Interview with Artist Santi Preecha
By Mick Michaels
The Cosmick View: Hello, and welcome to The Cosmick View/MBM Ten
Pounder! Thanks for taking some time to chat with us!
Santi Preecha: Thank you for having me!
CV: Describe your definition of your sound and style and how does
that definition uniquely describe the music?
SP: My definition for the sound of my music would
be experimental
electronic meets sound art. I personally lean on ‘sound
art’ as a
concise definition simply because it’s the most
open in that I like to
approach sound as a whole in an egalitarian sense
and try to avoid
the codified senses of music (this instrumentation
designates this
genre or style, or this beat means this kind of
music which signals
these emotions etc.). That being said, I primarily
work in the
electronic medium but of course that could also
mean working with
acoustic sources and integrating electro-acoustic
music as well. I
think a lot about the mediums we use to listen to
music today, i.e.
mostly earbuds and headphones and a lot of the time
while we’re on
the go. This in many ways frees music from the
singular time and
space required in a traditional show or even
listening to a record on
vinyl at home and this divorce is also interesting
to explore within
the music itself. The way we hear music has changed
and
reflecting/exploring that is important to me.
CV: Today, everyone talks about artist and audience connection. Is such a
level of connection actually achievable for an
artist and if so, how have you
made the connection to your fans?
SP: That’s a really great question and one I’ve
been thinking about
for some time. We live in such an interesting and
diverse time,
musically, artistically and culturally and that is
absolutely
exhilarating but it also means that there is much
more subdivision in
communication with the public as a whole. For
example, in
Beethoven’s time, his public would have been
exposed to more or
less the same kinds of music as he would have i.e.
folk music, music
you hear in pubs etc. and orchestral/chamber
concert music to
varying degrees. So for example when he wrote let’s
say his famous
9th, anyone could have been in the audience and
whether or not they
liked it, there would seem to have been a more
direct a
cultural/musical conversation because of the
limited amount of
music available than say today where an audience
may be more
exposed to only certain genres/styles/groups of
music than others
simply because there’s so much more out there now
and that we
have access to. And by audience today I mean the
general public,
not just the audience of the genre one happens to
work in.
Of course I love this diversity as well and I think
audiences are
changing and becoming more eclectic and varied in
their tastes; it’s
not as strange now than even ten or fifteen years
ago to go from
listening to say a Mahler symphony to Radiohead to
Nas if you’re
open to it as a listener and I think audiences are
becoming more and
more open. I very much believe in this
cross-pollination not just of
music genres and styles but also of all the arts.
There are countless
examples of historical art movements (Modernism,
Impressionism
etc.) where the artistic and cultural dialogue
affected a number of
art forms and the public as well. I’ve tried to
connect to my audience
through social media of course as we all do and
through interviews
like these but I also seek out various festivals
and try to be aware
and part of a dialogue that is interdisciplinary. I
think that’s very
important and helps one from being stuck in one’s
bubble both as an
audience and as a creator though it is very hard
because with
marketing and genre subdivision the way it is, we
are usually only
able to speak to and with a limited group if we’re
lucky. So having
that broad cultural discussion is challenging but I
hope and feel that
slowly we will find a way.
CV: Is fan interaction an important part of your inner culture as an artist?
SP: Yes absolutely! It’s an ongoing dialogue both
inner and outer.
Art for me at the end of the day is about
self-realization and that is
both inward with oneself but also outwardly in how
the world is and
one’s place in it. The same goes for fan
interaction. It’s part of that
inner/outer dialogue.
CV: Can an artist or band truly interact with its fans and still maintain a level of personal privacy without crossing the line and giving up their “personal
space” in your opinion?
SP: Yes I think so but it also depends on what one
defines as
‘truthful interaction’ and ‘personal space’; where
that line is. And it’s
different for everyone. For me I do think it’s
possible. I think a
truthful interaction with fans doesn’t need to mean
a divulging of all
one’s personal life details or biography or what
one goes through at
every moment. We’re all partly in the shadows,
partly illuminated
and that is shifting all the time, no matter who we
interact with,
even with ourselves. In a way the most truthful
interaction with fans
is through one’s work. There the truth is laid
bare, at least one’s
own truth.
