Klaus Schulze

Klaus Schulze uses the Alesis MIDIVerb 4, as listed on his official instruments page.

"I still love my Roland SRV-2000 and 3030 and my TC Electronic M-One 19-inch reverbs, the Lexicon 480L with the LARC, and of course, most important, the Roland RSP-550s, of which I have a bunch. These are the main effects I use all the time for the more prominent instruments. They create the rooms and reverb positionings and, of course, the delay cascades for most of the sequencers."

983 Computer (G.D.S., PPG, Fairlight), much better effect devices, Oberheim DMX, custom made EEH rhythm-computer, EMT plate reverb.

Alesis HD 24 harddisk recorder (3x) with remote control

"I still love my Roland SRV-2000 and 3030 and my TC Electronic M-One 19-inch reverbs, the Lexicon 480L with the LARC, and of course, most important, the Roland RSP-550s, of which I have a bunch. These are the main effects I use all the time for the more prominent instruments. They create the rooms and reverb positionings and, of course, the delay cascades for most of the sequencers."

Klaus Schulze uses the Alesis Studio 32 mixer, as detailed on the Klaus Schulze's Instruments page.

Soundcraft Mixer "GHOST" 32 channels (Midi automation)

Klaus Schulze uses the Tascam DA-40 DAT recorder, as listed on his official instruments page.

Klaus Schulze utilizes the Apple Powerbook G4, featuring 733 MHz and 933 MHz models, as part of his music production setup. This information is detailed on the "Klaus Schulze's Instruments" page on his official website.

Akai S 1100 (32 Mbyte)

Klaus Schulze utilizes the E-mu Vintage Keys sound module, as detailed on the "Klaus Schulze's Instruments" page on his official site.

Klaus Schulze uses the Alesis CLX-440 limiter and compressor, as detailed in the "Klaus Schulze's Instruments" section on his official website.

Klaus Schulze uses the Roland SP-555 Creative Sampler Workstation, as listed on his official instruments page.

Klaus Schulze utilizes three Roland SRV-2000 MIDI Digital Reverbs in his setup, as detailed on the "Klaus Schulze's Instruments" page.

Klaus Schulze utilizes the Roland SRV-330 Dimensional Space Reverb, as listed on the Klaus Schulze's Instruments page.

Klaus Schulze utilizes the SPL Vitalizer MK2, as listed on the "Klaus Schulze's Instruments" page.

Klaus Schulze is listed as using the Atari 1040 ST among his extensive collection of music equipment, as detailed on the "Klaus Schulze's Instruments" page.

Atari 1040 ST, Atari Mega ST 4, Roland: Super JX 10, S 50, D 50, MKS 80, MKS 30, U 110, MPG 80; Akai X 7000, Fairlight, Yamaha TX 81 Z, Akai S 612, Korg DVP 1, Roland SRV 2000, Korg SDD 1200, Ibanez SDR 1000, Eventide Harmonizer, 3x Hohner HS-1/E, 2x Klark EQ, Arsonic-Sigma 5.2, EMS Synthi A, and others...

1972 Teisco organ, Solina string keyboard, guitar, voice, tapes, tape echo, 4-track Telefunken home recorder, cheap 3-channel Telefunken Echo Mixer, Revox, broken Fender guitar amplifier.

The center of the studio is a console with a big 36 channel mixer (Soundcraft), the master keyboard (Quasimidi "Cyber 6"), a computer (Apple Power Mac G4) and additional equipment (see photo). To the left and right of the mixer there are flat screen computer monitors. Below the mixer the master keyboard is placed on a board which is assembled like a drawer so that Klaus can pull it out when he plays music, and push it back when he works mainly with the computer. The computer stands on the floor.

"I still love my Roland SRV-2000 and 3030 and my TC Electronic M-One 19-inch reverbs, the Lexicon 480L with the LARC, and of course, most important, the Roland RSP-550s, of which I have a bunch. These are the main effects I use all the time for the more prominent instruments. They create the rooms and reverb positionings and, of course, the delay cascades for most of the sequencers."

