Flow State

Ángeles Rojas

Flow State — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 07:03:21 GMT

Today we’re listening to Ángeles Rojas, an Argentinian composer based in Berlin. We previously featured her music along with an interview last spring. She took piano lessons growing up, and expanded her studies to composition at the University of the Arts in Buenos Aires. Despite her classical training, her chief influence is listening to nature, and recalling the sounds of the forest from her childhood. She views the composer as a medium, channeling sound that is always already flowing. Her latest record, Open the Windows and Let the Spirits In and Out, is a thirty minute drone piece that creates what this newsletter is all about: an atmosphere of profundity. Of her four other records, which are similarly longform, we’re revisiting Breathe Into the Forest, Into the Bird, Into the Song from 2022.

Open the Windows and Let the Spirits In and Out - Ángeles Rojas (30m, no vocals)
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Breathe Into the Forest, Into the Bird, Into the Song - Ángeles Rojas (43m, no vocals)
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We wish you a great start to your week.

via Instagram

Chloe Lula

Flow State — Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:02:12 GMT

It’s Friday so we’re listening to something more upbeat. Today we’re listening to Chloe Lula, a French-American cellist and electronic musician based in Berlin. We’ve recommended her music twice before. She grew up studying the cello intensively, and around 18 immersed herself in club music at Bay Area raves. She moved to Berlin for study abroad, where she honed her DJ skills, eventually playing clubs like Berghain and Tresor. Her latest record, Hidden Reverse EP, sounds true to the Berlin techno scene, but its active ingredient is a batch of electroacoustic recordings by Swiss composer Alexandra Bellon.1 On her previous record, Oneiris from 2024, she mixes cello performance with atmospheric synths and minimal percussion.

Hidden Reverse EP - Chloe Lula (41m, no vocals)
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Oneiris - Chloe Lula (37m, no vocals)
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Have a splendid weekend.

Dancing Vinyl

Sonny Rollins

Flow State — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 07:02:26 GMT

Today we’re listening to and remembering Sonny Rollins, an American saxophonist from New York City. He passed away on May 25 at age 95. Rollins was born in Harlem in 1930, started playing young, and in his 20s collaborated with the likes of Thelonious Monk and Miles Davis.1 In 1959, he retreated from the stage to the bridge; living on the Lower East Side, he walked the Williamsburg Bridge daily, playing his tenor sax as much as 15 hours a day.2 “When he emerged,” wrote Richard Brody, “his sound was starker, its textures even rougher, with far more weight on the isolated, monumental power of individual notes. Yet his method was also more freely associative, his phrases both rhythmically looser and more abrupt.” This style was captured on 1962’s The Bridge, on which Rollins shreds, as does guitarist Jim Hall. We’re also playing The Cutting Edge from 1974, a live recording from the Montreux Jazz Festival. The last track is a bluesy rendition of “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” featuring bagpipes.

The Bridge - Sonny Rollins (41m, no vocals)
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The Cutting Edge - Sonny Rollins (43m, no vocals)
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Have a great Thursday.

New York Times

The Guardian

Helena Silva

Flow State — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 07:02:17 GMT

Today we’re listening to Helena Silva, a Portuguese violinist and composer based in Lisbon. When she was nine, growing up in Barcelos, her family attended a local folk performance, and shortly after she took up violin instruction with one of its members. She continued with the instrument through high school and multiple degree programs. She’s performed with orchestras and ensembles across Europe, but today we’re focusing on her solo work. Her ambient classical recordings reflect her classical background and ambient influences: “Tim Hecker, Fennesz, Kali Malone, and Brian Eno,” as she told Composerism. Last fall, she released the LP Celeste, a series of atmospheric, richly layered violin pieces. She gets synth-like versatility from her instrument: legato drones, flanging harmonics, pizzicato arpeggios. It’s a filmic listen; Hildur Guðnadóttir and Jóhann Jóhannsson come to mind. We’re also playing her 2023 EP, Manta, whose aperture is more narrowly neoclassical.

Celeste - Helena Silva (34m, no vocals)
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Manta - Helena Silva (16m, no vocals)
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Have a great Wednesday.

