Name: Fiona Kraft
Occupation: DJ, producer
Nationality: French
Recommendations: Listen to Carl Craig’s album Versus and go and see Rapimento di Proserpina by Bernini in real life.

If you enjoyed this Fiona Kraft interview and would like to stay up to date with her music and current live dates, visit her official website. She is also on Instagram, Facebook, and Soundcloud.

What made it appealing to you to DJ yourself? What was it that you wanted to express and what, did you feel, did you have to add artistically?

Since my teenage years I was attracted to deejaying and I knew that it was matter of time I’d start to play. This year it has been 10 years since I started playing.

I have always loved music since my childhood. Probably what triggered me the most were childhood memories of my parents listening to the music with their friends. So I grew up wanting to share the music I loved with others.

With my sets I aim to tell the story, to take people on a trip. I combine the different musical worlds and bring the people with me.

Which other DJs were important for your development and what did you learn from them?

I was always more inspired by live acts than DJs. My development as a DJ goes mainly through the work in the studio, actually.

I see my sets more as 2 or 3 hour long tracks that I’m arranging live …

What does a great DJ add to the clubbing experience?

The DJ needs to have a vision of where she/he wants to take the dancers. To create a world of emotions.
 
Do you think that DJing creates a new form that can take on the qualities of a composition in its own right? Is this something you strive for?

Absolutely! DJing is a form of artistic expression in its own right. That's what I strive for always.

But we need to separate entertainment DJs and DJs that construct their sets with a message to the listeners and dancers.

When digging for music to play at your sets, what do you listen for?

I’ll be listening mainly to any forms of Afro House and Deep House. But I always look for gems in Progressive and Indie Dance as well as these soundscapes are giving my sets the edge.

How would you describe the experience of DJing, physically and mentally? Do you listen – and DJ - with your eyes open or closed?

When I step in the DJ booth I don’t do many calculations I try to sense the people and then I imagine the possible musical paths we can all experience together. Sometimes it’s very demanding mentally and physically, other times it’s just perfect combination of all the elements.

I’d usually close my eyes and follow the “force”. For me DJing is always special. I have many mini rituals before the show.

How does the decision making process work during a gig with regards to the inclusion of key records, the next transition and where you want the set to go? How far do you tend to plan ahead during a set?

If by key records you mean like “my last record that I just released” or “some big name unreleased bomb track” I actually never plan them. So I don’t go up there in the booth and try to navigate the people to something I fixed before. It’s a very good exercise for the DJ early on in their career but I don’t play like that. It doesn’t appear sincere to me to play that way.

Usually I’d have my manager asking me after my sets something like “why haven’t you played your last track?” Or “have you tested this or that” … My answer is often that there wasn’t the right moment for that record … this tells you everything about my DJ set thought process.

I play for the dance floor so all my choices are done right there on the spot. There is no rehearsal for the real life experience for me.

When you're DJing, does it actually feel like you're inventing something on the spot – or are you inventively re-arranging patterns from preparations, practise or previous performances?

DJing is actually building one’s vocabulary so it’s inevitable to bring something out again and again.

But it all depends of how often I play and how much time I have for record digging, if I have time to process all the new music I select. The less often I play, the fresher I become more in therms of this vocabulary.

But also, the more often I play, the sharper I get with my current selection.

Describe how the presence of audiences/dancers influences your mixing. How do you engage with them?

It influences me greatly. It all depends of the event … how far or close I am to them physically, whether am I alone in the DJ booth etc …

Sometimes if I feel physically far from them, if I’m on the big stage, I'll try to use my body and hands to engage with them. If it's more intimate and we are all close then everything is more intense - every little thing counts.

Online DJ mixes, created in the studio as a solitary event, have become ubiquitous. From your experience with the format, how does the experience and the way you DJ when you subtract the audience?

It’s a different thing to mix alone at home. It’s also an opportunity to do something different because there is no interaction.

It’s a good way to express yourself.

Technology has continually taken on more steps of DJing, producing and other "creative" tasks. From your point of view, where does "technology" end and "creativity" begin? Especially in the light of advances in AI, where do you see the role of humans in DJing versus that of technology?

There would be no DJing without technology and technological progress. DJs have two things to master: Music selection and technical skills, so I think that no matter the technological progress the DJ will always ride the technology.

We have had AI involved in creating playlists on Spotify for some time now, also YouTube is constantly recommending the next video. This things clearly work very well, but as far as DJing is concerned, direct human interaction and the ability to feel emotions are creating different experiences on the dance floor.

There is an energy exchange between the dancers and the DJ. What line of code can substitute that?

Collaboration is a key part of almost every aspect of music making, but it is stil rare in DJing. Do you have an idea why this is? Tell me about your own views on back-to-back DJing, interactions with live musicians or other forms of turning DJing into a more collective process.

From where I stand it’s a very intimate thing. I did some b2b that I didn’t enjoy at all, but others were almost out of body experiences.

To me b2b makes sense only if the DJs have respect for each other musically and they care to follow each other into new territories. Actually b2b is like a musical dialog. And in order to craft a beautiful b2b set you need to have DJ partners that are able to speak the same language - and by that I don’t mean the same genre.

DJing requires empathy, focus, time management, patience, and vision, among others. Are you finding that the way you play influences the way your life your life and vice versa?

My way of playing in no way influences my way of living - I rather think it is the opposite. This is an interesting question.

Do you feel as though DJing 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?

The level of emotion and energy that are transmitted by music is incomparable to making a great small daily joie de vivre.

Let's imagine you lost all your music for one night and all there is left at the venue is a crate of records containing a random selection of music. How would you approach this set?

Actually that happened last year at Watergate in Berlin. I was playing upstairs in the main room and for some reason my USB sticks didn’t work at all. So all I had were 10/12 tracks that the CDJs were somehow still showing from my old backup USB stick.

These tracks were so random and some of them I actually never played or probably listened so I turned down the monitors and I listened to them on headphones while the first few tracks were going. I did the best with what I had. There was a lot of looping and deconstructing in the process to make them sound differently. It was my first time playing Watergate and honestly I wouldn’t like to find myself in that situation again.

Funny enough I’m now represented by the Watergate agency - so I guess it went very well. :)