Dirkie Coetzee started his career in the EDM scene as a bedroom DJ way back at the tender age of 16. After spending numerous years perfecting his mixing skills he quickly started to feature in night clubs, events and radio stations around Southern Africa. It was in this time that Dirkie started to gain interest in the art of music production.

“I used to be a DJ, but thanks to the wonderful world of music production I can now create the music I want to play.”

Without any formal training in music theory, rhythms, chord progressions, sound synthesis or music production in general, Dirkie set out to learn this fine art by scouring any available articles and tutorials available on the internet. With many years of trial and error Dirkie slowly refined his skills as a music producer to create the sounds you hear in his music today.

“It’s hard to stay motivated when you feel like you are not achieving anything with your music, but passion for music always dies a slow death and quitting is never an option for me.”

It’s this passion for music and trance music production in particular that has helped Dirkie to get his music signed to some of the best labels in the business.

2011 is the year Dirkie Coetzee focused all his energy and time on producing Vocal Trance. His debut Vocal Trance production “Never Looking Back” with world renowned singer and songwriter Emma Lock has given Dirkie a solid platform to showcase his ability to craft this powerful genre of music. American artist Marcia Juell is another one of the world’s leading Trance Vocalists that has worked on collaborations with the rapidly rising producer from South Africa.

First enchanted by floating soundscapes and hypnotic arpeggios in electronic music of 90′s, Neo’s interest in producing started as an exploration of sound synthesis and sequencing programs. He soon realized the potential of trance as the form for his musical intentions and eventually creating trance became an inseparable part of his life.

Neo’s ambition in music is to take listeners on emotional and aesthetic journeys. Drawing inspiration from photographing nature and technology, transforming visual into musical is his favourite challenge. A fan of many styles of trance, his musical influences include ambient soundscapes, classic club anthems, goa, psychedelic and EBM.

Neo’s productions vary from uplifting club bangers to visually inspired musical trips. Since 2008 his tracks and remixes have been heard in clubs around the world and played in A State Of Trance among other shows. The future for Neo is a world of sonic possibilities to be explored – learning and experimenting never ends.

Neo Kekkonen – Metro EP to be released on Camouflage on 28th June 2011.

Tom is quite new face in the scene but his debut single ‘Cubic’ was released by Anjunadeep and was also featured on the ‘Anjunadeep: 02′ comp. ‘Cubic’ gained awsome amount of support from the likes of: Kyau vs. Albert, Ashley Wallbridge, Marcus Shcössow, Super8 & Tab, Jaytech etc.

Born in Lohja, Finland, Tom started his musical life at the age of 10, when he picked up his brothers guitar and started to play. In the age of 16 he found electronic music listening to Gary D. D-Trance collections and fell in love with the music. The first steps as a producer were made with the legendary modplug tracker and soon after that followed Jeskola Buzz and finally Cubase. Tom is very passionate producer and has sacrificed almost all of his life to music. Nowdays he spends hours after hours in the studio and makes his living as a Dj in nightclubs around southern Finland.

Future looks bright for this young producer, keep your eyes pealed for new releases from labels like Silk Royal and Subtraxx Recordings.

nervous_testpilot (aka Paul Taylor) has been producing and performing electronic music for over 10 years.

His driving, scorchingly melodic productions have been supported by the likes of Super8 and Tab, Mark Pledger, Miika Kuisma, Graham Gold, Ashley Wallbridge and Adymus.

Signed to Miika Kuisma’s legendary Subtraxx label (which first introduced superstar Sied van Riel to the world), he always puts strong emotional melodies at the heart of his powerful dancefloor-oriented productions.

The Past

Paul’s first records were experimental electronica, encompassing everything from lo-fi chiptune to ludicrous speedcore. Eschewing the normal path of DJing, he played live widely around the UK, taking his unique sound anywhere he could get an audience, supporting rock bands, rappers and even performance poets!

In 2005, he composed the soundtrack to PC sword-fighting title Determinance by independent game development studio Mode 7 Games, intorducing the world to his forward-thinking trance sound.

