Name: Andrey Guryanov
Nationality: Russian
Occupation: Composer, sound designer, sound artist, producer
Current release: Andrey Guryanov's Anthems is out via Abstand.
Recommendations: Well, I would like to share something but I’m ashamed of how little I’m of a reader.

If you enjoyed this Andrey Guryanov interview and would like to hear more of his music, visit him on bandcamp.



When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects and colours. What happens in your body when you're listening? Do you listen with your eyes open or closed?

I prefer to listen with my eyes closed and to be concentrated on what I listen to, if not specifically instructed otherwise.

I am trying to feel the connection, to build a sort of principal scheme of the piece, but mostly I’m focused on the feeling of the unique moment, that connects to another moment. So, pretty much trying and naturally failing to observe time.

What were your very first steps in music like - and how do you rate gains made through experience versus the naiveté of those first steps?

Oh, I was exposed to Nuendo when I was around 12-14, and I remember dealing with midi, external synth and just being totally fascinated with possibilities, sounds, and how it all works. And I made a couple of tracks and recorded them to cassette back then, that I lost and don’t think will ever find again. I’m very curious about its content now.

On the other hand, I can mostly see it as ‘what is already done’ and ‘what I want to do.’There's no starting point, just constant movement.

Being naive is a very good instrument to deal with things, and I also think that these first steps are in a way an absolute, that we’re trying to reach again and again - at least with our feelings.

According to scientific studies, we make our deepest and most incisive musical experiences between the ages of 13-16. What did music meant to you at that age and what’s changed since then?

I guess I answered the first part of the question accidentally. As for the second part - music is just taking more and more of my concentration, time, and energy, playing more and more important role in my life.

Also, the album Hybrid by Brook, Lanoise, and Eno happened to me back then, it was a very strong affection for a decade. It didn't age that well for me later unfortunately.



Over the course of your development, what have been your most important instruments and tools and how have they shaped your perspective on music?

Max/Msp made the biggest change in my life when I figured out how can I basically make my own interfaces according to my own methods and ideas. I was never that focused on sound quality as I was on the idea of extending my body into something resembling a tool.

On the one hand, it makes me limited in my gestures, on the other - my tools are very specialized and meet my needs. The interesting part comes when it extends my needs and starts to shape them, showing me something new. So, the perfect tool would be something I’ve made that I have no idea how to use first.

Other than Max it’s mostly just all the mixed experience I have with sound. I like to smuggle things from experimental music into film sound, from visuals into sound-based things, and so forth.

What, would you say, are the key ideas behind your approach to music and what motivates you to create?

I can’t say it’s something constant. Mostly I have a feeling that I have to do it. It can be an idea that I need to make real or a feeling that a particular constellation of things should be turned into life. Mostly it’s just the feeling that something should exist and I should help it to.

I started playing music on stage when I was 15, I played bass in a power-trio band, and back then I liked the idea of me on stage and also enjoyed the process.

Eventually, it was the joy of the process itself that became more vital.

Paul Simon said “the way that I listen to my own records is not for the chords or the lyrics - my first impression is of the overall sound.” What's your own take on that and how would you define your personal sound?

I would love it to be described as ‘the connection between the message and how it’s shaped into music’. And the feeling of ‘everything’s in its right place’.

At least I always have two of those in the back of my mind when I do something.

Sound, song, and rhythm are all around us, from animal noises to the waves of the ocean. What, if any, are some of the most moving experiences you've had with these non-human-made sounds? In how far would you describe them as “musical”?

I would totally call them music. Once in my life, I heard a wind that was more music than any music I ever heard. I listened to the recording years after, and still had the same feeling. It’s a personal and individual experience for sure, but for me, it stays the same with that particular recording.

Also being in the winter forest when the rain is almost little fractures of sharp ice falling into the snow and on the trees is one of that moments for me.

From very deep/high/loud/quiet sounds to very long/short/simple/complex compositions - are there extremes in music you feel drawn to and what response do they elicit?

The longest set I’ve ever played was 12 hours long, as one half of the KGXXX duo. I’ve played 8 hours as well, 2, etc. We played 2-3 hour sets as Logs. In both cases, it was in the improvisational stream.

I found it really precious when my expectations of time and the variety of my material are both long gone, and I’m just in the middle of it. That is the moment when the liberation is as total as it gets for me, I guess.