Flow State Ep. 329: Boards of Canada

Flow State — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 07:03:03 GMT

Today’s mix is all Boards of Canada, following their release of Inferno, their first album in 13 years. We put together a tracklist and sourced 18 recommendations from the community, with three tracks being recommended twice. This mix covers all of Boards of Canada’s LPs – from 1998 to 2026 – as well as several EPs and a remix of Boom Bip. The focus is instrumentals, though a vocal moment here or there was hard to avoid. Attributions of recommendations are under the corresponding tracks. There’s a longer free preview available on this one. We hope you enjoy.

0:00:00 - Boards of Canada - Gemini (excerpt)

0:00:04 - Boards of Canada - Corsair
–

0:02:30 - Boards of Canada - Sundown

0:04:28 - Boards of Canada - Open the Light
–Kenneth James Gibson

0:08:26 - Boards of Canada - Satellite Anthem Icarus
– /

0:13:07 - Boards of Canada - Seven Forty Seven
–

0:19:02 - Boom Bip - Last Walk Around Mirror Lake (Boards of Canada Remix)

0:22:45 - Boards of Canada - Left Side Drive
–

0:26:41 - Boards of Canada - Roygbiv
–Stuart Bogie

0:28:22 - Boards of Canada - Everything You Do Is A Balloon
– &

Linus Alberg (Interview)

Flow State — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 07:02:51 GMT

Today we’re back and listening to Linus Alberg, a German pianist and composer from Augsburg. He started piano lessons at age nine on a Yamaha upright, which he still plays to this day. He’s classically trained, and began putting out his own original music in the late 2010s. We’re first playing his new album, UON, which came out in April. Its soft acoustic piano is reminiscent of his influences Ólafur Arnalds and Nils Frahm. Second we’re playing Living on a Planet Full of Empty Life from the end of 2020, which is similarly gentle but also includes rich arpeggios such as on “Orthosie” and “Sinope.” One track, “Jupiter,” includes four on the floor drums. On both records his close-up, multi-mic recording setup creates a kind of surround sound, as if you were listening to the pieces from inside the piano. A conversation with Linus follows the streaming links.

UON - Linus Alberg (35m, no vocals)
Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Bandcamp / Tidal

Living on a Planet Full of Empty Life - Linus Alberg (66m, no vocals)
Spotify / ~~Apple Music~~ / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Bandcamp / Tidal

What was your earliest memory of music?

As far as I can remember, I’ve always been surrounded by music. My dad used to play the guitar, bass, and keys in a band when he was a young adult. When my sisters and I were born, he played around the house all the time, and my mother sang beautiful lullabies to us. So music and instruments have always been part of my life.

Tell us about your start with piano and the first instrument you played on. What was the first piece or two that you learned and felt like a real achievement?

The first instrument I learned to play at the age of six was the drums, while my older sisters played the cello and piano. At first, I found it annoying when my sister practiced the piano at home, but when I was nine years old, I joined on one of her lessons, and after that I immediately stopped playing the drums and took lessons in classical piano. I think what fascinated me most was not just being able to play melodies, but also realizing that it’s about how you express or articulate each note and how you connect them with each other. And through that, being able to build and convey emotions or even tell an entire story – that really inspired me from the very beginning.

The piano on which I played my first notes is the exact same one I still play on today. It’s the piano my parents bought for us kids and has been in our house ever since. It’s a Yamaha M1J, and although I’ve played on many different pianos over the years and it’s starting to show its age, I’m still in love with the sound of this particular piano.

I would say that Debussy’s “Clair de Lune” and Chopin’s “Nocturne, Op. 9, No. 2” are definitely among my earliest “achievements.” Along with Beethoven’s music, their compositions were some of my favorites and the ones to which I felt the strongest emotional connection during my years of studying classical piano.

Who were the composers that most helped you find your own sound?

