Name: Vinny Golia
Occupation: Multi-Instrumentalist, composer, improviser
Nationality: American
Current release: Vinny Golia's Even to This Day - Music For Orchestra and Soloists is out now. A sprawling 110 movement work, it features contributions by a large cast of collaborators.

If you enjoyed this Vinny Golia interview and would like to stay up to date with his music and projects, visit his official homepage.

Over the course of his career, Vinny Golia has worked with a wide range of artists, including Patrick Shiroishi, Nels Cline, Darius Jones, Theresa Wong, Chas Smith, and Ulrich Krieger.

[Read our Patrick Shiroishi interview about improvisation]
[Read our Patrick Shiroishi interview about collaboration]
[Read our Nels Cline interview]
[Read our Darius Jones interview]
[Read our Theresa Wong interview about Alternative Tuning Systems]
[Read our Theresa Wong interview about her album Practicing Sands]
[Read our Chas Smith interview]
[Read our Ulrich Krieger interview]
[Read our Ulrich Krieger interview about Alternative Tuning Systems]



Where does the impulse to create something come from for you? What role do often-quoted sources of inspiration like dreams, other forms of art, personal relationships, politics etc play?

Everything you experience will show up sooner or later, maybe you had a friend that walked a certain way and that became a vamp or ostinato you like. Could be someones speech pattern A way they play or maybe you found out they were ill.

Maybe it’s a memory of a place, a sound or a smell, or it’s how someone touched you. A story, the news, the state of the planet, watching an event, being forced to stay in your homes because of a virus, feeling helpless to do anything you feel is meaningful.

Everything your life gives you is fodder to create, something you can give back to the universe.

The Even to this day, series of compositions is a good example of all these thing.



For you to get started, do there need to be concrete ideas – or what some have called a visualisation of the finished work? What does the balance between planning and chance look like for you?

All of the above and none of the above apply. You really have to be ready for anything, and the only way to do that is to be receptive to everything that comes your way.

You met people, and get put in circumstances for a reason. We do not know what the reasons are, but we can define them by interpreting these encounters and transmuting the energy into positive imagery.

I prefer to do this with sound at the moment but earlier in life I chose visual means. An artist job is to assimilate, interpret and communicate what they see or hear and feel. There cannot be a one size fits all to do lasting, important, work.

And, as an aside it’s not up to us to say what is lasting, important work, our purpose is to do the work.

Is there a preparation phase for your process? Do you require your tools to be laid out in a particular way, for example, do you need to do research, or create early versions?

I don’t think so, things can’t be too precious or you never get anything done. I do like to have good instruments and it took a long time to amass the collection of horns, gongs, bells and sample instruments I use.

I also read a lot of books and watch movies, I like to have the books and dvds etc, so I can pull things out for reference in a hurry. If not I go online or to the library to find information. Clarity I is important, even if it breeds confusion.

Do you have certain rituals to get you into the right mindset for creating? What role do certain foods or stimulants like coffee, lighting, scents, exercise or reading poetry play?

None that I am aware of.

I have a studio area for composition and a space to practice in. It’s really all I need besides a certain amount of time to myself

What do you start with? How difficult is that first line of text, the first note?

I start by starting, I have notes, sketches, a back log of ideas, or maybe something comes while practicing. I have pads around the house where I can jot ideas down quickly, even if I go on a walk I can sing into the phone. The only time it’s difficult to start a piece is when I don’t want to.

There’s always a battle if I’m performing a lot I have to address the instruments which means less time to compose, the reverse is also true. Sometimes false deadlines make my brain sluggish, so I have to buckle down if I need something by a certain time.

To quote a question by the great Bruce Duffie: When you come up with a musical idea, have you created the idea or have you discovered the idea? Once you’ve started, how does the work gradually emerge?

We practice to be receptors to all these ideas floating around in our world. We practice to learn how to be open and how to respond quickly once an idea has entered us. Anything can trigger this event, nature, walking driving, listening to an artist you admire, seeing something that terrifies you or cajoles you.

Maybe it’s wanting to do a project with an artist you have not met yet but know of, so many ways to get the initial idea. Then the hard part, we need to keep that idea as pure as we can to get the true essence of what we hear, or how we hear that idea.

I like to jot down a sketch as soon as I hear something that attracts me or if I get a sonic response by looking at something. I think being a visual artist as my primary background helps a great deal here. Then I sing the sketch a lot to get the melody engrained in my conciseness so I can not be swayed by the technical aspect of writing or playing.

Many writers have claimed that as soon as they enter into the process, certain aspects of the narrative are out of their hands. Do you like to keep strict control or is there a sense of following things where they lead you?

I can follow the process but I am usually referring to the original idea. Some times process takes over, or familiarity comes to the fore.

