The Los Angeles producer marries lo-fi beats and classical recordings on recent album for Deutsche Grammophon
You’ve probably heard the style by now: Lofi beats are relaxed instrumental hip-hop tracks that sound like they were lifted from an old cassette tape due to their hazy, hissing aesthetic. Los Angeles-raised producer L.Dre is a true master of this relatively new sub genre, but on his album Lofi Symphony for Deutsche Grammophon he rose to a completely new challenge.
The renowned classical label approached the young lofi producer with an idea: How would it sound if he tried to combine lofi beats with high quality recordings of classical orchestra musicians? Being open-minded by nature, the producer rose to the challenge but first he had to leave his comfort zone: “This is definitely different from everything I ever did before”, L.Dre says, phoning in from his studio in Los Angeles. “Actually I don’t think something like this has ever been done before.”
A digital native, the young producer utilised social media to build his personal brand from his careers’ very beginnings. Through Instagram, Youtube and TikTok, he openly shares tricks and hacks around music software, as well as glimpses into the everyday life and working routines of a lofi producer with his followers. This educative approach makes all the difference for L.Dre in a flood of faceless content providers. His high work ethic, combined with his relaxed, approachable personality, made his channels and his community grow inexorably.
As a youth, skateboarding and hip-hop dominated his daily routine. The talented musician learned different instruments in his childhood, such as guitar and drums. Even though he studied music production in college, Youtube became his most important teacher. Inspired by his early heroes, hip-hop producers such as J Dilla or Kaytranada, he started to upload instrumental productions to streaming platforms as a teenager. His chill beats were inspired by the classic boom-bap style of the 1990s and fitted a trend that just became apparent in certain playlists at that time. His generation had discovered lo-fi beats primarily as background music, for example for studying or just hanging out.
For the young producer, a very special opportunity arose when Deutsche Grammophon approached him about a project idea, combining lofi beats with classical music. Apparently, a son of an A&R at the German record company was a big fan of L.Dre’s beats. His father saw an opportunity and reached out. L.Dre liked the idea, but he didn’t realise that the album’s production process would prove to become more complex than that of a regular project in this genre.
First of all, it was about picking the right tracks from the labels’ deep catalogue: Clair de Lune by Claude Debussy and Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata had been among L.Dre’s personal favourites for a long time, he says, but he added Erik Satie’s Gymnopédies or Vivaldi’s Four Seasons to expand the soundscape of the album. Aside from calm, melancholic pieces that were obviously suited for the lofi treatment, L.Dre also consciously picked some more energetic compositions to broaden the dynamic range of the record. He wanted to “pick a few truly iconic pieces and retell their story in a new way, my very own way”, and then he adds chuckling, “I also wanted all my producer friends to wonder how I actually got clearance for these famous tracks.”
In a first procedure step, L.Dre sampled the well-known songs for a raw version of the beat, then the “new” composition was transcribed and submitted to an orchestra of select musicians to re-play. With these recordings, L.Dre finalised his tracks in laborious detail work. It’s exactly this tension, stemming from the combination of lo-fi aesthetic and hi-fi recordings, that makes Lofi Symphony sound so interesting: Pristine string recordings meet vintage sounds from an original Steinway piano from the 1920s, the genre-typical vinyl crackle and the characteristically muted drum sounds.
This musical constellation required a special intuition for the right balance. Instead of chopping up his sample sources beyond recognition, L.Dre embraced the big melodies of the classical compositions. Lofi Symphony sounds gloriously timeless – even beyond the usual background listening context of lo-fi music. This is music that invites active listening, but it can still soundtrack your life.
by Stephan Kunze