A major source of inspiration on my journey from classical piano to finding my own sound was discovering the music of Ólafur Arnalds; in particular, his album Living Room Songs from 2011 remains one of my favorite albums. And, of course, my first encounter with the music of Nils Frahm, starting with the first time I heard his album Felt. The two of them were kind of role models growing up, who changed my perspective on the piano as an instrument. They have also broadened my horizons when it comes to composing for classical acoustic instruments in combination with electronic and modern elements.

But also, composers like Max Richter, Hania Rani, Philip Glass, and Büşra Kayıkçı are huge inspirations to me and still help me figure out what I love about music in general and in detail and that’s definitely influenced the way my own music has evolved up to now.

Tell us about your studio setup for UON. What instruments/gear/software did you use to make the record? How specifically do you capture the sound from the piano?

My new album, UON, is a collection of ten tracks created over the past few years in various studio setups and locations. So I recorded some of the tracks at my parents’ house, others in my old home studio, and still others in my current studio using different setups.

At the heart of most of my setups are the Yamaha piano from my childhood and an old Mannborg pedal harmonium, both of which I’ve recorded with various microphones into Ableton – the DAW of choice on my computer. As well as an old Wurlitzer Electric Piano, a Moog Grandmother I mostly use for subs as well as a Prophet 12, which was the first ever synthesizer I owned, for pads and synth textures.

When recording my piano, I usually play around with different sorts, thicknesses, and sometimes layers of fabrics to soften the sound. Plus, a lot of the time, I experiment with microphone placement. Normally I use more than one stereo pair of KM184 mics in front of the piano mechanic. Sometimes going up to five or even seven mics in total, recording different parts like the back or front-bottom of the piano simultaneously.

In post-production, I like to have more freedom and bring the microphone signals together, depending on which microphone characteristics, frequencies, or position I like the most for the specific piece.

What’s your composition process like? How much is deliberately written before recording versus improvised or added later in Ableton?

My compositional process depends on the specific project I’m working on. However, most ideas come to me while I’m just playing around freely, experimenting, and improvising on the piano. This often leads to initial sketches, simple short melodies, and eventually more elaborate compositions. I try to capture short melodic ideas – which quickly feel like one of many layers or loops – and record them right away so that I can continue adding ideas while still in the same state of flow, allowing me to build a basic framework for a piece from a small idea relatively quickly.

Other pieces evolve into a complete story or a distinct composition for the piano as I play them. These usually take shape within a few hours or a day, and I initially record them provisionally just on my phone or in my head. Over the following days, sometimes weeks or even months, I continue to refine the composition until it feels complete and ready to be recorded as the final version. Sometimes, while working on such a composition – which was originally intended primarily for a single instrument like the piano – ideas for additional elements emerge, such as subtle accents at certain points with bass notes or additional harmonies played by harmonium or synthesizer layers.

And other pieces simply emerge as a first take, capturing the very moment when the idea takes shape as I play freely on the piano and improvise. In fact, those are my favorite moments – when they happen, it can feel almost magical. But they’re also the rarest moments, because many different factors and circumstances have to coincide and be in harmony for them to occur – things that can’t be forced, planned, or controlled.

How do you discover new music these days? Any recent notable finds?

To be honest, I don’t really actively look for a lot of new music, especially when I’m working on my own projects. But I always love discovering the latest releases or news from artists I know and admire. Sometimes I come across similar music or composers directly on streaming platforms, but also on social media, in magazines, or through people or labels I follow. So, no big surprises :)

Among my latest discoveries that I really enjoyed listening to are Seven by Felix Rösch, Are We Alive? by Natalia Tsupryk, and Nowhere Sessions by Snorri Hallgrímsson.

Name an underrated artist from the past 50 years.

That’s a tough one… Off the top of my head, one composer whose music can’t get enough attention is Hanakiv, who, in my opinion, creates extraordinary and uniquely beautiful music that stands out from most I know.

What are you working on next?

Since the beginning of the year, I’ve been working on two new projects and am currently in the process of recording and gathering a lot of new ideas. I’m really enjoying the process at the moment, even though I’m not quite sure yet what format they will ultimately take or how they’ll unfold. However, my plan is to finish both of the projects till the end of this year. And maybe work on visual concepts for both of them and start building my first live program around some of these new ideas.

