Conrad Schnitzler - Trigger Trilogy - 3CD

Conrad Schnitzler is a genuine legend in the Krautrock and electronic music worlds. Schnitzler studied under Joseph Beuys before joining an early Tangerine Dream. Their first album, Electronic Meditation shows a band highly influenced by Schnitzler's unique, singular approach. Schnitzler left Tangerine Dream to form Kluster with friends Dieter Moebius and Hans Joachim Roedelius. When Schnitzler left Kluster they changed their name to Cluster, eventually merging with Michael Rother (of Neu!) to form Harmonia, a group who Brian Eno once called the most important rock group on the planet. Schnitzler also founded Eruption in 1970 along with Klaus Schultz, Manuel Gottsching (Ash Ra Tempel), and Klaus Freudigmann.

Looking back at Conrad Schnitzler's career, it becomes obvious that he was an architect who helped draw the blueprints for some very significant musical movements. Perhaps overlooked, or at least desperately underappreciated, it hasn't slowed Schnitzler down. Since leaving Kluster, Conrad Schnitzler has composed diligently for electronics and piano. Now located in Dallgow, Germany he continues to accumulate equipment and recordings of what he says is “cold, hard electronic sound.”

Trigger Trilogy consists of three discs, each selected from hundreds of hours of Schnitzler's private recordings. Each represents one of the few unique approaches that Schnitzler takes to recording, each uniquely identified and defined by Schnitzler. Within each of these recordings one can hear how Schnitzler influenced a generation of artists not only in Germany, but the world; and how he's brought those sounds into the modern day. It's also apparent in these recordings that Schnitzler is thoughtful and enlightened, a total pioneer floating freely in a world of sound.

Trigger One consists of what Schnitzler calls his Solo Voices or Solo Electronics. This particular recording happens to be rhythmically based electronic work. Recognizing that in traditional music the melodic line is subordinate to the ensemble, leaving it no true impression of its own, Schnitzler has liberated the solo voice in his own music and given it its own vocation as noise, tone and sound. By superimposing several voices or forming a sound environment by mixing, Schnitzler has created new dimensions; worlds of sound where the individual voice is no longer subservient to synchronization or the conductor's baton. The results are sound combinations which adhere to no logic. ”The strength of the individual voice lies in its freedom from vis-a-vis any sound.” ~ Conrad Schnitzler

Trigger Two is what Schnitzler refers to as Free Concert Mix Solos:

“From solo to mix, from melodic line to ensemble. Accumulation of voices, note clusters which are not opposed to one other but are equal and parallel in a free play of energy. The mix of solo voices produces concentrations of notes and noises, tangles, compressions, sound constellations, sound catastrophes, acoustic phenomena's. The individuality of each voice is absorbed into the chaos of the overall sound, is held there and blurred. Musical developments emerge from the atmosphere of the individual voices of the ensemble and its variations. Sound sequences spill forth, revealing tight and loose webs of notes, changes in tempo, varying expressions of volume and dynamics and shifts in the direction of the sound pattern. A sound chaos which appears to change automatically becomes perceptible. The indeterminate starting order for the solo voices create an open unfinished work, containing a wealth of episodes with sound sequences, environmental associations, stylistic devices from other worlds and interplays of nature and technology.” ~ Conrad Schnitzler

Trigger Three, the final disc in the Trigger Trilogy, is a Con-Cert. This is a tradition that Schnitzler has been working in for quite some time. Originally using cassettes and now using compact discs Schnitzler creates live mixes of multiple recordings. The sounds are intentionally designed, shaped, constructed and composed in specific relation to one another.

“The articulation of sound in an era where new technology allows for the creation of an unlimited number of new sounds calls for new recording techniques. These are offered by tape, CD or computer hard disks. In the past I used conventional cassettes to create my concerts, but now the sounds are recorded on CD and can be used in the concerts thanks to their enhanced quality. The individual tracks have fixed starting points which can be adjusted by a number of seconds and thus produce different results. The volume of the individual tracks can be adapted to the acoustics of the location, and the listening experience will vary for each location as a consequence.” ~ Conrad Schnitzler