Ulrich Schnauss presents ‘Now is a Timeless Present’, a career-spanning retrospective encompassing key works from the past two decades. The German electronic composer will be selecting fundamental music from his back catalogue, much of which has not been performed live before.
At once uplifting and otherworldly, the music of Ulrich Schnauss combines multi-layered synthesizers with beats and ethereal vocals, serving as an aural escape route from the trappings of reality. Born in Kiel in 1977, Schnauss developed a love of electronic music from a young age. He explains, ‘I’ve always used making and listening to music as a way to escape – putting on headphones is a way to leave reality behind for a while, reminding yourself why it still makes sense to carry on.’ Inspired by the alternative guitar bands of the late 80s and early 90s as well as Acid House and early electronica, Schnauss began developing his own distinct sonic palette. Melding delicate dream-pop sensibilities with ecstatic electronic excess and defying the constraints of traditional music genre boundaries.
After a move to Berlin in the late 90s, Schnauss felt confident enough to employ a more freeform approach and began recording ‘little electronica pieces’, culminating in the first album released under his own name, 2001s 'Far Away Trains Passing By'. Four further studio albums have followed: ‘A Strangely Isolated Place’ (2003), ‘Goodbye’ (2007), ‘A Long Way to Fall’ (2013) and ‘No Further Ahead Than Today’ (2016). However, Schnauss has continued to produce and release music under various pseudonyms and in collaboration with other artists. He’s a prolific remixer and a member of the last Tangerine Dream line up picked by the late Edgar Frost.
After an initial struggle to perform the unique, interchanging nuances of his compositions live, Schnauss’s discovery of Ableton software has enabled him to build new arrangements on the spot, lending diversity and distinction to each performance. ‘I can also react to the atmosphere of the room,’ he explains, ‘sometimes playing more ambient; sometimes more rhythm-orientated versions of the songs.’
Joining Ulrich Schnauss on stage is his long-term collaborator, London-based visual artist Nat Urazmetova. In her live visuals the organic and synthesised, amorphous and elusive, fluid and uncanny coalesce, mutate and continuously evolve in the free-flow of improvisation. Through shifting the accustomed modes of perception, the visual performance threads the different narratives of seeing, sensing and relating to the sonic counterpart’
