of an audience? Any special memories?
I do play live, but certainly not often - tend to communicate musically via free demos with eBay sales and via www.archive.org - loads of special moments : mainly the look of shock on people's faces LOL
Your musical influences
Well most importantly I think Iannis Xenakis, who realised that the small details don't make the big picture. I owe him a great debt in terms of theoretical outlook. Same goes for John Cage. I sometimes sound like Michael Tippett or Hans Henze or Alfred Schnittke, and I'm also heavily influenced by Codeine, Throwing Muses, The Fall, Sonic Youth. Sound-wise, I suppose think late Stockhausen, Gerald Barry, Accroche-Note, God-is-my-Co-pilot.
What equipment do you use?
Own software, mainly fairly primitive parameter-based chance operation stuff via MIDI initially, then mix and edit via Audacity and Krystal Audio, always as sound, never as MIDI - MIDI just generates pitch-events. I also use a digital camera to record natural audio, microphone for voice (mainly spoken) and also a treble recorder and whatever equipment happens to be lying about. I might be getting a piano (oooooh!!) so expect lots of improvisations in 2007.
Anything else?
Main "hub" website is http://homepages.tesco.net/gregskius/ but I mainly publish via http://www.archive.org/ "The Internet Archive", where I have 21 (at the moment) complete CDs for download. This site will also become an important entry-point to that collection.