Off 6/1-6/5

Flow State — Sun, 31 May 2026 21:09:36 GMT

Flow State is off this week. We’ll be back on June 8.

Boards of Canada

Flow State — Fri, 29 May 2026 07:03:06 GMT

It’s Friday but more importantly it’s release day for Boards of Canada, whose new album is their first in 13 years. Boards of Canada are two Scottish brothers – Mike Sandison and Marcus Eoin – who started the project in the mid-’80s. The name comes from the National Film Board of Canada, whose public access documentaries they watched on TV growing up. The brothers combine heavily processed synthesizers, obscure samples, and hip-hop percussion to evoke curiosity and nostalgia. Their new record, Inferno, uses the wistful pads and lines familiar from their ‘90s records but, as the title warns, also features driving, menacing elements sometimes distorted beyond recognition. One could say that with Inferno their discography takes a darker turn, but already in 2013 they were telling The Guardian, “We’ve become a lot more nihilistic over the years.” Inferno isn’t all negative; its mood swings, with a track of panic preceding a track of acceptance. That’s our first reaction anyway – curious to hear yours once you listen. We’re also revisiting what we consider to be Boards of Canada’s magnum opus, Music Has the Right to Children, from 1998.

Inferno - Boards of Canada (69m, vocals on about half of the tracks)
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Music Has the Right to Children - Boards of Canada (71m, occasional vocal samples)
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Flow State is off next week. Have a great week.

Across the Horizon Ep. 64: Marisa Anderson

Flow State — Thu, 28 May 2026 07:03:22 GMT

On today’s episode of Across the Horizon, host Bob Holmes of SUSS is joined by co-host , the Portland-based guitarist who just released The Anthology on UnAmerican Folk Music on Thrill Jockey Records. They discuss the new record, which was inspired by the personal record collection of Harry Smith, American polymath and major figure in the Beat movement. They also discuss a playlist from Marisa’s own collection including Fela Kuti, Kokoroko, Ennio Morricone, and others.

For Flow State, we’re playing two records by Anderson, who’s a second-time Across the Horizon guest and third-time Flow State recomendee. We’re starting with the new Anthology LP, which came out last week. On it, she records folk songs from around the world, tracing throughlines “from Afghanistan to Vietnam via Yemen, Cambodia and Turkmenistan.”1 Typical for an Anderson record, the primary instrument is guitar (and its cousins, tres cubano and requinto jarocho), occasionally accompanied by keys or accordion. We’re also playing Still, Here from 2022. We previously described that record as “a collection of subdued, doleful numbers” which holds up on relisten.

The Anthology of UnAmerican Folk Music - Marisa Anderson (37m, no vocals)
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Still, Here - Marisa Anderson (34m, no vocals)
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Flow State is off next week. Have a great Thursday.

Bandcamp

Brandee Younger

Flow State — Wed, 27 May 2026 07:03:14 GMT

Today we’re listening to Brandee Younger, an American harpist from New York. She grew up on Long Island and started playing the harp at age 11. She studied music at The Hartt School and New York University, where she now serves on the faculty. Her first record (an EP) came out in 2011, and since 2014 she’s released seven LPs. We’re playing two of those. Gadabout Season, which came out last year, was recorded on Alice Coltrane’s newly restored harp and features Shabaka on flute and Josh Johnson on sax. We’re also playing Brand New Life from 2023, a jazz record that reflects Younger’s classical training and hip-hop influences – Pete Rock and 9th Wonder make appearances. It ends with a great cover of Stevie Wonder’s “If It’s Magic.”

Gadabout Season - Brandee Younger (43m, no vocals)
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Brand New Life - Brandee Younger (37m, light vocals on tracks 2, 4, 5, and 8)
Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

Flow State will be off next week. Have a great Wednesday.