CV: Is music, and its value, viewed differently around the world in your
opinion? If so, what do you see as the biggest
difference in such multiple
views among various cultures?
SP: Yes but I think it’s less about where you are
in the world and
more about its social function. I think musical
value still is very tied
to function and unfortunately there is still this
great divide between
the world of so-called academia (i.e. contemporary
classical music)
and other contemporary music (hip hop, pop,
electronic etc.) again
to do with function. This is not new however. There
has always been
a divide between functions of music which determine
value. In the
Baroque period for example you had church music,
music to
accompany royal barges (Handel’s Water Music),
dance music
(Gigue, Gavotte, Sarabande etc.). There are many
examples of this
in many different cultures, the functions are
similar: religious,
state/cultural functions, clubs (dance), etc. Since
Beethoven, there
has been a shift, in the West at least, to more ‘personal
expressions’
in music, ultimately to music for music’s sake even
but as we can
see today, most contemporary music outside of
academia still very
much adheres to function, social function to be
exact. How much has
this changed now that music is so often consumed
personally and
intimately on earbuds in private? Does this open up
music as a new
form of communication that in some ways bypasses
the traditional
social communal functions music has always played?
In a way my
music is often grappling with this, particularly in
this latest album.
This dichotomy between the visceral physical
communal cathartic
function of say techno, be it underground or not,
and a kind of inner
‘self-expression’ and musical, cultural exploration
that perhaps
doesn’t conform entirely to the former function.
Can these co-exist
in today’s music? I think it can but it’s an
ongoing question and
exploration and ultimately it may end up being an
entirely new kind
of music.
CV: Do you feel that a band that has an international appeal, will tend to
connect more so to American audiences? Would they
be more enticed or
intrigued to see the band over indigenous acts
because of the foreign flavor?
SP: I think that totally depends on the musical
style and also
whether or not the band with the international
appeal is from
America. Sigur Ros for example I would say has a
pretty
international appeal. I couldn’t tell you if their
audience is more
American or not. I think though instrumental music,
which is the
realm I primarily work in, is universal, or can be.
If it’s music with
lyrics and the lyrics are in a foreign language
then yes maybe there
is that language barrier but again, Sigur Ros is a
great example here.
In terms of whether an American audience would be
more enticed or
intrigued by an international band over an
indigenous one because
of foreign flavor, I’m sure there is still that
allure there to a degree,
especially depending on the genre of music, but I
think it’s becoming
less and less so although of course one still carries
one’s culture
with one and through one’s work. But I think the
connection is more
personal now than the broader appeal of one’s
nationality. There is
more diversity even in one’s cultural identity than
in previous eras I
think. For example, I grew up in Thailand with Thai
culture but also
with a lot of English literature and Western
classical music
(Tchaikovsky was my first exposure to music I can
remember) and
some Japanese culture etc. so while my nationality
is Thai,
musically, artistically my identity as a Thai
artist would be different
than say other Thai artists etc. I think the same
goes for any artist
these days.
CV: Has modern-day digital technology made everyone an artist on some
level in your opinion? Have the actual lines of
what really is an artist been
blurred?
SP: It depends on your definition of artist. The
much earlier
definition of artist was as ‘artisan’ as in someone
who crafts
something. In that sense yes there are many more
artists around as
we all have much more access to these tools. In the
19th century
definition of artist as ‘visionary’ I would say the
percentage hasn’t
changed much. There were many many artists around
in the 19th and early 20th century but how many Picassos were there, or
Becketts or T.S. Eliot’s? Today there is a new definition of artist as
‘entrepreneur’ and the interaction has changed
between artist and
public. The way art is consumed, thought of and
discussed is
different and in some ways it’s feels less open in
that these
discussions can and are still had but in smaller
subsets of people. So
the interdisciplinary days do not seem to be
flourishing as much
anymore which is a shame but I’m sure there will be
a resurgence of
this as we move forward. There’s a great article I
read a few years
back about this called “Artist as Entrepreneur” or
something similar.
It’s an ongoing discussion a lot of it which stems
from the question
‘what is Art?’. Specifically, what is Art today? At
the end of the day
though it seems to me it still has to be about
communication and
exploration that leads to that self-realization for
both the artist and
the audience. Only time will tell who lives on and
who doesn’t.
