By John Moxey
Hari Ossa is an experienced musician and songwriter currently based in Spain. After recently signing to indie label Artificial Bliss Records, he is currently working on his debut album.
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Can you tell us a bit about your early years in music?
I had music in my mind from as far as I can remember, but I first started playing guitar in a band at school, as usual my duty was to improvise guitar solos, I never wanted to imitate or play the original solos so I used to improvise for 15 minutes on each song until my friends stop playing and leave me alone on the school stage!!.
We didn't own any "real" instruments, the drummer rehearsed hitting his knees with his palms, the bassist playing the low strings of a spanish guitar, the keyboard player using a little yamaha toy keyboard and me playing solos with a spanish guitar amped thanks to a microphone attached to the bridge with an elastic belt, going through a little mono radiocassette.
When we played in public we rented all the equipment, it was really cheap stuff that most of the time never managed to stay in tune but the exitement of playing was glorious.
Do you have a favorite instrument?
For composing and write songs there's nothing like the computer, it's my main instrument right now, but I must say that the guitar is my love, moving my fingers on it's neck it's instant satisfaction for my soul.
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How long have you been playing guitar?
I play the guitar on and off since I was 16, prior to that I had a piano but never felt good to play that thing. Guitar was like love at first sight...
Do you have any preferred styles/genres?
Zappa has the biggest block in my music listening time graphic, I listen to his music almost everyday, but there's more music in my head from all over the world, lately I've been listening to Bach's keyboars works, specially the "Goldberg Variations" played by Glenn Gould, that guy is fantastic, also there's a lot of Indian music in my playlist, the only music that I can't stand is shameless commercial stuff.
But when I play I'm limited to what I can do on the guitar, I can't play Flamenco or bebop for instance, jazz feels like running in the water for me, although I enjoy listening to it.
I like to play blues and 70's rock-fusion tunes, when I go jamming we usually play Mahavishnu's "Be Happy" and Zappa's "Pygmy Twilight" plus some manic jam where we all kick our demons out using all weapons avaliable.
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I understand you have been recording an album. How is it progressing? Do you have a planned release date yet?
It's like having a baby you know? you want to see it done and you know how it's going to sound, but you must go thorough the whole painful process of composing, playing, singing, recording, arranging, editing, mixing and mastering...
Being a one man orchestra means a lot of work and sometimes it's boring but you know, I like having total control on my music.
The album was suposed to be out this year, and I still think it's possible, but the truth is I'm still working on it, I'd say it's like 70% composed. It features a lot of percussion and a zillion guitars.
How do you approach writing a song?
I try to make the song be what the song wants to be, when I start a tune I record parts over parts reacting to them improvising more things, all new parts added can alter the song structure or cause another part to dissapear if it makes the song move in it's natural direction. This way I never know how the song is going to end.
A song can start from a Lyric, a drum loop, a bass line, a sound, a feeling... any of the things that you can find in a song.
How has being signed to Artificial Bliss changed your approach to your music?
Well, I'm still making my stuff, walking my path, the only thing that changed is that I'm making an album, not just separated songs, an album must have a "conceptual continuity".
You seem to have had and eventful and unconventional childhood. How do you think this influences your music?
Well, those crazy years are my biggest influence, I learnt never to fear change and experimentation and always be open minded.
What artists would you say are your biggest influences?
Zappa of course, but also Robert Fripp, Vangelis and a lot of argentinean musicians from the 70's & 80's like L.A. Spinetta and Charly García.
What is your proudest musical achievement?
Being able to make music!, I was rejected from the music school where all my brothers were studying when we were child, they said I had no musical talent, so being here after all this years makes me very proud of myself.
What are your music plans for the next year?
I miss playing live, so after the album is done I want to form a band and return to play live, that would be great.
What other artists would you like to work with?
I don't know, that list could be very long, there's a lot of great musicians out there, it would be nice to play with Zappa's 76' band, Terry Bozzio on drums, ray white on voice, Patrick O'Hearn on Bass...
