Despite topping over one million world‑wide album sales with an established record label, America's First Lady of New Age music, Suzanne Ciani, has opted for an alternative independent route. Jonathan Miller asks why...
Since last time SOS talked to her, back in May 1994, US contemporary composer Suzanne Ciani has undergone immense upheavals, both musically and privately. By ending her long‑standing relationship with Private Music, arguably the world's premier New Age music label, which has sold more than a million copies of her albums, some might say she is committing commercial suicide, forsaking guaranteed large recording advances in favour of going it alone.
In late 1994, Suzanne formed Seventh Wave, a new independent production company and record label in partnership with her husband Joe Anderson, who just happens to be an entertainment attorney. Dream Suite, their first release since the move, was recorded in Moscow with the 70‑piece Young Russian Orchestra, and was nominated for a National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences Award for Excellence (Grammy) for Best New Age Album in 1995.
May The Force Be With You
Never one to rest on her laurels, Suzanne has already released a Seventh Wave follow‑up, entitled Pianissimo II. Like 1990's Pianissimo, for Private, it is a solo piano album and features three new compositions alongside 12 of Suzanne's best‑loved melodies, including 'The Velocity Of Love,' which has come to be regarded by many as her signature theme, prompting Steve Feinstein at KKSF radio of San Francisco to observe, "As long as people fall in love, 'The Velocity Of Love' will remain one of the most moving contemporary instrumental songs of all time. Its heartfelt melody and magnificent arrangement make it a timeless classic."
Pianissimo II was performed on a one‑of‑a‑kind, hand‑built Yamaha CFIIIS nine‑foot concert grand piano and a seven‑foot Yamaha DC6 II Disklavier grand piano, at Star Wars creator George Lucas' prestigious Californian Skywalker Sound studio, in a "cathedral‑like room." Skywalker Sound is part of the Skywalker Ranch film complex — home to those very clever Industrial Light & Magic bods, whose special effects grace many of the world's top action movies — and was reputedly built especially for popular US vocalist Linda Rondstadt.
The CFIIIS was recorded using two B&K 4006 microphones, a Boulder mic preamp, and a DCS DCS900 24‑bit A/D converter, while the Disklavier was recorded using two Neumann M50 microphones. Recording was accomplished in24‑bit with a Tascam DA88 digital 8‑track and a Rane RC24T PAQRAT recording converter. Coincidentally, this allows 24‑bit recording in stereo on a DA88. The album was assembled and pre‑mastered with the Sonic Solutions Mac‑based audio editing system, which was created by James Moorer, a music software genius whom Suzanne knew from her days of studying computer music at Stanford University's Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. A Sony PCM9000 was used to finally transfer the album for mastering.
California Dreaming
Last time I interviewed Suzanne, it was in a nondescript Dutch hotel restaurant at the time of her well‑received headlining concert during the 1993 KLEMdag festival. This time, though, the setting for our talk was the much more inspiring one of her ocean‑side residence/studio, in the tiny North Californian coastal town of Bolinas. This undeniably quaint retreat is famed for being locked into a '70s time warp, its residents largely comprised of well‑to‑do former San Franciscan hippies. Not being too keen on tourists, the locals have gone as far as removing all the Bolinas road signs to prevent unwelcome visitors, but thanks to impeccable directions, I easily found Suzanne's home, where we sat down for a lengthy conversation about her new‑found freedom.
"The juncture really came around the Dream Suite album," Suzanne began. "I was planning to do an orchestral album, and when I proposed this to Private Music they said, 'Ah, but we don't want an orchestral album.' In the past I worked very independently with them. Basically, I delivered an album once a year and that was it. My albums are like my children and it's like giving away a child. Even though Private has five of my albums I thought, 'I just can't do it.' So I found myself between a rock and a hard place, where I wanted to go forward artistically, but I wasn't willing to give the album to someone who didn't want it. Thus was born this notion of going independent, but, first of all, I had to extricate myself from the Private situation and so forth."
Starrs In Their Eyes
Since Suzanne had always had a very positive business relationship with Private Music's founder and mentor, ex‑Tangerine Dream mainstay Peter Baumann, I was surprised at this unfortunate turn of events and wondered whether Peter could not have intervened on Suzanne's behalf. However, it transpired that his interest in the music industry was already rapidly diminishing, as first he made Private Music a public concern, with himself as the principal shareholder, before later selling his holdings.