Flow State Episode 328

Flow State — Tue, 26 May 2026 07:03:11 GMT

Today’s mix opens with a new track by , followed by a collaboration between Alaskan Tapes, Blu Miles, and Ann Annie. Also new ambient by Maston & Greg Foat, Eluvium, Exportion, and Black Boboi. We excerpt a single by ambient trombonist Kalia Vandever, and then play a track from guitarist Bill Orcutt’s new record with cellist Mabe Fratti. There are two tracks from the Life Aquatic soundtrack: one by Sven Libaek and the other by Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo. Drums come in with Seefeel, tamanaramen, Yuni Wa, and Larry Heard. A hypnotic track from Karim’s debut LP leads into the Mothersbaugh track to close. We hope you enjoy.

0:00:00 - a. vos - halos

0:02:44 - Alaskan Tapes, Blu Miles, Ann Annie - In-Cloud

0:06:24 - Maston & Greg Foat - Carving Jade

0:08:53 - Eluvium - Communication

Billy Bang

Flow State — Mon, 25 May 2026 07:03:19 GMT

Today we’re listening to Billy Bang, an American violinist and composer. He was born in Alabama in 1947 and moved at a young age to the Bronx, where he grew up. At 18 he was drafted into the army and served a tour of duty in Vietnam around the time of the Tet Offensive.1 Upon his discharge, he spent time studying law and participating in activism until committing himself to the violin. He was immersed in New York’s free jazz scene, going on to collaborate with artists like Don Cherry and Sun Ra (whose Arkestra he played in). In the early 2000s, he released jazz albums into which he channeled his memories of war; he told the Jazz Times that following his discharge, “I lived in Vietnam, totally, all the time.” Vietnam: Reflections, which came out in 2005, reaches for a kind of post-traumatic peace, and features Vietnamese musicians playing traditional instruments and songs, a kind of international encounter Bang described as “the opposite of war.” Reflections was the followup to Vietnam: The Aftermath, which came out in 2001, with faster tempos and expressions of strife.

Vietnam: Reflections - Billy Bang (70m, vocals on even numbered tracks)
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Vietnam: The Aftermath - Billy Bang (71m, no vocals)
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We wish you a great start to your week.

Vietnam Veterans of America

Karim

Flow State — Fri, 22 May 2026 07:03:16 GMT

It’s Friday so we’re listening to something more upbeat. Today we’re listening to Karim, a Moroccan electronic musician based in Casablanca. Shout out to ’s First Floor newsletter for putting us on. In 2014, Karim founded Tikita Records, which spotlights artists from around the globe with a focus on hypnotic sounds – minimalist, techno, and ambient. He just released his own debut LP, Lila, which channels Moroccan traditional styles via modular synthesizers. Specifically, he drew from the Gnawa, “a religious-spiritual musical tradition descended from West African peoples brought to Morocco as slaves hundreds of years ago.”1 Lila’s entrancing repetition draws a connection between Gnawa nighttime healing rituals and contemporary raves. We’re also listening to Sqala, his 2021 collaboration with French producer Amandra, which has two versions of the title track and four remixes of them, including one by Donato Dozzy.

Lila - Karim (61m, no vocals)
Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Bandcamp / ~~Tidal~~

Sqala - Karim (43m, no vocals)
Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Bandcamp / Tidal

Have a fantastic weekend.

Bandcamp

Andrew Hill (Guest rec from Martyn)

Flow State — Thu, 21 May 2026 07:02:36 GMT

Today we have a guest recommendation from Martyn (), a Dutch musician and DJ, who just released a jazz/electronic album, Music for Existing.

For today’s listening, I’m recommending two great records by pianist and composer Andrew Hill. Part of a generation of influential jazz pianists who all debuted in the early ‘60s and dominated the jazz realm throughout the ‘70s and into the ‘80s – people like Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner, and Chick Corea – Andrew Hill carved out a truly unique sound both in playing style as well as in composition. He released a string of records on Blue Note between 1964 and 1970, containing mostly his own innovative compositions and featuring a spectacular cast of musicians. Perhaps because he preferred to play original work rather than other people’s, he often goes unmentioned in the conversation, but dig into his albums and you will find a unique and intricate sonic world like no other.

