Creativity Is Like A Muscle

Photo Benjamin Schäfer

Interview with Music Producer and Pianist Jan Wagner

Jan Wagner grew up in a tiny city called Sigmaringen, in Southern Germany. He grew up with music as his father a musician as well had a music school which he rant in their home. It was early on he was interested in the process of making music, the knobs, faders and instruments not really playing live. So he built a home studio in his dad’s music school where he would produce beats. Eventually friends would visit and the music school turned into a studio.

Tell us more about how you got into music Jan?

When I was 17, a friend of mine told me about a crazy musician and his amazing studio so I went there and met Hans Joachim Irmler and saw his legendary Faust Studio. He became my mentor and I spent several years in that space learning about production under his wing. I had the chance to work with so many fantastic artists like Jaki Liebezeit, FM Einheit or Gudrun Gut, and learn from them. In 2010, I decided to move to Berlin to study audio engineering at SAE. I never wanted to study any instrument or producing per-se, I only wanted to study the technical side. You can’t really study music or production, you have to practice and discover it while playing. After finishing SAE, I met Pola Roy from Wir Sind Helden and he invited me to work with him in his Hitipapa Studio. During this time, I started mixing a lot of techno tracks for Ostgut Records and started producing my first solo album, which became Nummern. I worked with James Varghese on that and then I started working with artists like Rosa Anschütz or Tobias Preisig. And now, finally, my second album is out! It’s called Kapitel.

Greatest inspirations or influences? 

The greatest inspiration is life. You have to go out and discover life to the fullest. Every good and every bad incident forms into the person you are. My inspiration comes from that. I take all that energy and transform it into something new. I remember sitting with my friends at home and watching MTV Cribs, I only watched it because I wanted to the see the studios these artists built in their mansions. I was so fascinated with having a studio in your house, so I started building a home studio with my father in his music school.

My father influenced me a lot because he facilitated me in becoming a producer. Later on, it was Hans Joachim Irmler and the entourage at Faust Studio. Irmler’s approach to making music and being in the studio shaped me a lot! In recent years I was more and more affected by artists such as Bruce Hornsby, Brian Eno and Ryuichi Sakamoto. 

Tell us about your creative process?

My creative process is simple. I sit down, press record and just play and without judging. In the first phase everything should be as simple as possible. No technical distractions, you have to let your energy out without thinking about the set up or the technical side of things. You can always re-record tracks, but the feeling you carry with is fleeting, so you have to capture that in the first part of the process.

I have a daily ritual called morning pages. I write three pages straight through, without thinking, right after I get up. I make myself a coffee and just write whatever comes to mind mind. This clears my thoughts, dispels my anger or excitement, whatever I carry around with me. I think that overcoming a writers block only works when you reflect on yourself. Even the block itself can be inspiring in its own way. Question yourself, why is it that you don’t have anything to say in this particular moment? And always remember that creativity is like a muscle, you have to train it and it needs rest, you can strain it or over work it. So don’t stress yourself, meditate and reflect on yourself. 

Anything you have to say about these times we are living through?

To be honest, it took me three days to even start answering your questions. Not because I didn’t want to, I was just not able to. We had to postpone our tour of Poland and went straight back to Berlin before they closed the borders. It’s a new situation, the one that we’re facing right now. It involves us all. I’m not disappointed or angry at anyone, because there’s no one to be angry at except maybe at all of us, as a society.

This crisis shows us how connected the world is. We should start thinking as one planet because thats what we are. We really have to take care of our planet.

No ridiculous cheap flights to play a single gig on a different continent. We need eco-friendly touring plans or routings. At least 4-5 gigs per territory, otherwise it’s just too wasteful and this we can’t afford anymore. Right now, we have the time to rethink our past and how we functioned, and when this epidemic blows over it will be our duty to support the venues and artists.

Anything else you would like to share Jan

I would just like to wish everyone the best of health. Take this time for yourselves, meditate, rethink and re-organise. Now, we finally have time for all of this! And: stay positive, anything else is really a waste of time.

Cover photo by Benedikt Bentler