Suzanne: "Peter had already pretty much withdrawn and was no longer around. There had been a lot of changes in that label, as you can see now. Basically, they switched gears, starting out as a kind of enlightened instrumental genre label, and then they got involved with the blues. They even signed Ringo Starr! I love Ringo, but I didn't feel that the label was even going in the same direction as myself anymore.
"I've always worked as a pure artist and never written into any kind of genre. I simply do what I'm up to next and if my label can't support me on that fundamental level of being the artist that I am, then it's time for a divorce — no hard feelings or anything. In fact, I think that [Private Music President] Ron Goldstein was quite a gentleman in the long run, in that he said, 'If you're really unhappy, then we're not going to stand in your way.'
"I think one of the things that also made it a little bit easier for me to get out was that they would have had to pay quite a bit to keep me for the two future albums for which I was still contractually tied."
Making Waves
"Joe [Suzanne's husband] was a litigation attorney — the kind of guy who goes to court and fights for things. He was defending insurance companies and these mega‑corporations against individuals and wasn't very happy about my situation. He's a powerful guy, but his first love really is music. He had a rock and roll band at that time, playing two or three nights a week in San Francisco, and he took one look at my record contract and said, 'My god, as a labour issue, I haven't seen a contract as bad since coal mining days in Virginia!' A little button was pushed within him and he said, 'You know, this is a field that needs me.'
"There are a lot of artists out here and I know them all, and their exploitation stories are the same. So with our new label we're committed to shifting the way a record label does business — with no evidence that it could work. Maybe we'd find out that you have to exploit the artist in order to really make a viable business, but I knew that in the long run this wouldn't work, because when an artist becomes unsupported and unhappy, they cease to produce. Patrick O'Hearn left Private for similar reasons. In fact, I think he had a worse time than I did and was more hurt because he was with them from the beginning.
"The music business has a way of operating: most of the attorneys are paid the big bucks by the labels, so all artists are represented by attorneys whose first allegiance really is to the label. So Joe said, 'Look, I'm not going to represent the labels — just my own — and I'll represent the artist without any conflicting interests.' He wrote an article that was published in a legal journal exposing this conflict, and we tried to make some waves. It's time for a shift and that's our commitment."
Independence Day
This is all well and good, but an obvious question at this point in the proceedings is whether Suzanne was at all worried about the gruelling prospect of Seventh Wave attempting to match Private Music's long established, powerful network of distribution through BMG.
"Well, my first two albums were self‑produced, and I would have loved to have started a label even back then. I already had my businesswoman side, but I think New York City was just the wrong place to nurture New Age music, even though 'New Age' wasn't the term then. It was 'Classically‑Inspired Instrumental Music.'
"We're lucky now because independent distribution has grown tremendously. Five years ago, if you wanted to be independent you had to make separate deals. Just for the United States you had to make five separate deals — the West Coast; the South; the mid‑West; the East, or whatever. Everything was regional and it wasn't organised. Now we've had these conglomerate takeovers and mergers, so there are now internationally‑viable independent distribution systems. They're not as large as the majors, but they're pretty damn close.
"We still have to get, for the most part, independent distribution for foreign territories and it makes more work, but, on the other hand, it's effective. BMG might have had my stuff for the whole world, but I've always had a big following in Spain, for example, and not so much in France, so what good did it do?"
Concerning the issue of territorial divides, I asked Suzanne why she felt her music has proved so popular in Spain, where she has completed two extensive tours in recent years. After all, surely there can be no language barrier with instrumental music?
"Well, I've noticed that the phenomenon of this so‑called 'New Age' music — and I use the term very advisedly — does make inroads at different times in different places. There was a person named Ramon Trecet, who's a very powerful media person in Spain, who loved my music. Ramon had a TV show and put my videos on TV. I didn't even know about this until I was invited to come and do some concerts in Spain.
"I had no idea that I had such a following in Spain and of course you never find out from your record company because your foreign figures are always ridiculous. They don't pay you and that was another one of my real dissatisfactions — the fact that in a foreign country a CD might cost $30 retail and I was getting half of what I would get for an album in the United States! Explain that?
"The artist is an afterthought in the financial existence of a record. I used to cry because I did all these sold‑out concerts in Spain, signing autographs for all these fans who would proudly come up thinking they were supporting you by buying your albums. I can say now that that is the case, but at that time they were supporting BMG, they weren't supporting me. So there was a lot of unhappiness there that made me want to adjust the experience. Now I go to Spain and I feel good."
Electric Becomes Eclectic
At this point, I steered our conversation onto Suzanne's new music by asking if she sees a continuation between Dream Suite and her past releases with Private Music, despite their reservations about its orchestral nature.