Starting off with a slightly odd entry in Hill’s catalogue, Dance with Death was recorded in 1968 but released twelve (!) years later, in 1980. The album kicks off with “Yellow Violet,” a statement piece that showcases Hill as a composer – constantly playing with the tension between traditional rhythmic patterns and swing and more avant garde-leaning dissonance in his harmonies. Even though his pieces are littered with odd time signatures and other irregularities, often challenging his musicians and himself to put together coherent solo performances, it always feels organic and natural, almost like a casual stroll through a thicket. Check out “Fish ‘n Rice,” at first glance another “mainstream” bluesy piece that becomes a springboard for soloists Joe Farrell on sax and the great Charles Tolliver on trumpet (of Strata-East fame) to deliver some incredible work. I also have to mention drummer Billy Higgins’ clave / latin rhythmic patterns on this album, gelling together an otherwise awkward and dissonant sounding title piece.

Lift Every Voice was released at the tail end of Hill’s tenure at Blue Note, recorded during the (brief) time when it was en vogue to use choir in jazz (Donald Byrd’s “A New Perspective” comes to mind). The title track is an adaptation of “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” an important piece of music recorded at an important time in black history (civil rights movement). The album has an almost religious feel but is also forward-thinking and structurally and melodically uncomfortable in the best kind of way. I can’t think of a jazz record quite like this to be honest. Besides the vocal contributions this album also showcases Andrew Hill’s almost “aloof” and explorative way of playing. You can hear him find new rhythmic and melodic patterns on the fly, searching and experimenting, thinking with his hands. This record, again, has amazing performances by Hill’s band, specifically by underground trumpet hero Woody Shaw on “Hey Hey” and “Lift Every Voice” as well as the wailing tenor sax of Carlos Garnett (apparently one of his very first recording dates, which is crazy if you listen to the confidence in his playing).

Dance With Death - Andrew Hill (46m, no vocals)
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Lift Every Voice - Andrew Hill (70m, choral vocals on most tracks)
Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

Have a great Thursday.

Resavoir (Interview)

Flow State — Wed, 20 May 2026 07:03:51 GMT

Today we’re listening to Resavoir, an American composer and trumpeter from Chicago. We’ve featured his music on plenty of mixes but never spotlighted his albums. Will Miller grew up playing trumpet and studied composition at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. He’s recorded with artists like SZA, Mac Miller, Lil Wayne, and Whitney, and started the Resavoir project in 2018. As Resavoir, he writes a bunch of orchestral parts, records many fellow Chicagoan musicians, and then produces the tracks in a DAW. The result is a blend of lush soul and jazz pieces built over hip-hop templates. His latest record, Themes for Dreams, is mellower than previous ones – it’s almost an ambient album – and features artists like Marta Sofia Honer, Jeremiah Chiu, and Macie Stewart. His remarkable self-titled debut LP from 2019 earned rave reviews for his leadership of 18 musicians, their interesting improvisation, and the pieces’ artful composition. It’s a cinematic listen, reminiscent of the dramatic, intriguing ‘60s and ‘70s scores of Henry Mancini and the two Pieros (Piccioni, Umiliani). Track three features harpist Brandee Younger. A conversation with Will follows the streaming links.

Themes for Dreams - Resavoir (30m, no vocals)
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Resavoir - Resavoir (30m, vocal notes on tracks 1, 2, and 7; lyrics on track 8)
Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Bandcamp / Tidal

What’s your earliest memory of music?

Really hard to say, but my grandpa Phil was an amazing classical pianist and we would hang and listen to classical music together, and he would play piano for me when I was really young. He definitely inspired me to want to learn how to play.

What were the early albums/artists that helped you find your sound?

In no particular order:

Ornette Coleman – The Shape of Jazz to Come
Flying Lotus – Cosmogramma
Radiohead – In Rainbows
Glenn Gould – Goldberg Variations
Keith Jarrett – Expectations
Kenny Dorham – Quiet Kenny
Freddie Hubbard – Straight Life
Dirty Dozen Brass Band – Medicated Magic
John Coltrane – My Favorite Things

What were your first recordings like? What did you use to make them?

