Interview e - Nigel Sixsmith
Today “Mag66″ aka Nigel Sixsmith is guest at blogasys.
blogasys: What is “Mag66″ standing for?
Nigel: The mag66 nym comes from the fact that when I was six I started to read magazines, lots of them and have done so ever since… and so my close family always called me the “magazine boy”. Years later when I first got interested in Usenet, I had to think of a nym to use and so I chose mag66 as in (mag)azine, the age I started reading ‘6′ and my last name Sixsmith giving the other ‘6′!
blogasys: Could you please tell us a little bit more about yourself?
Mag66: I’m an ‘Ex-Brit’ born in England in 1957 who moved permanently to the USA in 1996. I spent my childhood in a small village about 100 miles north of London and then at the age of 15, joined the British Army as a Musician. During my Army years, I studied at the Military School of Music at Knellar Hall, and then spent a great deal of time traveling around the world, meeting and playing with all kinds of different musicians and bands. After I left the Army, I settled for a few years in London, working at various studios as a session musician as well as starting up our own studio, The Art of Sound, dedicated to introducing young musicians to the synthesizer. I now live in Arizona with my partner, Brenda, our 16 year old son Chris and our dog, Hoss.
blogasys: What is your musical background?
Mag 66: My musical background is quite varied, I would guess you could say. My mother was responsible for getting me started down the musical path by arranging for me to have piano lessons when I was 5 or 6. My first experience with a keyboard was by my sneaking into a local Methodist Chapel, when the Preacher was not around after school and playing “Rock & Roll” on a very old foot pump action church organ! Unfortunately, one day the Preacher caught me but instead of being (too) annoyed, he simply told me that if I agreed to play every Sunday at his services, then I could spend one afternoon a week, after school, playing whatever I liked on the Chapel Organ. So began my brief career, at the age of 9 as a Church Organist!
At age 11, I was sent to a new school, Arthur Mellows Village College and it was there that I met the most amazing music teacher, Malcolm Stowell Smith. He auditioned me for the school orchestra and band and promptly convinced my parents that I should learn to play, of all things, the Tuba!! Next thing I know, I am hauling this huge brass instrument around all over the country, playing at various concerts with different bands and orchestras and even managed to do a few solo performances here and there, which for a Tuba player, was pretty rare (and very strange!) Malcolm also encouraged me to sing as at that time of my life, I had this (apparently) quite angelic, though deep´ish voice so I started to sing in various productions of operas and operettas as well as taking part in competitions around the country.
Sadly, Malcolm, for reasons unknown, suddenly decided to leave the school after 3 years and teach somewhere else and after that (and after the fact that at 14, my voice didn´t exactly break but shattered into a thousand pieces) my singing career was over and so it was back to hauling around the Tuba again.
I joined the British Army, as I mentioned earlier, as a Tuba player, Double Bass player and Pianist/Accompanist, shortly after my fifteenth birthday and studied for my Music Degrees in both Performance and Theory. It was on a trip back home shortly after I joined, that I had my first experience of a synthesizer. An old school friend of mine, Tom Anniss, introduced me, via a very scratchy recording, to Walter/Wendy Carlos’s soundtrack to “A Clockwork Orange” as well as the “Well Tempered Synthesizer” and I was hooked on synthesizers for life. I knew then, that I had to buy one and I set my sights on getting a Minimoog as soon as I could. However, being still in the Army meant I had very little money and so, my dreams of owning a Moog had to be put on hold until several years later when I finally managed to buy myself a used one from a close friend of mine. Instead, I bought myself one of the first Korg MS-10s to arrive on the English shores. I still had to take out a couple of loans at outrageous interest rates, to be able to afford it (and it took me several years before I ever finally finished paying off those loans too!) but I finally had my hands on a working synthesizer!
After a few months of owning and diligently studying this new synth, and being sick to death of playing “Umm Pah Umm Pah” on the Tuba, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with the military band, I convinced my commanding officer to allow me to play synth with the band resulting in my playing “lead guitar” sounds at a couple of concerts of “Modern Pop Songs” as well as “Sound Effects and Gun Fire” during a performance and recording of the 1812 Overture!
My time with the Army was rapidly coming to an end however and so I after I resigned I joined a group of traveling musicians who performed at several free festivals around Europe and with my trusty MS-10 (and a portable generator and Amp) in hand, I began to find gigs with many bands of the time such as Hawkwind at the Windsor Free Festival or Gong at the ´77 Live Reunion gig, to name but a few. I was the nameless, crazy, hippy, synth player who stayed mainly off at the back of the stage, making all these weird and strange sounds from my “box of tricks” while the bands played to their audiences.
Since then, I have done session work in various studios in England and the USA, I helped found a studio, called The Art Of Sound, as mentioned earlier, moved to the USA and began working on just my own music and I have never quite lost my love (Obsession) for synthesizers.
blogasys: Which musicians influenced you most?