"I've got a long career, so my music is all related, but I think the idea for me to do an orchestral acoustic album was a surprise, because for years I had been heavily into electronic music and my ear was not satisfied by an acoustic sound. There was always something missing.
"On the other hand, electronics has changed quite a bit over the years and my ear longed for something with a little bit more refinement than I felt was achievable in the electronic medium. Even on the early albums with the analogue synths, I've always tried to find that level of depth, nuance, sophistication. Sometimes it's a lot of work to imbue that medium with all of those qualities. I guess it just became more and more work and therefore impossible.
"I wouldn't want to qualify electronics as a cheap medium. Basically, it's what you do with it that's important. But if the sound that you're talking about is orchestral, I don't care how hard you work at reproducing an orchestra electronically, you're gonna come up short. So if your goal is the orchestral domain, you're better off by far working with an orchestra.
"I considered at the time that I would add synths to Dream Suite, but in the end I was actually a bit overwhelmed by the beauty of the playing of the Russian musicians."
From Russia With Love
Suzanne then went on to explain how she came to record in Moscow with the Young Russian Orchestra: "I was starting to look for an orchestra and I'd heard that there was a lot of orchestras in the former communist countries that were now open. So I just started networking and making contacts. I found a guy in New York who said, 'Sure, I can get you an orchestra in Moscow. I can get you any one of 70 orchestras! What would you like?' And I said I wanted a youth orchestra.
"Everybody said if you're going to do an orchestral album then you should just go and use the London Symphony Orchestra like everybody else. But I thought I didn't want my music to be just like one more job to them, because the emotional aspect is too important — not that they don't do a wonderful job, but my music is very personal. It depends on that emotional message and I just knew I would get that from these young, sensitive and highly‑trained Russian musicians.
"The legacy of the communist countries musically is tremendous and now it's available to us, which is a privilege — to work with these people who have been supported all their lives since they were infants. Now they have no more state support. This wonderful resource is going to disappear and, in fact, is already disappearing. A lot of those musicians have migrated to the United States and any other orchestras where they can actually make a living, so I felt that for me to be able to take advantage of that moment was really a privilege."
On the downside, the fall of communism has also had a detrimental effect on the everyday lives of Moscow's general public, with an appalling rise in drug trafficking and inner city violence, for example. Were there any hairy moments during the Dream Suite recording sessions at the Mosfilm studio complex?
"I had such fears about going to Russia. I brought my own recording tape and almost — and should have — brought my own toilet paper! I didn't know what to expect, but I got to Moscow and the studio is the most incredible studio that one could ever want. Russia's filled with wood and this enormous studio is covered with beautiful resonant wood throughout. It was the most incredible studio I've ever worked in, in that medium."
I assumed the recording equipment at Mosfilm to be of Western origin: "Well, they did say that they had a digital recorder and when I got there it turns out they didn't! It was just there on loan from a Japanese person who'd brought one in one day. In a way that was better, because I recorded on analogue and I'm really happy because I might not have made that choice if they'd had the digital machine. Analogue really does make a difference — the warmth is wonderful.
"When I got to Capri Digital [Studios in Capri, Italy] I went over to 48‑track digital for the ease of editing and I added my piano and whatever else I needed to do. As producer, that was necessary because I really needed to be in the booth as these things move fast and furiously. I brought my little PowerBook computer to Moscow and I had all the pieces in the PowerBook, so the conductor actually conducted to a click that I designed. So all the tempi were kind of set and that allowed me to add synth later, if I wanted to."
I Second That Emotion
Coming full circle, we arrived at Pianissimo II. Suzanne: "Because I'm living here, my involvement with the piano is conditioned by this lifestyle. I'm far away from the music industry and I pretty much live with my piano. My first piano album, Pianissimo, was one of my biggest‑selling albums. I didn't understand why, because here I was devoting my life to furthering the art of electronics, then I toss off an acoustic piano album and everybody goes, 'Yes! Yes!'
"And I have to say that influenced me, because people hear differently and, in fact, hearing is an educated response. I can't expect my audience to hear electronic music the same way as I do — they're not interested in that level. There's a gap between what excites me and what excites them. The way I might say, 'Wow, listen to that vocoder patch!' simply isn't in their world.
"Parenthetically, a long time ago I studied Indian music. I remember before I studied it I'd put on a Indian record and it would all sound the same to me. After studying, I was able to make all the distinctions. It was a big lesson to me because I realised that there is no absolute about the way people hear. Who knows what people are hearing? But I do think that the emotional message should communicate, regardless of anything else. I get excited about 24‑bit and all of that, but I know that the real goal is to make an emotional communication.