I remember my friend Jonah gave me a Tascam 4-track cassette recorder and I messed around with that a little bit. I wish I could find that tape. I was probably a junior in high school. I’m sure it sounded like trash, but I remember having a single RadioShack mic and overdubbing myself playing trumpet and piano. When I think of recording myself, that’s the first thing that comes to mind. But I also remember being pretty stoked on the CD that my 8th grade band made where I had a big trumpet solo. I didn’t start taking recording myself seriously until college once I learned how to use Logic Pro. That changed everything. Up til that point it was mostly just Zoom H2 recordings of a live band, or super clean live band studio recordings.

Tell us the main things you learned at Oberlin Conservatory that you apply to the music you make these days.

My first composition assignment freshman year with Wendell Logan was to go to the Oberlin Reservoir and write a song with nothing but a handheld Zoom recorder. It’s a really challenging task. I had never tried writing this way, and rarely do even today. But I think the lesson was equally about hearing music in your mind rather than seeing it on a page, or finding it with your hands on your instrument, and about finding space from it all and clearing the mind. I was so blinded by my drive to conquer the trumpet that I didn’t really give myself the opportunity to just go to a nice park and sit still and listen to the natural environment and allow inspiration to come that way. Composition is such a fleeting, ethereal thing, much like inspiration.

With Themes for Dreams, how much of it was composed in advance and recorded with musicians live, versus things added in after recording sessions? How much of the album did you find in the edit, to take a phrase from filmmaking?

For this album, I had two rules: no drums, and no live band recordings. Many of the songs started out as most of my songs do – at the piano. Then I build on that until I can’t go any more. Then I edit it down, sit on it, think it over, let it rest for a few weeks / months / years, however long it takes to find the key to finishing the song.

Toward the end of the process, I wrote string parts and recorded strings on a handful of the songs. But “Tea” and “Time” started out as a live improvisation with William Corduroy that I then chopped up, and revisited with Corduroy almost a year later to record the guitar melody. “Leaves” started out as a synth loop that you can hear on the second half of the song. Irvin and Andrew came by the studio one day and I asked them to improvise a few takes over my synth loop and gave them some general direction for the mood. They jammed on it for a while, and then I took that jam and pared it down.

Tell us about one of your recording sessions for a hip-hop project that sticks out in your memory.

I recorded the horns on Mac Miller’s “Two Matches” in my living room using an Apogee USB mic in 2014.

How do you discover new music these days? Any recent notable finds?

I like going to record shops and digging, also listening to mixes / radio shows and going out to DJ sets. My friend Nik Arthur recently put me on to this amazing album by the Portuguese artists Carlos Maria Trindade and Nuno Canavarro called Mr. Wollogallu that’s really remarkable. I think getting recommendations from friends is my favorite way to discover music.

Name an underrated artist from the past 50 years.

Woo. Incredible music from the UK made by these two brothers in their home studio. They deserve wider recognition. [Ed. note: Great choice.]

What are you working on next?

Kind of a reaction to Themes for Dreams in the form of a largely electronic, sometimes ecstatic, beat-driven set. I really wanted to make an album that stemmed from live recordings/improvisations to reflect the chemistry of the live band, so that’s slated to come out later this year.

Flow State Episode 327

Flow State — Tue, 19 May 2026 07:03:56 GMT

Today’s mix opens with instrumentals by Hania Rani and Harold Budd. There’s some ambient country, beginning with a track off of SUSS’s new album, followed by Corntuth, Golden Brown, Joe Webb, Daniel Lanois, and Lau Ro. There’s a live recording of Suzanne Ciani featuring Actress. Then some band instrumentals by Zero 7 and Setting, before electronic music by Satoshi Tomiie and Jereon Search. A synth composition by Nine Inch Nails alum Alessandro Cortini closes out the mix. We hope you enjoy.