It has always fascinated me how 40 minutes determine a lot of time-domain pieces, and how far you can go, when you go beyond that.

From symphonies and traditional verse/chorus-songs to linear techno tracks and free jazz, there are myriads ways to structure a piece of music. Which approaches work best for you – and why?

I think I would like to be able to use all of them, and better even blend them. And also that would be nice to be able to pick one each time you have a different idea to fit that idea better.

I’m quite far from songs, unfortunately, even though I would like to write one eventually. But as of now it’s composition and editing surrounding a free improvisation for me, I guess.

Could you describe your creative process on the basis of one of your pieces, live performances or albums that's particularly dear to you, please?

Anthems grew out of an idea, a gesture of reality, I wanted to draw attention to. A conception on the one hand, and a minimal amount of sonic information on the other hand. Most of its material comes from the pauses in Russian / Soviet anthems.

The moment Russia changed its anthem back to the music that was used as the Soviet Anthem, the obvious statement of the gesture and a premonition of catastrophe and decay in this gesture, never let me leave that fact be and move on. And after a little bit of research, I figured there’s more historical data about it.

After I'd conceived this premise, Corona happened, locking me in with this concept, time, and not that many other things to do. I first worked on the pauses, to see if there’s something there and what that something might be. Then I started to build sound situations, that felt sufficient enough and self-reliable.

It was mostly an improvisational process, where I was also dealing with the whole awful content that the material - Soviet anthem - had in it. How and if it should affect my work, can I perceive this material as just sound, can I isolate it from its emotional and information charge. There were two approaches to that part, when I collected the secondary material I will work with later on. Each was around two weeks full-dive, and there was around half a year or more between them. And then there was a year of editing it on and off, mastering and so on.

On February 24, Russia started a cruel, purposeless, and insanely violent war in Ukraine, and that was the point where the premonition turned into a nightmare. That was when I added the last track.

Sometimes, science and art converge in unexpected ways. Do you conduct “experiments” or make use of scientific insights when you're making music?

This is something I don’t do so much, unfortunately, though I’ve tried. There’s always extending borders of some sort I guess, but that direct science-art connection never works for me.

How does the way you make music reflect the way you live your life? Can we learn lessons about life by understanding music on a deeper level?

I think music is a life of its own, and when you really commit to it, it teaches you to communicate with people, to deal with yourself, and to be present.

 I don’t think music is particularly exclusive in this regard. But it’s one of the ways to take a look at life from a different angle.

Do you feel as though writing or performing a piece of music is inherently different from something like making a great cup of coffee? What do you express through music that you couldn't or wouldn't in more 'mundane' tasks?

I guess, there’s a way to turn mundane things into music and also music into mundane things. It’s not the nature of the music that makes it so special, it’s also about the will and effort to communicate to it, to understand it and to feel it. I think it’s what you put in it that makes it special, and that could be a cup of coffee as well in the end.

If the circumstances are good, a cup of coffee could be full of meaning and message and also a masterpiece.

Every time I listen to "Albedo 0.39" by Vangelis, I choke up. But the lyrics are made up of nothing but numbers and values. Do you, too, have a song or piece of music that affects you in a way that you can't explain?

The numbers in your example made me immediately recall a piece called ‘Opus’ by José Toirac. Not sure I’m gonna be precise with the description, but it’s more or less numbers which Fidel Castro used in a speech, talking about, I guess, the success of the whole Cuban project.



So Toirac left only those numbers and cut out the rest. I’m not even sure if it’s a video work or a sound work, but it was very effective. It resonated with me on the level of conception, when I grasped it, and then left me analyzing Fidel’s voice, to find a sort of a totalitarian void in all these numbers. It was so simple and so straightforward, and I’ve only heard it once for maybe a couple of minutes.

What I can’t explain, is that it got my attention before I was able to realize what it is and before I read about it. It’s not exactly unexplainable but I’m not sure I was beyond that line.

If you could make a wish for the future – what are developments in music you would like to see and hear?

I feel obsolete with regards to the current process, way behind the avant-garde, so I would love to catch up and get to the moment of now first. I see so many ways music is spreading and so many modes of its existence. The only thing I can think of is just making listening to music more conscious and some more awareness towards sound pollution, but that’s mostly social things.

Music is what it is, and it shapeshifts but still stays the same entity that accompanies humanity on its way. It’s like the most not-looking-like-life image and model of life, that is quite close to describing the life.