My life in music. Music is my passion. After playing the bass, different basses, different styles, I started to deepen and develop in writing music. That was a big floor in my music experience. Of course I kept on playing bass, but writing music has such a completely different experience that it could just be done. Of course there were cross connections between the two disciplines. I took the things I knew from bass to the writing, and the things I learned and discovered while writing I found back in my bass play.

In recent years I have added a third to these 2 passions. Mixing music. I’m forced by the way, because I want to produce music, and it has to be mixed. To always outsource that, my production speed is far too expensive. So if I want to keep on publishing, I have to develop myself in mixing music.

Initially it was reluctantly, because it is very difficult and I was always not satisfied with the result. In this sense, there are many parallels with learning to arrange and compose. You have to rely on your own taste and ears. If you are just starting out, rules are your only hold. And you do not have much to do with rules with creative skills. That is frustrating. You really have to make hours, refuel your experience.

Slowly but surely, and I’m not there yet, I get more grip on the matter, which is just as addictive as arranging and bassing. Hours, days, months of listening and turning of buttons. Disappointment and euphoria. But it’s coming. I feel that it develops, that I get more self-confidence, that I dare to do things. That is important and crucial.

Of course, I can never become a top mixer because it requires huge financial investments. The best studios work with devices that cost millions of euros. I can never resist that and I do not have to. Still some productions, such as e.g. the last album of Anne-Lie is done in expensive studios with ditto producers. And that’s fine. But I will increasingly be able to lift the productions for which there is a smaller budget to a beautiful end result. And what can I enjoy.

These weeks I am busy mixing and editing the latest CD from Stageband Jazzorchestra, Hållsta Suite. What a party that is. Great musicians, beautiful music (because written by myself;)), very well recorded (Akkrum top studio) and more and more knowledge on my part. I regularly wake up at night with my head full of ideas. That is passion. In addition to the bass and writing, mixing is my third love. Delicious.