Urbans Mag: How Stephen Emmer reshaped his vision of classical music with Mt. Mundane

Urbans Magazine interview Stephen Emmer : Mt. Mundane

Stephen Emmer explores resilience and reinvention in his latest album, Mt. Mundane. In an exclusive interview, the artist shares his thoughts on inspiration, collaboration, and his vision to merge tradition, innovation and colour in the pursuit of timeless music.

There are aspects of music that many artists, in their pursuit of the immediate, often overlook: the importance of storytelling, of asking the right questions, and of answering them through a meticulous study of the world around them. These are the factors that distinguish great artists from the rest, regardless of their scale or medium. The story behind Mt. Mundane, is not just one of overcoming adversity; it is also an exploration of his new circumstances and how his humility drove him to elevate and enrich his craft. This introspective composition, grounded in a deep study of Impressionist classical music and other genres, was masterfully executed in collaboration with remarkable artists at the legendary Studio Two at Abbey Road. In this interview, we delve into the intricacies of Stephen’s work, exploring his creative process, his inspirations, and the unique vision that shaped Mt. Mundane.

UM: One of the things that caught my attention was the name of the album, Mt. Mundane. What was the inspiration behind the name of this album?

SE: Mundane has the notion of elegance. But in British English, mundane means the ordinary, and to leave the ordinary behind for that metaphorical mountain was my conceptual fantasy.

UM: This album is described as one of your most personal works and reflects the themes of loss and resilience. How did your own experience with hearing loss shape the emotional narrative of this album?

SE: That’s a good question. It’s the limitations that arise with those medical problems, especially the hearing in our case, that drive you to more intense thoughts of either stopping the creative path or somehow translating it into something positive. And I always, if I may, tend to use the metaphor of Paralympic athletes. When you have lost an arm or a leg while being an athlete, what are you going to do? Retire, or are you going to continue? Well, I can now personally tell you from experience that I asked myself the same question. And what happens is, when you’re in that position, when you’re being pushed into that corner, new, surprising forces arrive, and I was lucky to get that. So, through that insight, I was very motivated to continue, except that I needed to know and find out how. We can talk about that if you wish.

UM: Yes, because I was wondering about the kinds of challenges you have faced with your hearing and how they have impacted your daily life.

SE: In my case, it’s a very ugly trilogy of handicaps. It started with tinnitus. Then it became partial deafness—my left ear has completely lost its hearing. And thirdly, when you have those two, it’s all very closely connected in your brain. The equilibrium organ is millimeters away from your hearing nerve, so one can influence the other. After the tinnitus and, eventually, the deafness, I also started suffering from vertigo. In medical terms, they would call this Ménière’s disease. Some people experience all of these symptoms, while others only experience tinnitus or hearing loss.

UM: But neither of those challenges forced you to stop creating music. That is an amazing achievement in itself.

SE: That’s what a psychologist told me when I consulted him. He said: “Well, I hear you speak of music as your work, but I also hear it’s your passion. My advice would be not to stop this work, because it is also your passion.” And I said, “True words, doctor.” I even added, “We could transform my work and my passion into something new—a mission.” And that was really the starting point of two things. One of them was the album. That became my artistic expression of what was going on personally. At the same time, Connie and I initiated a foundation here in Holland called Artists Against Tinnitus.

UM: One of those missions was this new album, which was recorded at Abbey Road with over 30 musicians. What is your approach to orchestrating such a large ensemble while maintaining the intimacy of the Adagio movements?

SE: That’s nice to hear, but in actual fact, it was 60 people. In Studio Two at Abbey Road, not even The Beatles, when they did “All You Need Is Love,” could fit in the orchestra, so they went to Studio One, which is more often used for film soundtracks. This was about the maximum we could squeeze into The Beatles’ studio. I also wanted to invite a choir, but that’s another 30 people, so we recorded them afterwards. But you’re right, it is still not a full symphony orchestra. It’s a chamber orchestra with the intimacy of chamber music. It’s intimate, but I needed the differentiation in color—the colorization of the arrangements and orchestration. I thought, we cannot achieve that with just a quartet or a quintet. It’s, again, a bit of a fantasy ensemble. I also wanted to use and write for tuned percussion—marimba, vibraphone, and celeste—to be as important as the upfront instruments. We had to bring them forward in the mix; otherwise, you couldn’t hear them enough. Even for Abbey Road, it was a bit of an experiment. But the magic of the way the room sounds is true. I now know for certain. I’ve been in many studios, and while the equipment might be state-of-the-art or very good, the legend of Studio Two is true. It has a truly magical acoustic.

