Peter Michaels, composer, producer, musician

Who or what inspired you to pursue a career in music?

My father was a musician when he was younger, travelling Europe with his jazz band and telling stories of his encounters with Duke Ellington and Stan Getz. He was a clarinettist, though I never heard him play that instrument. I knew him mostly as a singer and guitarist.

Who or what have been the most significant influences on your musical life and career as a composer?

My first work was in my late teens, collaborating with a theatre-director friend. We put shows on in the Edinburgh Festival and throughout the UK theatre fringe scene. Over a few formative years I was given free rein to write with ambitious musical scope – The Tempest set in a nightclub, tales of Renaissance automaton coming to life, music-hall comedy, as well as premieres of plays by Stephen Fry and Ted Hughes.

What have been the greatest challenges/frustrations of your career so far?

Perhaps because I have not focussed strongly on a single style or format, I have found it hard to categorise my own work and share it with other people. We are told that as musicians we need to build our social media following and so on, but I always find myself too busy finding a new sound or chasing a new idea to pause long enough to dedicate the time needed to that side of things.

How do you work? What methods do you use and how do ideas come to you?

I improvise as often as I can, as much as I can get away with. Sometimes on a simple idea with variations, and sometimes in a very free style outside of traditional melody or harmony – I find this a good way to think creatively, but also it is very therapeutic to let go of all your learning and see where you end up! I find it important to occasionally allow yourself to have no aim or end product in mind. Out of the noise, there often emerges an idea I like, which I will pursue until it becomes moulded into a piece that I can recognise.

If I am writing to a brief, I usually have a strong idea of the musical landscape before I start writing, so the process is different – I am trying to realise an already clear idea. Even so, the improvisation I do at other times feeds into the process.

How would you characterise your compositional language/musical style?

I am strongly influenced by classical, jazz and contemporary music so each of those styles plays a large part in my writing. I don’t tend to combine them into one super-style, but I like to let them bleed into each other a little bit. I might be writing a jazz piece, and feel that some baroque arpeggios or chromatic lines would work. I have also taken a lot from my time writing with Brazilian musicians, especially in the use of cross-rhythms.

Of which works are you most proud?

I formed a strong collaboration with a Brazilian violinist, Felipe Karam. Together with our quartet Pocket Caravan we wrote three fantastic albums, toured the UK, USA and Brazil and produced some of my favourite music.

As a musician, what is your definition of success?

Whilst I love performing, I often feel most positive when I listen back to a recording from years ago and think “I don’t remember playing or writing that but I like it!”

What advice would you give to young or aspiring composers?

I think it depends on their aims – if they want to write for media then I would encourage them to work with film makers at or just above their level, because there are so many technical skills that need to be refined. But for everyone else, I think that composers should spend time on stage, learning what makes and keeps an audience engaged.

What’s the one thing we’re not talking about in the music industry which you really feel we should be?

In the UK our live music scene seems to be dying. Venues are closing and it is getting harder to earn from performing. Working with other musicians, and being in front of an audience, is the quickest way to developing your musical language. This is happening at the grass-roots level, and that used to be the most fertile ground for finding new voices which could then be recorded and developed. Small labels have all but disappeared – the ones that are left expect the musicians to fund their own productions. The larger labels insist on huge followings before they invest a penny. So now people have to create at home by themselves and find an online audience before they can be considered worth investing in. All this seems so far from the creative, sharing environment which is needed for innovative musical development. Unless you see people playing an instrument, and see how audiences react, you are missing a huge part of the communal nature of music.

What is your most treasured possession?

My dad’s old classical guitar.

What is your present state of mind?

Impatient to work on new projects, even though there are so many left unfinished.

Peter Michaels’ debut solo album Fractures is out now on major streaming platforms, including Spotify, Deezer, and Amazon Music.

petermichaels.co.uk