"Getting back to the Pianissimo concept, the piano is such a different emotional medium. It's so intimate. Doing a piece one way and then hearing it kind of naked on the piano is just a wonderful thing. Some people might say, 'Are you giving us new pieces or are you just redoing all those old ones?' But for me it's another expression completely. You're totally involved in the performance, and it was emotionally quite draining for me because it was such an intense focus."
Kurzweil Konvert
Evidently this lengthy ongoing project will involve Suzanne reverting back to her compact and bijou collection of electronic instruments, with the
88‑note Kurzweil K2500 taking centre stage as the master keyboard controller: "I used to have these very strong opinions about different manufacturers and I always said I'd never use a Kurzweil. I just didn't like the sound. Then when I moved into this house, before I had my equipment sent from New York, Joe loaned me his Kurzweil, and it won me over. I started investigating, got involved and started talking with the Kurzweil people. I found them to be a very dedicated and excellent company. I like the way they do business and where they're coming from. They really do care, and the K2500 and K2000 are both sophisticated instruments with a lot of depth. So I'm a Kurzweil convert!
"I'm very fond of these 'orchestras‑in‑a‑box' like the Proteus 2 — on which I wrote Dream Suite — and I'm trying out Roland's new MCC10 Orchestral module at the moment. I get a big kick out of opening up something and taking out an instrument that weighs only 10 ounces! I want something which I can carry over my shoulder, so I've just got a tiny little portable Korg, because one of my needs is to be able to write whilst on the road. I like Korg machines too. I like the company and what they do.
"One of my main tools is still the Disklavier MIDI piano. I just sketch into that all the time. It makes me confident that a fleeting idea won't disappear. I like using all the tools. It makes life much easier. I'll sketch something in the Disklavier, then I'll listen to it; play it on the Kurzweil into the computer; print it out; play with it some more; write in changes and corrections; play it in again; take it apart; reorganise the architecture of the piece by saying, 'This verse should be here,' or whatever."
Clearly Suzanne's not about to hang up her MIDI leads just yet!
New Age, New Media
Although originally released on Seventh Wave as a standard CD in 1994, Dream Suite was swiftly reissued the following year as a 'Multimedia Enhanced' version with an additional track of Macintosh and MPC‑compatible i‑trax data.
The multimedia presentation begins with a static reproduction of the album sleeve artwork, the creation of Suzanne's sister and favourite artist, Mary. Suzanne also designed some of the backgrounds herself, getting involved in Adobe Photoshop which she found, "very similar to the thinking in audio synthesis." The CD features, amongst other things, short video clips of Suzanne and the Young Russian Orchestra in action at Mosfilm Studios in Moscow, and an interview with Suzanne at her "spiritual home" of Capri in Italy — where Dream Suite was mixed. Here users are encouraged by Suzanne to, "click on any of the icons to hear more about each song in Dream Suite." Excerpts from the chosen track are then played.
A review in US CD‑ROM Today magazine concludes, "Ciani deserves a lot of credit for making the most of the medium." There are, however, a couple of minor programming flaws in the production, unlike its more impressive Pianissimo II sibling, produced by the same team.
As Suzanne says, "I've been a tech‑buff all my life, and even though I'm working in an acoustic domain now, my love for technology is still there. Many, many man hours go into this because we wanted it to be more than just a replica of the liner notes, which is kind of the in‑fashion mode of doing these things."
A trip through the multimedia section of Pianissimo II is both entertaining and educational, as Suzanne introduces you to a brief history of the piano from occasional SOS contributor David Crombie's book, The Piano, shows you the actual music notation of her compositions in 'follow‑the‑bouncing‑ball' fashion as the music plays, and takes you behind the scenes to the recording of the album.
Seventh Wave On The 'Net
"I think it's very, very important [to have an Internet presence]. We like to deal on an international level and it collapses the universe. I get email from all over the planet every day. I'll have friends telling me what's going in Chile, say, and whether the record stores have my albums. Fans are very supportive. They're very up‑front and we appreciate their help. Now that I'm running an independent label, it's a whole different ball game and it does mean something and make a difference to me, my art and my life — not just to BMG!
"Joe [Anderson] masterminded our Web Page and we put some samples of music in there. Now that we have a label with new releases all the time we have to update it pretty frequently — maybe on a monthly basis."