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As a Zappa fan, what lead you towards writing Electronica?
Before I discovered Zappa I was into Jean-Michel Jarre, Vangelis, Isao Tomita, jean-Luc Ponty and Andreas Vollenweider, those guys were playing in my room all day when I was 13 so I have this secret electronic roots; Zappa also used a lot of electronic stuff on his Synclavier albums, "Jazz From Hell" lasted for months inside my walkman and "Civilization Phase III" caused time to stop when I first bought it.
Also I started working with Atari computers very early, at first I used them to emulate humans, limiting every part to what a human is capable of playing, then I realized how stupid that is and started experimenting weird things.
Who have you worked with during the recording of your album?
Nobody but me yet, and I don't plan to invite anyone but you know, anything can happen...
What is your favourite track on your own album?
There's one tune that I like a lot, it's a minimalistic thing called "We're Ready" that basically is a synth bass line and some drums plus a football game, Richard Nixon and the wise words of Mr. Nicolas Slonimsky, I'm very proud because Slonimsky's daughter Electra gave her permission for the use of her father's voice in my tune.
You run your own music web site. How is that progressing?
Well, that's the worst thing of being a control freak, I never manage to do all the things I have in mind for the site, I'm always behind my own ideas, I started some "guitar & music" lessons where I talk about how to make music with the aid of a guitar, and also I have this blog about the making of the album; the nice thing about my site is that you can hear all my stuff, from 1994 untill now, so you can ger a very clear picture of my musical evolution.
Another place to find me is at myspace where I have a nice profile...
Do you have any advice for other musicians and songwriters?
Don't hear anybody but your own heart, always keep making music no matter what and never stop learning.
Also, if you're going to do something, do it the best you can, be true to yourself.
What indieland musicians do you currently rate?
You know, I thought some styles were dead, but I was wrong, non main stream music is still there evolving and renovating itself, I've found great musicians in the net, like Bend Sinister, Jude Haines, Mikaru... there's a lot of people making music you just need to be curious.
Have you had any musical training?
First I started reading from my sister's harmony and theory copybooks, since I was rejected from music school I decided to learn by myself, then I took some guitar lessons and then I managed to get into the conservatory to be a music teacher and learn classical guitar, the first semester the guitar teacher and the theory teacher told me to forget about music and use my imagination in advertising or anything else... thank God I met Yury Pronin, a Shostakovich student that was my harmony teacher, who encouraged me to keep at it and teached me almost all I know musically.
I lasted 3 years at the conservatory, after that I started studying electric guitar but I've always used more time to compose than to play guitar.
What was your first band?
My first "real" group was a band I had at the university called "La Manga", we were all studing music and as you can guess we played a lot of collective improvisations, then I started writing tunes for the band which was real fun because of the various instruments we had: trumpet, oboe, violin, bass, e. guitar (me), drums, trombone and percussion; the violin player had a piezo bridge through a guitar amp so we sounded a bit like a mixture of Zappa's "hot Rats" and the Mahavishnu Orchestra...
We never played other people's music, I remember the name of a tune we had was "amoeba's sexual awakening" that started with a chromatic theme and then we all improvised like crazy.
To find out more about Hari Ossa, please visit his website www.hariossa.com.
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About John Moxey
John Moxey started Songstuff in 2000 and is an active songwriter and musician as well as a regular Songstuff author of music and music technology related articles and member of the site crew.
John started playing his first instrument (piano) in 1971, and has been writing songs since 1979. He began playing his now main instrument, the guitar, in 1982. In 1986 he finished training as a studio engineer and in 1997 obtained an Honours Degree in Electronics and Music from the University of Glasgow.
John now plays several other instruments including mandolin, violin, bagpipes, didgeridoo, bodhran, and vocals.
John has a broad range of performance experience from choirs and orchestras to pipe bands. He has sung for, played in and written for various bands, and produced songs across a number of genres.
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