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Rêl Institiwt
2il Lawr, 19 Ffordd Yr Orsaf
Llanrwst
Sir Conwy LL26 0EP
“I’ll tell you why… There’s a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson, something to the effect of: ‘if you can’t be free, then be as free as you can be’. And I like the arbitrary restrictions that one places on oneself, so that you don’t get scatterbrained and don’t reach for everything that’s available. Keep your focus very narrow: just this and nothing more, and make that absolutely exquisite and don’t get sucked into distractions, don’t listen to the siren chorus singing across the waves about this keyboard that has a billion sounds in it. I couldn’t care less about things like that. They just get in the way. I’m not bragging, but the way I work is that I focus entirely on a small thing and try to milk that for all it’s worth, to find everything in it that makes musical sense. A studio gives you the freedom to do that, but it also gives you the freedom to do everything, and to me everything is a tyranny. What’s the point? So for me it’s a conscious choice to work in a studio when I want and need to, but not to own a studio. It’s the same with owning instruments. All I have is an old, worthless Casio 202, which I don’t even use any more, and the shakers and bells. I don’t even have a piano any more.”