"I still love my Roland SRV-2000 and 3030 and my TC Electronic M-One 19-inch reverbs, the Lexicon 480L with the LARC, and of course, most important, the Roland RSP-550s, of which I have a bunch. These are the main effects I use all the time for the more prominent instruments. They create the rooms and reverb positionings and, of course, the delay cascades for most of the sequencers."

"We just spoke about the issue of certain discontinued plug-ins that I love to have available. They are the reason I stick to my trusty PowerMac computer setup (running a pretty old OS)." A pair of PowerMac G5 towers can be seen in Klaus' studio (ninth photo).

Using a cheap Teisco organ, guitars, tapes with Dynacord echo, a 4-track Telefunken recorder alongside a cheap Telefunken 3-channel Echomixer, Schulze crafted the strange Irrlicht (literally: eerie light) in 1972. Cool and strangely ahead of Brian Eno's similar Discreet Music of three years later, this was quiet music of the minimalist droning variety.

In 1986 Schulze installed fully digital 24-track recording recording equipment, and by this time was getting heavily into MIDI and sampling. Rack mounted synths from Korg were added, plus Akai samplers. A Korg DVP-1 digital voice processor, and a Publison Infernal Machine 90 (a powerful sampler/digital effects system). This all featured, along with the Fairlight, on Dreams, its hi-tech sound and contrasting moods blueprinting the current Schulze sound.

"The main recordings came directly from my desk on to DATs, with no audience noise. I edited these live pieces into two 45 minute sections. 'Silence & Sequence' and 'Variation on BF' were new studio recordings. My main instruments are six Akai S1000s — two keyboards, four rackmounted with 32MB storage each. I've ordered the new Tascam DA88 8-track digital recorder to replace the DAT system I use.

"The main recordings came directly from my desk on to DATs, with no audience noise. I edited these live pieces into two 45 minute sections. 'Silence & Sequence' and 'Variation on BF' were new studio recordings. My main instruments are six Akai S1000s — two keyboards, four rackmounted with 32MB storage each. I've ordered the new Tascam DA88 8-track digital recorder to replace the DAT system I use.

"The desk is a Soundcraft 92-channel, with two power supplies because of its size. I use Arsonic Sigma noise reduction and gain control to avoid digital distortion, very important. EMT reverbs. Effects are varied: Dynacord DRP20, a very cheap but good Boss analogue delay, an Eventide Harmonizer, BGW amplification with RTV correlation and peak limiter. I record on a Tascam DAT at home and in concert. There's no analogue recording. I use an Atari Mega ST4, upgraded to 26MB of RAM, with a 105MB hard disk. I need that for my 60 minute pieces. Now the opera is about 104 minutes, and I need a lot of working capacity because I cannot break off at a point to access the hard disk. Everything has to be immediately accessible."

"The desk is a Soundcraft 92-channel, with two power supplies because of its size. I use Arsonic Sigma noise reduction and gain control to avoid digital distortion, very important. EMT reverbs. Effects are varied: Dynacord DRP20, a very cheap but good Boss analogue delay, an Eventide Harmonizer, BGW amplification with RTV correlation and peak limiter. I record on a Tascam DAT at home and in concert. There's no analogue recording. I use an Atari Mega ST4, upgraded to 26MB of RAM, with a 105MB hard disk. I need that for my 60 minute pieces. Now the opera is about 104 minutes, and I need a lot of working capacity because I cannot break off at a point to access the hard disk. Everything has to be immediately accessible."

"Well, I'd love to go over to PCs, where I'd be working with a 50MHz or 60MHz clocks, much faster than my Atari, but the problem is that my music software won't run on the PC. I use C-Lab Notator on the ST and Steinberg Cubase [a Windows version has just been released — see review in this issue] on the Mac. These are slow, but because I'm very familiar with them I'd have to start all over again to learn the new Logic [Mac-based successor to Notator] and Windows equivalents, which are faster. For me the computer is a big tape machine. I can notate 92 tracks, which is three digital recorders' worth."