0:00:00 - Hania Rani - Esja

0:04:10 - Harold Budd - Down the Slopes to the Meadow

SUSS

Flow State — Mon, 18 May 2026 07:03:05 GMT

Today we’re listening to SUSS, an American band based in New York City. The trio has done a Flow State interview, contributed a guest rec (The Necks), and member hosts the Across the Horizon show. In 2016 Holmes formed the group with fellow veteran musicians Jonathan Gregg, Pat Irwin, and Gary Leib (with William Garrett helping on the boards). “Ambient country” was the phrase that defined the band’s approach, channeling influences like Ry Cooder, Daniel Lanois, and Ennio Morricone. Their debut record, Ghost Box from 2018, epitomized the style, especially its iconic opener “Wichita” and followup “Late Night Call.” Leib, who played synths in the band and was also a cartoonist, passed away in 2021.1 The group’s latest record, Counting Sunsets, came out on Friday, and plays their signature style of pedal steel-infused ambient with a wistful air. Also worth checking out is their live performance on KEXP from the end of ‘24.

Counting Sunsets - SUSS (39m, no vocals)
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Ghost Box - SUSS (60m, no vocals)
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We wish you a great start to your week.

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Pitchfork

Noémi Büchi

Flow State — Fri, 15 May 2026 07:03:10 GMT

It’s Friday so we’re listening to something more upbeat. Today we’re listening to Noémi Büchi, a Swiss-French composer and pianist from Zürich. At a young age she discovered music by pressing the keys on her parents’ “ancient, unused, and out-of-tune piano,” she told 15Questions. She studied the piano classically, and then at university embraced the freedom of synthesizers. In her original music, she pays as much attention to composition as sound design, emphasizing the physicality of sound, inspired by Éliane Radigue among others. We’re first playing her new album, Exuvie, which came out in March. “I suppose” and “structure undone” are highlights. We’re also playing Does It Still Matter from 2024, a set of dramatic electroacoustic compositions, with piano foregrounding some tracks such as the brilliant “Collective Disaster.”

Exuvie - Noémi Büchi (36m, manipulated vocals on tracks 6 and 8)
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Does It Still Matter - Noémi Büchi (36m, slight vocals on track 10)
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Have a really nice weekend.

Setting

Flow State — Thu, 14 May 2026 07:03:02 GMT

Today we’re listening to Setting, an American trio from North Carolina, consisting of Nathan Bowles (keys, banjo), Jaime Fennelly (synths), and Joe Westerlund (drums). All multi-instrumentalists, they’d played in many bands before covid, when studio sessions and tours came to a halt. In 2021, the trio started playing together, fusing elements of ambient, krautrock, country, and minimalism. Setting, as the name suggests, is a band that’s very much about live presence. They’ve released several live albums, in fact, which are available on their Bandcamp page. We’re listening to their two studio albums. The self-titled one just came out a few weeks ago, a kind of bluegrass Oren Ambarchi record. Their debut LP, Shone a Rainbow Light On, came out in 2023, and is more ambient, the drums a subtler accompaniment of the zither, strings, synths, and keys.

Setting - Setting (46m, no vocals)
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Shone a Rainbow Light On - Setting (40m, no vocals)
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Have a great Thursday.

Oowets

Flow State — Wed, 13 May 2026 07:02:39 GMT

Today we’re listening to Oowets, an electronic music project from Japanese artist Wasaburou Watanabe. He was born in Chiba and later moved to Kagawa, where he’s now based.1 He previously released ambient music under his given name, and started the Oowets project in late 2020 as a vehicle to explore the intersection of organic and artificial sounds. He mixes the sounds of natural objects (wood, sand, stone), field recordings, and synthesizers. At times it becomes unclear whether a sound is from the environment or from a machine. We’re playing two of his Oowets LPs: the most recent one, Uchuu, from March and Calm Food from 2024. On his active YouTube page you can find such videos as the 90-minute [山の湧き水音] High-quality sound of mountain spring water and 9Hours Sleep Music | 7.83Hz シューマン共振 Schumann Resonance & 333|666|999Hz+Natural Sounds+Tibetan Bowl, which slaps.

Uchuu - Oowets (27m, spoken vocals on track 4)
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Calm Food - Oowets (33m, vocal sample on tracks 3 and 10)
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Have a great Wednesday.

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