Richard Chartier: "Music is a process, not a philosophy"
1. What is your priority as an artist in search of sound?
My priority is to create honest work and hopefully something of beauty.
2. What is the main concept of your new album Interreferences?
I don’t tend to work with concepts or formal narrative themes in my solo work. That is more of the realm of my work under Pinkcourtesyphone.
The press release is very much a reflection of this.
3. It would be interesting to know who chose whom: you chose Room40, or the label chose you?
I have worked with Lawrence English for a long time via Room40 and LINE. He has released several albums of mine, and my label LINE released his work For / Not For John Cage.
I think we first met (in person) when he invited me to perform in Australia 15 years ago.
I admire his work both as an artist and as a curator of a label. He is a non-stop force.
4. Modern music gradually contains more and more drone. What would be a logical move for you in the future in terms of drone music?
Drone has been a part of music for a long time over many cultures. I don’t think of my artist process as logic-based or in terms of "next moves". Logical moves implies work driven by "the market".
5. What is the current concept behind LINE label?
LINE has been based, from the beginning, on minimalism primarily, in its myriad of forms. Ultimately it is curated purely subjectively according to works that strike something in me (and my ears). That, of course, has shifted over 20 years and expended.
It’s interesting to receive demos that are very similar aesthetically to works that LINE released in its first two years. Everything works in cycles.
6. You have recently celebrated the 50th anniversary. Congratulations! Are you planning to radically change your art in terms of style?
Anniversaries are just arbitrary numbers. I look forward and backward all the time. Only looking backwards in terms of reflection. I don’t plan changes in my art. Change in art should be a natural progression, not a formulated plan.
7. Do you see yourself more as a part of the American music scene, or the international scene?
I don’t think of it at all that way.
8. Do you separate music from philosophy, or are they one and the same for you?
Music is a process, not a philosophy.
9. What delayed plans will you resume after the pandemic?
Travel. Perform. Continue to create. Continue to seek out and listen to music that inspires. Survive.
Official website of Richard Chartier
Richard Chartier on SoundCloud
Questions: Ilya Kudrin