UM: The experience of listening to music nowadays often feels overwhelming. Many albums or live events sound overly compressed, as if they’re trying to mimic the loudness of advertising. It feels like the dynamics are being forgotten, and everything ends up sounding flat and uniform. But your album stands out. It has the correct dynamics, the space, and the balance that allow the music to breathe. What inspired you to move away from traditional symphonic elements?

SE: That’s perhaps also the reason why we shouldn’t call it a symphonic album. Symphony orchestras often rely heavily on writing for brass instruments, and personally, due to my circumstances, I can no longer tolerate brass. The intimacy and soothing qualities of this work are closely tied to my new acoustic challenges. That’s one reason, but as you surely know, I also tend to get bored easily with a single genre or style. I enjoy exploring new directions. Even if I considered doing something with loud guitars or similarly intense sounds, it would remain purely a fantasy. Realistically, I wouldn’t be able to handle that anymore during the composition or production phases.

In my search for something more soothing, Spotify’s algorithm offered me recommendations based on its classic “if you like this, you might like that” logic. Starting with Mompou, I delved into more obscure Impressionist music. In France, they refer to Mompou as the “Catalan Manpower” or even the “Erik Satie of Spain.” Spotify cleverly suggested other music in a similar vein. For instance, Maurice Ravel, who is partially of Basque descent, appeared on my radar. While Spotify doesn’t provide much financial return for artists, its algorithm guided me to Ravel’s work. If you enjoy Mompou, it suggested, you might also like Ravel—both being from roughly the same period and sharing regional ties.

I began exploring Ravel’s compositions, which we all know from Boléro. Interestingly, Ravel himself called Boléro “the only non-music I ever made.” He considered it more of an etude or exercise in orchestration than a true composition. Yet beyond Boléro, when you dive into his less commercialized works, you discover fantastic, sweet, and harmoniously adventurous music. This inspired me to think that this might be the direction I should pursue, given my circumstances.

As I embraced this path, I also realized how much today’s neoclassical music scene revolves around American minimalism. Artists like Max Richter and Ludovico Einaudi are heavily influenced by the works of Philip Glass and Steve Reich. While I admire their work, I often find it lacks adventure, painting music in monochrome tones. In contrast, Impressionist music from 100 years ago was celebrated for its vibrant colorizations. I thought it would be a wonderful idea to revive the rich color palette of Impressionist music and give it a contemporary twist.

UM: You have mentioned being inspired by French post-Impressionist composers like Ravel and Debussy. How did the orchestrations and harmonizations inform your approach to the compositions?

SE: I’m happy to say that what I liked about Debussy is that he also looked beyond what was common practice in his day. For example, he attended the World Expo in Paris and discovered Indonesian Gamelan music being performed live. He was intrigued by it and thought it would be a good experiment to incorporate its tonalities and tone scales into Western European music. My connection with that is also personal, as my mother is from Indonesia. I thought it fitting to explore something similar.
With Ravel, what I really admire is that he wasn’t inspired by American minimalism but by his meeting with George Gershwin. Gershwin used a lot of jazz-type harmonizations and progressions, and Ravel took those ideas back to France, incorporating them into his compositions. I consider both to be the godfathers of film music. Their innovations eventually influenced American composers, who integrated those styles into film scores, which is an old love of mine.

UM: I see an evolution through decades where compositions from those artists, among others, are being simplified to give a “contemporary touch.” How do you feel about the simplification of music over the decades? Do you think it underestimates the intelligence of modern audiences?

SE: I see your point there. It’s something that has been scientifically investigated recently. Pop music today uses simpler chords than in the ’80s, which were simpler than the ’70s and ’60s. Pop music now allows little variation. The old idea of an introduction is gone. Record labels say, “Start straight away with what you want to tell us in the song.” I personally see this as underestimating the audience. It’s a cynical view. It’s the same with TV productions. When I composed music for TV, someone told me, “Keep it simple and stupid.”
You don’t know for sure if the audience is “stupid,” and it’s not very nice to assume that. For my album, I didn’t feel I had the strength or formal schooling to create a full symphony with several parts. But I thought about Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys. He used a full orchestra to create what he later called “pocket symphonies”—mini-symphonies structured as three-minute pop songs. Today, attention spans are shorter. So, as you suggested, you can’t afford to go all the way. But I tried to condense the modulation and complexity of long symphonies into shorter, three-minute pieces. They’re like mini-symphonies or pocket symphonies. Whether this could be a future format for classical music is up to listeners to decide. The TikTok generation won’t listen to a 25-minute symphony. If you want to interest them in classical music, it has to be shorter. There was a lot of research about this for the album.