Influences? So many but I guess I should mention the following people:
Walter/Wendy Carlos, who started off my obsessions with synths. Roger Powell of Todd Rundgren & Utopia fame, because of the way he put together these incredible keyboard/synth rigs for live stage work and was an amazing synthetic sound creator too. (He also is a mighty fine computer programmer and was responsible for the first PC Midi Sequencer program written for the Apple II, which was called “Texture”).
David Sancious (Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Peter Gabriel, Sting, etc.) who was the first person I ever saw play live who recreated and performed guitar lead lines on a Minimoog. Kate Bush. The way she writes and creates her music set the standards by which I have tried to follow. Peter Gabriel’s Textures, textures and textures. How he creates those incredible pads, harmonies and “quirky” effects used throughout his music, is something I have always found myself striving to emulate.
The Edge (U2) I just love his guitar work and the way he produces these amazing guitar sounds and uses them, in really interesting counterpoint melodies, in the most unlikely ways, within the rock framework of U2’s music. Steve Hillage, Daevid Allen, Miquette Giraudy and of course, Tim Blake of “Gong” fame, for introducing me to the wonders of step sequencers, poly rhythms and evolving textures.
blogasys: What kind of music are you listening today?
Nigel: The current playlist for my car’s MP3 player, has amongst others, currently stored in it;
Kate Bush, especially her last album, Aerial, which I have listened literally thousands of times by now and even though it was released in 2005, I still find myself listening to at least once or twice a week. The Fray, who I think are one of the most under-appreciated bands of the current times (even though they did score a huge hit with “How to save a life”!). John Meyer’s Continuum album, I love the way he puts together great but simple melodies with wonderful (and at times funny or sharp) lyrics. The Beatles ” Love ” Amazing re-workings of some classic songs. Various tracks from Artists on Soundclick.com - There is some incredible talent out there, undiscovered by the masses and I am lucky enough, with the advent of such places as SoundClick, to be able to listen to and share music with all these people.
blogasys: Now lets talk about your music, are there any projects you finished and is there a current one you are working on?
Mag66: I am currently putting the final touches to my album “An Oasys in the Desert” which I am now hoping to release sometimes around April (But don´t hold me to that date!) It´s an album of music, I have written, performed and recorded since I got my Korg Oasys, I use only the Oasys for every sound recorded so it´s a kind of history of my exploration and understanding of one of the classic Keyboards available today.
blogasys: Which equipment did you use and why?
Mag66: For recoding, just the Oasys. Nothing else. The Oasys is just this incredible keyboard which inspires me every time I sit down in front of it. I just had to write music using this amazing keyboard and so the new album is the result of all this inspiration and time I have spent learning and enjoying the Oasys.
blogasys: But there are more synthesizers then the OASYS in your studio
Mag 66: : I am one of those people who could never afford the keyboards that I really wanted when they first came out so I always had to settle for a cheaper alternative like buying a MS10 when I really wanted a Minimoog… or an EMS Polysynthi when I really wanted a CS-80.
The JD800 was the first synth I bought new when it was released. I played one in a store in London and knew I had to have one. I just loved all the sliders and the sounds you could create using such a tactile work surface so, as I had just sold my house and had a little money left over, I went and bought my first JD800. It became my main polysynth until the release of the Oasys (though I did often use the Triton and Karma a great deal too).
Here is a list of what synths and keyboards I have owned and in what order I bought them:
** indicates I still own this particular synth
(N) = Bought New
(U) = Bought Used
Korg MS-10 (N)
EMS Synthi E (U)
EMS Polysynthi (U)
Korg MS-20 (U)
Roland Jupiter 4 (U)
**Minimoog (N)
EDP Wasp (U)
Polymoog Keyboard (U)
SC Prophet 5 (U)
ARP Odyessy (U)
Yamaha CS-60 (U)
Yamaha CS-80 (U)
EDP Caterpillar (U)
Polymoog (U)
Korg PolySix (N)
**Roland Jupiter 8 (U)
Fender Rhodes (U)
Moog Taurus Pedals (U)
Casio CZ 101 (N)
Moog Memorymoog (U)
**Casio AZ-1 (N)
Korg Delta (U)
Rhodes Chroma (U)
Korg M1 (N)
Yamaha DX21 (U)
Yamaha DX7 (U)
Elka Synthex (U)
Yamaha SY-85 (U)
Ensoniq ESQ-1 (U)
Kurzweil K2000
** Roland XP-30 (N)
** Roland A-90 EX (N)
**Korg Trition #1 (U)
**Korg Wavestation A/D #1 (U)
Korg Wavestation A/D #2 (U)
Korg Triton Classic #2 (N)
**Korg Karma #1 (N)
Korg Karma #2 (U)
**Kurzweil K2500RS (U)
** Novation Supernova II (U)
** Virus KC (U)
**Roland JD800 (U)
**Roland JD990 #1 (U)
**Roland JD990 #2 (U)
**Korg Oasys 88 (N)
When I arrived in the USA in the mid 90’s I had to leave my JD back in the UK because I couldn’t afford to ship it here. Eventually I sold it to a close friend of mine but I missed it a lot and so, a few years later when I caught the “Ebay” bug… I saw one for sale in nearby California, that was very cheap and so I bid and won the auction and got another JD800 once more. (I also picked up two JD990s extremely cheaply off of Ebay too!) so now I have three of the beasts which I use to create very complex layered sounds as and when needed but sometimes i still just sit at my JD800 and twiddle with the sliders discovering still more new sounds and textures that I cannot create via any other keyboard I own (including the Oasys!) as there is something about the JD’s sound that is unique to my ears at least.
