It was a really fruitful experience that knocked into me this interest in actually working with these historical instruments. I’d pick a different instrument every week and read about it online, learn about it and then go and get to know it in person. ![]() In the early years the place wasn’t very well known so nobody was coming to tours, especially in the dead of winter, so I’d have all this time when I’d be alone. I got hired as a tour guide, and I did that for eight years. That was the turning point for me, having access to any electronic instrument you can think of. So when I was 20 years old I got a job at a musical instrument museum in Calgary, of all places. Sarah Davachi: I was studying some early electronic music from the ’50s at school and it got me curious, but none of that music really did much for me. What was your introduction to electronic music? Like, I’m never gonna own a Jaguar and I’m okay with that, but it doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate that a Jaguar should exist just because I don’t have access to it.” “The only analogy I can think that makes sense is like with cars, comparing a Jaguar to a Honda – that’s a thing that people can understand. It’s harder to go find a 1968 Moog and be able to A/B those instruments, so I think people get a little bit bitter about that,” she continues. “You can go into Guitar Center and play a $5000 Gibson and feel what that feels like. No, there’s so much more to it than that. “When you’re playing a synthesizer it’s so unfair to say you’re just turning knobs it’s as unfair to say that someone who’s playing guitar is just strumming. “For some reason with electronic instruments, people just don’t want to understand that they’re instruments,” she assures me. This obsession has been a constant throughout her career, and she’s keen to illustrate how much the analog synthesizers of the 1970s have just the same distinctive, unpredictable qualities as any traditional instrument. Now based in Los Angeles, Davachi is currently working on a PhD in Musicology at UCLA, diving headfirst into organology, the study of instruments. A mixture of confident, studied synthesis and gloriously restrained instrumental performance, they sound something like Pauline Oliveros collaborating with Arvo Pärt, or Stars of the Lid covering John Taverner. This year, Davachi has been touring almost non-stop and somehow has managed to find the time to put out two proper albums: April’s Recital-released Let Night Come On Bells End The Day and Gave In Rest, on Ba Da Bing!, that emerged earlier this month.īoth albums illustrate just why Davachi is receiving so much attention right now. The discovery of analog synthesis took her on in exciting direction that she’s followed ever since – it even helped renew her interest in the piano. She had studied piano from an early age but burned out quickly, resenting the anxiety of classical performance. Early Genesis.”ĭavachi’s path to becoming a world-renowned synthesizer expert is quite unique. “Todd Rundgren, Beach Boys, George Harrison, Genesis. “I actually have a plan to do a cover record of classic rock songs,” laughs Sarah Davachi as we start talking about musical influences. ![]() ![]() In this interview, John Twells meets LA-based composer and academic Sarah Davachi, who opens up about her introduction to electronic music and ongoing obsession with musical instruments, from vintage synthesizers to pipe organs. Signal Path is a new series that delves into the creative process of our favorite producers and musicians.
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