UM: I wanted to ask about the collaborations on this album. Collaborating with artists like Anthony Weeden or Ben Dawson brings a wealth of talent to the table. How did their expertise help achieve the cinematic and introspective tone that defines Mt. Mundane?

SE: That’s an interesting question. Anthony Weeden was someone I admired as a fan because he conducted and arranged for the late Jóhann Jóhannsson, the Icelandic film composer. Jóhann was very artistic, almost like a European composer. Sadly, he passed away three years ago. His assistant, Hildur Guðnadóttir, is now the top female composer and won an Oscar for Joker in 2019. Anthony also worked with her and earned his credits on projects like The Theory of Everything.
I was looking for someone in England to assist me with conducting, as that’s the one thing I cannot do. I hate seeing people with vanity going into studios and pretending to conduct without knowledge. I thought I needed to be humble and leave it to someone more experienced, and Anthony was perfect. He’s very skilled at the practical side of orchestration. I sketched everything myself, but he would ask questions like, “How many flutes? One, two, or three?” I didn’t always have precise answers. I trusted him, and he brought balance and cohesion to the orchestration.
Ben Dawson, the pianist, also played a key role. Normally, I play my own parts, but due to my medical limitations, I thought it better to involve a classical pianist. Ben had exactly the sensitivity I was looking for. He taught me things I didn’t even know about, like how all the magic is in the pedaling. He did a wonderful job, which greatly improved the piano pieces.

 

UM: The Adagio form plays a central role in the album. Why did you choose this movement as a foundation for conveying the emotional arc of grief, hope, and gratitude?

SE: I’m glad you asked this because most people don’t ask these types of questions. My idea for the album was the “pocket symphony” concept. A full traditional symphony consists of multiple sections—three, four, or five—including the Andante. But when I listen to classical music, I always gravitate toward the slower movements. That’s where I feel the most emotion lies. The introduction is usually attention-seeking, and the finale often feels too dramatic. I never liked those as much. For me, the Adagio—with its slow tempo—is the most personal and expressive part of a symphony. It’s also typically around two or three minutes long, aligning perfectly with the pocket symphony idea. That was the conceptual reasoning behind it.

UM: You also introduced melodies from your 45-year career into new symphonic pieces. How did you choose which themes to revisit, and what was it like integrating them into this project?

SE: When I listened back to those melodies, I used them as starting points, combining them with all the musical knowledge and experience I’ve gained over the years—in harmonization, chord progressions, orchestration, and tempo. I realized they were naive, yet sometimes fresher than the melodies we create as seniors. They had a truly junior, fresh type of thinking. While they were primitive, my 40 years of craftsmanship made it the best of both worlds: the naivety of youth and the seniority of experience. I sympathized with my younger self. I thought, “He was a sweet guy.” Today, I hope not to be too cynical or pessimistic, but I hear that sweet young boy in those melodies, and I wanted to honor what he thought at the time.

UM: Were there specific recording techniques or technologies you used to capture that cinematic sense on Mt. Mundane? Abbey Road obviously offers not only digital tools but also a wealth of analog gear that can create a completely unique sound. Did those resources play a role in achieving your vision?

SE: All microphones were vintage, heritage equipment. Abbey Road is one of the few studios in the world that has 50 to 60 vintage microphones. Most studios have one or two, but Abbey Road brought out microphones from the ’60s, even ones used by The Beatles. They set them up in the studio, which has amazing acoustics. The room itself is very analog, with an old envelope design. Upstairs in the mixing room, they have an analog console called the Neve VR, which is a wonderful hybrid console. The monitoring speakers in the mixing room are analog Bowers & Wilkins, reminiscent of the 1970s. They use this setup for serious projects, including Hollywood films. The digital aspect only came later, during the editing in Pro Tools. I couldn’t make it to London for most of the mixing, but we used a high-quality connection through a company called Audiomovers. It was the best of both worlds—analog recording and digital mixing.

Where to Listen to Mt. Mundane…

Mt. Mundane, the latest album by Stephen Emmer, is now available on major streaming platforms. You can listen to it here.

Or get a copy of the Mt. Mundane Luxury Edition here.

[UM – A. Fernandez – January 2025]

Thanks for sharing