Interview | @diegostocco’s “Music from a Bonsai”

Apr 30, 2010 by TheZargon    26 Comments    Posted under: Music

One of the things that I am asked over and over again is, “What the hell is sound design?” There are many analogies to explain it and most of them totally fail so I have to return to practical examples to get the message across. Sound design has come a long way as did the role that technology plays with it. This applies to sound design, to DJing and to the concept of what a live concert is as well. (Please read this excellent and thought provoking post by Peter Kirn regarding laptops and live music).

Due to the amount of data flowing today on social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, Soundcloud or YouTube, it is really hard to find something that makes you stop from clicking immediately that mental “next” button: Diego Stocco’s work is one of those that makes you to stop to watch it because his work has that “wow!” factor. See it for yourself before I continue.

Diego is someone that, in the sound design world, doesn’t need any introduction. Those of you that never heard of him probably have already heard his work on such movie trailers as “Terminator:Salvation”, “2012?, “Eagle Eye”, “The Uninvited”, “Jumper”, “Transformers”, “Resident Evil: Extinction”, “Awake”, “Skinwalker” and “Lady in the Water” and video game trailers like “Justice League Heroes”, “Soulcalibur IV”, “MK vs DC, “Call of Duty, World at War” and television shows like “The Tudors” or “Moonlight”. Apart from that he has also done sound design for such brands like Nokia, Samsung, Panasonic, BMW and General Motors.

Diego has also achieved a name for himself by using non-traditional sound design techniques and by building his own instruments that he uses to create original sounds. The Experibass, a “monster” that is made of a violin, viola and cello strings amplified through the body of a double bass, caught the attention of Hans Zimmer who used Diego’s invention and talent on Guy Ritchie’s “Sherlock Holmes”.

Interview with Diego Stocco

I recently came across Diego’s latest work “Music From a Bonsai” and this gave me the a good reason to bother Diego and have him answer some questions.

Your work as a composer and sound designer is widely perceived as innovative and you keep pushing that notion. What drives you to experiment with sound design and composition the way you do?

Diego Stocco (DS): Mostly curiosity, I can hear interesting sounds around all the time and I can’t stop thinking how they would sound organized into compositions. I think all objects and instruments contain sonic material that can be shaped into different forms, some of those can be tonal, some less, some are rhythmically defined, some very abstract.

When I first listened to some of your pieces lots of references came to my mind: Pan Sonic, Autechre, Amon Tobin even Aphex Twin but applied to natural sounds. Who are your main influencers? What role do they play when you are composing?

DS: I’ve heard about these artists before and I had a chance to listen to a couple of tracks from Amon Tobin, and probably Aphex Twin, but my musical heroes are Mike Oldfield and Peter Gabriel. These are the musicians that cracked wide open my musical sensibility and inspired me to go out and try my own things. I feel I learned from them the concept of expressing whatever music you have inside.

“Music from a Bonsai” is your latest experiment in using “living instruments” to produce a composition. What are the technical challenges to make such a production?

DS: This one was pretty challenging actually, the bonsai has this short and tiny sounds that are hard to control. Intentionally I didn’t want to start messing with synths and samplers, that would have surely helped in creating a more complex composition, but the spirit of this project was to stay true to the source.
Usually when I do these types of projects I test in advance if the techniques I want to use are actually going to work, but I like to keep the performance part open. I let my imagination suggest me a groove to start with, and when I feel it’s going and it’s solid, I start playing it with my hands too. Then I start layering the other elements and the piece becomes more defined.

Apart from your work as composer and sound designer you are also experimenting in building your own instruments. Experibass comes to mind immediately since it got you to play, as soloist, on Hans Zimmer’s “Sherlock Holmes” soundtrack. How did you come up with the idea to build the Experibass? And how was it to work with Hans Zimmer?

DS: I’ve been customizing and building instruments for a while, but the classical strings were a new territory for me. I was curious to hear what kind of resonances a violin string could have if amplified by a double bass.
So I built the instrument to find out. Then I also discovered many other interesting things happening within the instruments, for example, every note, hit and noise resonate through all the strings, creating sympathetic resonances. Once the instrument was ready I had to come up with some techniques to show even to myself how I was thinking to play it, and so I thought to make also a video.
It’s was a great surprise when Hans Zimmer contacted me. I always admired his soundtracks because besides being an incredible composer, he has such a natural instinct for great sounds.
He gave me the freedom to express the potentials of the Experibass on his music, encouraging me to come up with even more playing techniques. It was amazing to see his enthusiasm and positive reaction about what I was playing.

Do you prefer to use a large variety of tools (software) or do you stick with a few you already know? What are those? (Question submitted by Nick Maxwell)

DS: Every project is different and it depends what I’m trying to achieve, if there’s an opportunity to learn something new I definitely go for it.
There are some software and tools that have been a stable presence in my setup. I’ve been a Pro Tools user for a long time, that’s what I mostly use to record; inside Pro Tools I also do the mixing.
I’ve been using Røde mics for a variety of projects, they sound great and they have this particular model called NT6 which is so small that I can attach it to my fingers, as I did in “Music from a Tree”.
Rather than that, there might a new plugin sometimes that catches my attention, but I always thought that ideas are the most important tools, without those you could have a million dollar studio and not getting anything original out of it.

Below you can see the “Music from a Bonsai” video. If you leave any questions you might have for Diego, on the comments I am sure he will be kind enough to answer them.

:: Connect with Diego ::
Diego Stocco on Béhance
Diego’s Videos on VIMEO
Tags: Diego Stocco, Experibass, Interview, Music from a Bonsai, Music from a tree