How many tunes are written at 120 BPM because that is the default tempo of computer notation programs. Sometimes the process leads to use doing the same thing over and over again, or maybe your ensemble demands a certain style of music, so you constantly rewriting the same tune, these are things we must be aware of as a performer/composer. So constant reevaluation is important.

Here for musical examples, I’ d use something from one of my quintet albums like Abstractions & Causalities, or Trajectory.



Often, while writing, new ideas and alternative roads will open themselves up, pulling and pushing the creator in a different direction. Does this happen to you, too, and how do you deal with it? What do you do with these ideas?

Yes! Well, this is what we want. No? New ideas, leaving the safe zone? This is the test to see if you are a stylist or an innovator. Can you expand your horizons to create new work, create a larger base to work from, if so, what could be better?

Is it difficult to function in unfamiliar areas ? Yes! You cannot rely on your old tricks when you do not know if the soil you are standing on is firm. This is a painful yet glorious place to be.

It’s not an easy place, and sometimes not even rewarding because every time you achieve a plateau. Another appears on the horizon and the quest continues.

There are many descriptions of the creative state. How would you describe it for you personally? Is there an element of spirituality to what you do?

I try to strive to have an element of spirituality in everything. It’s not easy but I try.

Once a piece is finished, how important is it for you to let it lie and evaluate it later on? How much improvement and refinement do you personally allow until you’re satisfied with a piece? What does this process look like in practise?

Honestly, I am never really satisfied with a piece, either I see or hear something that would change it to be better in my eyes and I shelve it or create another piece to build on that foundation, occasionally I will tuck it away and work on it later. But if that project is looming over me I will stay on it until I feel it’s finished..

In practice the process looks like mounds of papers and notes, canvases and drawings, scribble and unintelligible notes to oneself. It’s a lot of time spent by yourself in a room, with an instrument or a computer, or both, this process puts a huge strain on relationships, as this is the most important thing-at that moment, and in turn is very lonely.

Before covid I was not one to go back to pieces, but as I was archiving some of the material, or backing it up, I revisited a lot of the music I had written and started to do some revision by using the material for different orchestrations, or different ensembles.

Right now I am working on a piece that was for solo vibraphone, but now has become a dual piece for string quartet and string orchestra. This idea of revisiting opened a lot of doors for me that I had forgotten about, these doors led to rooms where I found a lot ideas I could refresh.

What’s your take on the role and importance of production, including mixing and mastering for you personally? How involved do you get in this?

Amazingly important! It’s an area that people like Amad Jamal and Charles Mingus explored but I think the audience was unaware of these major innovations at the time.

When I was working more in film, I learned the ultra importance of production. Even when I started producing, with the help of people like Nels Cline and Wayne Peet, I learned the studio was a separate entity, it really was a different space than a performance.

An album has two purposes, either it was an album of documentation, a live group performance or representation of what the ensemble sounds like, (ex. The Vinny Golia New Music Orchestra-Live at Redcat), or it was a studio product, with overdubbing or sonic enhancements, (ex. Music for Strings, Piano, Woodwinds and Percussion). So learning about overdubbing, reverbs, panning, on and on, all were handy tools for big projects like movie scores or even the Even to this Day: Music for soloists and orchestra release.



Now I get rather involved, depending on the ensemble or project and what the purpose of the recording is.

After finishing a piece or album and releasing something into the world, there can be a sense of emptiness. Can you relate to this – and how do you return to the state of creativity after experiencing it?

That creative state never leaves people who create, they make think it’s gone but it is there all the time. It surfaces whenever you get inspired, and when you are not inspired it nags you to get inspired.

But there is also another area that creates that emptiness, and that is when you are ignored. An artist may work on their project a very long time, bring it to fruition, release it, and then no one notices. Maybe they do not have a following, or they are less experienced in how to release a project, or maybe they live in a geographic area that the press does not have arts coverage, or they just do not know what to do. A depression may set in, when no one responds, or there’s no critical assessment, the cycle of communication is not completed.

An artist needs that communication to grow. Your view of the world can get a little darker each time your project is ignored and this feeling can become malignant. It can attack everything you love.

By the way, combating this feeling with humor is good, we on the West coast would say, especially after a large project that took a half a year or a year to complete, “ok, let’s sit back and wait for the silence” … Sometimes returning to the creative bubble is you can do.

The first Movement of Even to this day … is a good example of being somewhat ignored on large scale works. Or the Vinny Golia Large Ensemble, an ongoing group of 50 players started in 1982.

Creativity can reach many different corners of our lives. Do you personally feel as though writing 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?

It’s exactly in these so called mundane areas that the tests of creativity lurk, especially if you think one task is above another.

All things are equal, we may have our areas that we enjoy but often in doing a task you do not like to do, that’s where we might find the next doorway into ourselves and further our creation. (And no one loves procrastination more than I do when it comes to those tasks)