blogasys: What was the reason for you to purchase OASYS?
Mag66: I walked into a local music store in late 2005 and saw this visually stunning keyboard, stuck right at the back of the main keyboard room. I sat down, put on a pair of “cans” and the next thing I knew, six hours had passed and I was still playing and enjoying the heck out of the Oasys. I knew about the work Stephen Kay had done with Korg and the Korg Karma and I had bought a Korg Karma a couple of years earlier and loved it, for what it was capable of creating, both sonically and musically but to be honest, I didn´t care for the Korg Karma’s interface. It was a very complicated keyboard to program, made even more difficult by the small screen and lack of the work surfaces it obviously needed.
The Korg Oasys, answered all my prayers. Not only had Stephen improved and expanded upon the amazing Karma and it´s capabilities but Korg had put together a keyboard which had a large, touch sensitive screen, a great set of controls and work surfaces to work with, in real time, added to that a set of amazing sounds and the ability to create new and refreshing sounds and on top of all that, made the Oasys an open ended system so more new facilities could be added at a later date without the musician having to go through the old cycle of - Buy a keyboard, buy a new keyboard a year later and relearn a lot of the programming because it´s an updated and better version of the previous one, buy yet another new version with even better facilities and features (and more re-learning to do) a couple of years after that.. and so on. Though the initial cost of the Oasys is high´ish (Though when you compare how much the Oasys costs today, to how much a Minimoog or a Prophet 5 cost when they were released, it´s an absolute bargain in many ways) you don´t have to keep learning new interfaces, you get a great basic set of musical tools to start off from with new features being added by Korg at regular intervals (The STR-1 Plucked String Modeling expansion, has been my personal favorite one so far though the LAC-1 (Polysix and MS-20) expansion is pretty amazing too!) and you still get to keep a really nice feeling keyboard with the same set of controls, easy to use interface, and excellent work surfaces that you are used to. You are finally out of that costly cycle of buying new keyboards every year or so, simply to gain access to the latest types of sounds or features.
blogasys: Are there any things you would like to see in a future update?
Mag66: This is an easy one for me. I would hope Korg will re-do / re-work the sequencer/HD recorder section of the Oasys. It´s the only part of the Oasys that I feel, limits the outflow of creative juices, as far as I am concerned. That´s not to say that the current sequencer or HD recorder isn´t usable because it is and you can produce and record some really great songs, using just that built in sequencer but I feel, it needs to be brought up to date and more in line with the rest of the “vision” that is the Korg Oasys.
blogasys: thank you for the interview!
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Nigels website: the art of sound
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medusaland says:
Hi,
i really like this interview and also the relaxed songs at Nigel`s page!
Best wishes
medusaland
März 4th, 2007 at 18:57
blogasys says:
Thanks Kurt !
Nigel composed and recorded some nice tracks.
peter
März 4th, 2007 at 19:09
Thilo Rex says:
Nigel Sixsmith is a really talented musician and composer. i could listen to his music for hours and hours and never get enough o f it. Thanx, Peter, for this great interview with another interesting OASYAN !!
T.
März 5th, 2007 at 00:22
blogasys says:
OASYAN
Thanks T-Rex. As stated above I like his tracks and I am looking forward to Nigel’s CD!
März 5th, 2007 at 08:43
gill newberry says:
I was in the Glinton Youth Orchestra directed by Malcolm Stowell-Smith playing 2nd violin with my much better looking sister, Delia. He was a God in my eyes & poured his waking hours into preparing scores suitable for the material he had in the orchestra - we were all pretty terrible, and I remember him auditioning a little girl playing a brass instrument who may have only had a couple of terms worth of lessons and he said “Um, ok, good enough” - he would then go home and revise the score to adapt to her musical ability. As a result, beginners could play alongside more expert players still feeling that their contribution was really worthwhile and they were part of the success of the whole orchestra - which they were.
I think Stowell-Smith’s wife persuaded him to move his operations closer to her own family so that she could have more support with their small childern as he spent so much time at weekends engaged with our lovely orchestra.
Oktober 18th, 2008 at 18:20