The Present

2009 saw the release of the anthemic “Imaginary Cities” on Future State Recordings, which was shortly followed by a string of remixes and original tracks on the Bonzai labels Subtraxx and Green Martian.

His remix of Miika Kuisma’s “One Step Behind the Mankind” proved a hit with a huge variety of DJ’s, was supported across the globe from the US to Japan, and was featured on Above and Beyond’s Anjunabeats Worldwide radio show.

The Future

2010 will see nervous_testpilot take to the road for his first regular gigs in several years, as well as contuning to release music on Subtraxx and other labels – stay tuned!

www.nervoustestpilot.co.uk

A finnish electronic music making duo Ayleon consists of Sami Tikkamäki and Tomi Pihlajamäki. Both have a long experience in music making on their own. In 2005 they joined and started co-operation in order to make some remixing work.
Ayleon’s musical influences comes from various electronic genres such as trance, dance, house, breakbeat, electro house and many different 80′s dance music. Past years they have managed to create their individual style by combining lots of different styles and ideas – mostly those ideas have worked well. Even though they like to make their songs according to specific genres, their main idea has always been to avoid the most typical ways to make music. It’s boring, that’s why. However they get more inspired by experimenting with sounds and trusting their ears. After that comes all the necessary routines, mixing etc.

www.ayleonmusic.com

Syna is a relatively young Finnish club music trio formed in 2004 by three well talented producers Toni Kurkimäki,  Mika Vuorela and Timo Juuti.

The trademark sound of Syna is a confection of deep progressive basslines, breakbeats and emotional melodies which can be melancholy and uplifting at the same time. Such blend can only be crafted by very talented producers with diverse musical backgrounds and producing styles, which presumably creates the cutting edge of Syna and assures the sustainable progress of their sound.

www.synamusic.com

A decade is a long time in the dance music industry. A decade spent in the very epicentre of clubbing, exploring the fine art of production and the magic of DJing, can give you a truly instinctive feel for the next big thing.

That’s exactly what a decade in the music business has done for Finnish DJ and producer Ville Lope.

As a DJ, he’s crafted a style which is both sophisticated and dancefloor-friendly; as a producer, his original tracks and remixes have graced world-famous labels.

Ville Lope’s sound blends different flavours of progressive trance: from deeper tracks through to full-on melodic scorchers. You’ll find driving, solid basslines throughout his sets and productions.

Over the past 10 years, Ville has DJed all over Finland, establishing himself as a connoisseur of progressive who never fails to ignite the dancefloor.  It’ll come as no surprise to hear that he’s often been booked alongside international superstars.

In his role at Subtraxx isn’t only an artist, he’s also the A&R of all three labels, Subtraxx, Camouflage and Nemesis.

www.villelope.com

Miika Kuisma is a finnish musician, artist, philosopher, futurist and inventor who’s passion is to understand fundamental nature of the reality by exploring spirituality, science, history and technology.

In early 90′s he got big revelation in a small house club and walked out as a new person. From that moment he knew dance music was ‘for him’. His first electronic records which influenced him the most include works by Jarre, Cosmic Baby, Moby, Prodigy, Faithless and early Eye-Q releases. After falling in love with so many electronic styles by now, also his own productions have become somewhat unpredictable.

His tracks are usually somewhere between progressive and melodic, while not being not ‘too deep’ or ‘too cheesy’. On the DJ’ing side Miika was known for his perfectionistic approach to build his sets in certain way. Especially his “Intelligent Design” radio mixes were trips across different moods and genres.

Miika has spent most of his life playing around with technical gear but also loved to draw and play instruments from very early age. After getting his degree in electricity he turned around and took career paths in graphic design, programming, animation and user-interface design.

Besides music production and performances he played key role in the concept and interface-design with EKS in the development of the MIDI controller EKS Otus. He played his last DJ gig in April of 2009, sold his record label “Subtraxx Recordings” for Bonzai Music and relocated into South-East Asia. Currently he is involved in designing new types of creative applications, media formats and business models.

www.miikakuisma.com