CV: How would you describe the difference between an artist who follows
trends and one who sets them?
SP: The artist Holly Herndon whom I greatly admire
said something
related to this about how she thought about what
kind of music
would be heard in the future and wanted to explore
that. I think
there’s the key right there. Someone who isn’t
stuck in the past but
rather attempts to understand all of the present,
which includes the
past, in order to try and find new forms that can
express the ‘now’
which can also come from thinking about what the
future could be as
well. Electronic music is an incredibly exciting
playground in this
way because in many ways it is still such a young
medium. The
orchestra had several hundred years before it got
to Mahler for
example. Electronic has been around far less. As
much as I love the
electronic music I’m hearing today, I’m constantly
thinking and
asking myself where this could go, what is music
today, how do we
think and function today that’s different from past
times, how has
our consciousness changed due to all these
advancements in
technology and how could that affect and become
part of a musical
expression that is part of a present dialogue?
These aren’t questions
that can have concrete answers but that’s the
excitement. Each
album, each piece is an attempt at an answer. As
Beckett said “Ever
Tried. Ever Failed. No matter. Try again. Fail
again. Fail better.”
Words to live by.
CV: Has music overall been splintered into too many sub-genres in an effort
to appease fan tastes in your opinion? And has
such fan appeasements, in
actuality, weakened music’s impact as a whole by
dividing audiences?
SP: Yes absolutely! It’s taken me many years to
reconcile this for
myself as a listener. Because music has been
codified since the
beginning of our existence, we have a lot of ‘codes’
that define what
music is, i.e. these chords mean this emotion, this
rhythm means
this kind of exhilarating state etc. I’ve
questioned this a lot and
often tried to answer the question of how many of
these musical
tools (chords, melodies, rhythms etc.) are
culturally defined and
how many of them are innate. I think like a lot of
things the answer
is somewhere in between. For example, why is it
that across
multiple cultures over centuries we find examples
of a triplet that
often is used to give a sense of excitement,
sensuality, of movement.
Could it be that it is because we’re bi-peds and so
this sub-division
into three rather than two (like a march) gives us
that feel? This
could be an example of a musical element being
innate in us as
opposed to culturally defined. I think it’s
important as listeners as
well as creators to learn to truly ‘listen’ to the
music and not just to
style or to the ‘coded triggers’ we are already
used to. In every and
all genres. This also questions the often-used term
‘emotion’. What
does this really mean and can we truly appreciate
something new if
we’re only listening for emotion? This is a
complicated question but I
do feel that it’s important not to only listen for ‘emotion’.
There is a
time and place for emotional, nostalgic music that
reminds us of
better days etc. but if we’re only using that as
our bar for what we
like or what we should listen to, then we’ll never
listen openly to
something that does not have those traits.
CV: What can fans expect to see coming next from you?
Apart from this second album that just came out on
February 2nd,
ROUND A ROO, I’ll be releasing a score album for my
score for Guy
Longstreet’s neo-noir psychological thriller Black Jade in the near
Future. I’m also working on a new project but it’s
still in its early
experimental phases so we’ll see where it goes.
CV: Thanks again for taking some time and talking. It is greatly appreciated.
SP: Thank you so much for having me!
Check out Santi Preecha at:
Instagram: www.instagram.com/santipreecha_music
Official: www.santipreecha.com
Like The Cosmick View on Facebook at:
Pamela Aloia: Author, Energy Healer, Teacher
Spiritual Counseling and Sessions Available
www.pamelaaloia.com
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My name is Mick Michaels...I'm an artist, music fan, songwriter, producer, show host, dreamer and guitarist for the traditional Heavy Metal band Corners of Sanctuary. Writing has always been a creative outlet for me; what I couldn't say in speech, I was able to do with the written word. Writing has given me a voice and a way for me to create on a multitude of platforms including music and song, articles, independent screenplays, books and now, artist interviews. The Cosmick View is an opportunity to raise the bar and showcase artists in a positive and inspirational light. For me, it's another out-of-this-world adventure.
Spiritual Counseling and Sessions Available
www.pamelaaloia.com
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