Premiere: Max Cooper gives Poppy Ackroyd's 'Paper' a crunchy electronic rework

Max Cooper has taken to post-classical pianist and composer Poppy Ackroyd’s ‘Paper’, giving it a cinematic electronic rework.

The Nils Frahm and Hauschka-championed artist released her debut full-length ‘Resolve’ in February last year to wild acclaim.

Beginning by allowing Ackroyd’s piano notes space to exist on their own, Cooper’s remix builds gently around twinkling electronics in a manner that’s made him so revered in electronic circles, adding his characteristically textured, synth-led style.

Max Cooper says: “Poppy has this playful style with the piano, which I tried to carry into the electronics as well, with lots of live synth jams, polyrhythms in the percussion and lots of small edits. I applied the same idea to the arrangement, with multiple different bridging-type sections linked together, so it has some sort of musical jest in there, leading into something which is another lead into something, so it needs a little listening time to all come together. Moments of bass and distortion/saturation were needed to pull everything back down to some balance, and not have it escape into complete frittering.

“It was an enjoyable musical process for me – it’s always nice working with someone else’s musical feelings, it can be a refreshing break from isolated solo work, and a great learning process delving into the details and construction of other pieces of music. That’s part of the reason I like to do remixes.”

Listen now:

Poppy embarks on a UK/EU tour soon:

18.01 – Castellón (ES) – Sala Cambra
06.02 – The Hague (NL) – Paard Van Troje
07.02 – Brussels (BE) – Flagey
08.02 – Wiesbaden (GER) – Hessisches Landesmuseum
09.02 – Bochum (GER) – Jahrhunderthalle
12.02 – London (UK) – EartH
13.02 – Bristol (UK) – Colston Hall Foyer
14.02 – Manchester (UK) – St. Michael’s
16.02 – Glasgow (UK) – The Blue Arrow
17.02 – Leicester (UK) – Attenborough Arts Centre
22.02 – Brighton (UK) – Attenborough Centre for the Creative Arts (ACCA)