Name: Bryan Senti
Nationality: Cuban-Colombian-American
Occupation: Violinist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, producer
Current release: Bryan Senti's new single "Icaro", which includes a remix by Dustin O'Halloran, is out via Naive. It is part of a projected album of remixes by Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, Ian Chang, Manuelcha Prado, Paul Corley (feat. Toumani Diabatè), Shida Shahabi, John Monkman, Spencer Zahn and Adam Wiltzie.
Recommendations: The Artist – Kehinde Wiley (Napoleon leading the Army over the Alps); The music of Toumani Diabaté (Elyne Road)

[Read our Dustin O'Halloran interview]
[Read our Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith interview]
[Read our Ian Chang interview]
[Read our John Monkman interview]
[Read our A Winged Victory for the Sullen interview with Adam Wiltzie]

If you enjoyed this Bryan Senti interview and would like to know more, visit his official homepage. He is also on Instagram, Facebook, and twitter. For a deeper look into his creative process, read our earlier interview with Brian about his creative process.



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 guess it really depends on the music.

I remember going to the Berghain for the first time, feeling the kick pulsating through my body like a sonic therapist searching for pulled muscles, and unable to sit still I started to dance. Techno all of a sudden clicked in a way that it never had when I listened to it on my bookshelf speakers in LA.

But that contrasts with my experience growing up with classical music, where the journey is largely cerebral until, often at an unexpected moment, the music engulfs you with emotion, as if to say that all that compositional work was slowly disarming you so that you could become vulnerable at this particular moment.

And then of course there’s elevator music, where one feels and thinks nothing. Every kind of music elicits a different response.

I recorded some (to me) incredible pieces of music when I had almost no idea what I was doing. 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?

My first steps with music were learning to play the violin, and as a result my very first pieces of music resembled the classical music I was listening to / performing.

I think in the previous interview, I mentioned how a jazz teacher once told me that none of us needed to go to school if we just really listened to music. I think that’s true, and so I strongly feel the most important thing that has happened since being that kid learning to play violin is that I’ve heard a lot of music, of all different genres. Now armed with that knowledge, I can apply that to the music I’m writing to hopefully create something different and powerful.

I guess I don’t really prize naiveté per se, but on the other hand improvisation is really important. I saw a video of Rick Rubin where he talked about the improvisational element of recording, about happy accidents / seeing what comes out in the recording session.

I think he’s absolutely right, and incorporating this ‘improvisational’ mindset to composition and recording leads to great discoveries. But nothing replaces listening.

It is generally believed that we make our deepest and most incisive musical experiences between 13-16. Tell me what music meant to you at that age, please – and how its impact has changed since then.  

I did have a formative musical experience at this age.

I was performing at a festival in Amsterdam, playing a Mozart trio with a pianist from Japan and a cellist from Russia. I wasn’t concentrating and got terribly lost and as I couldn’t communicate well with my colleagues I completely messed up the concert. That experience haunted me till my 30s but by then beta blockers existed as well as lots of literature on flow states and stage fright by writers like Don Greene.

I think its important to teach kids early how to confront the stage so as to not conflate stage fright with talent, or lack thereof.

Over the course of your development, what have been your most important instruments and tools - and how do you think working with them shaped your perspective on music?

The violin and Logic.

Since the violin is a single voice instrument for the most part, it helps me construct music through voice leading individual lines rather than through chords as the piano often does. It also has so many different colours and ways of being played, which has helped me approach music in a more improvisational and experimental manner.

Logic just happens to be the DAW  that I learned. But these programs, and their surprising differences, have a powerful effect on how we think about music and what we ultimately write. I’d love to learn Ableton and see how my music changes.

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

I think the key idea right now is to explore the intersection between different genres, cultures, peoples.

I’m of the morbid opinion that if you’re using 12 tones, the notes and chords have already been discovered and the frontier lies in arrangement, how it’s produced / recorded / edited, and stylistic juxtapositions.

This again underlines the importance of listening to lots of music.

Paul Simon has been quoted as claiming that “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 read once that what defines a film is its tone, I think Paul Simon is saying the same thing about music. I think for any ‘recorded’ media, it’s absolutely true - the summing of all parts that leads to an overall ‘tone’ or ‘sound’ is what ultimately renders a final impression on the audience.

If you took the same performance of a Mozart piece recorded in the 90s on Deutsche Grammaphon and instead of using a decca tree close mic-d everyone with ribbon mics, you’d have a very vibey more neo classical modern style recording. It would also feel more intimate and less distant, perhaps less ‘elitist’ too. Dialling in the ‘sound’ of things, could lead to whole new discoveries.

For my music specially, I’m in a ‘neo-classical’ moment right now but when it comes time to engineer and mix, I want someone to be able to talk about a My Bloody Valentine record just as much as their able to talk about a DG release. I want the final recordings to feel unplaceable: a mix of modern and old approaches, with a heavy dose of experimentation.

Sound, song, and rhythm are all around us, from animal noises to forces of nature. 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”?

Probably the most moving would be that of the ocean, the sound of waves crashing can go from pleasant and serene to terrifying and formidable, both sounds oddly enough leaving us with the sense that we’re an incredibly small part of the universe.

All of it is musical to me though, from the sound insects make to hearing the sound from a black hole. It may not feel composed, but things that feel composed are the work of humans.

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?

I love the extremes and I feel drawn to both. That said, for where I’m at in my life, I feel like they’re more reference points.

Loud aggressive music feels more like unbridled anxious youth, and while there may be some of that still in me, I’m slowly gravitating towards the serene, calm of ambience.

That said, I have two kids, so I’m in neither world.

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

I try and structure things differently every time, otherwise I get bored. So I’m constantly thinking about how different genres approach things.

As a result, I don’t expect things to be easy.

Science and art have certain overlaps and similarities. Do you think "objectivity" has a place in art and do you conduct “experiments” or make use of scientific insights when you're making music?

Not really, but regardless I think it’s hard enough to confront the ultimate objectivity within one’s own ‘subjectivity’.

So perhaps I’m just conducting experiments on myself to figure out what it is I really like and can ultimately stand behind.

Seeing, smelling, touching, tasting – which of these sense impressions have the strongest points of contact with your hearing/listening experience?

I guess it would have to be seeing just coz music mostly is a solitary journey for me. Not all the times, but most of the time.

Does the way you make music reflect on the way you live your life? And vice versa, can we learn lessons about life by understanding music on a deeper level?

Music is absolutely an expression of how you live your life and therefore we can of course learn lessons about life / other lives by understanding music on a deeper level. Take religious music for example.

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?

Completely different, and everything.

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. Conversely, many popular love songs leave me cold. Do you have similar paradoxical examples - and why, do you think, is the same piece of music capable of conjuring such vastly different responses in different listeners?

Of course. Particularly ‘popular’ music coz popular music is just as much about being at the centre of a cultural moment as it is about musical construction.

So if you weren’t in Germany / Europe during the early 70s to experience Krautrock, you probably don’t feel that strongly about it. Same goes for modern styles like say, PC music: if you weren’t in college in the 2010s, odds are you don’t get it.

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

We’re seeing the championing of more cultures now - that is incredibly important to me. My wish is for it to flourish as it should.