Interview by Gaurhoth (Draugurz) – August '07...:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

When did you start Lebensessenz and what was the motivation for you to start the project?

I have started with Lebensessenz during the Winter of 2003. At the time I did not want to make something really serious (maybe because I just had a poor keyboard, a poor computer and a poor tape recorder where could I record my simple songs), so it was started just to be a project of minimalistic ambient that could be the expression of my melancholic feelings. I was only 17 and in that time I was a very depressive guy, so Lebensessenz in 2003 got as motivation a sentimental negativity.

But things change. Today I am feeling old. Well, I know that I am just 21, but I have changed many things in my life. I am not the same guy closed in the room, looking at the walls and screaming, full of depression and responsibilities with school. I have got many influences during that time (2003 to 2007), and this influences from chats with friends, movies, books, paintings etc., were the stones for the construction of my castle, the essence of my life. I have opened my eyes to artistic expressions and today I see that the emotions can be the essence of my inspiration.

The music I make is inspired by the moments I live. There was a time when I was reading a lot of "The sorrows of young Werther," drinking wine and writing romantic things, so the motivation to compose could be a simple smile of a girl. There were times when I wanted to escape this world, you know, things we are forced to accept because we live in society, so I felt motivated to compose to feel far away from the values of society. Books and specially poems that I read, movies that I see (specially about romances), moments I live, nostalgic crisis I have, pride of my roots and the history of my family, and many other things are the motivation to keep the project alive. I am very connected to music and this project, besides themes like German literature, it talks about myself, so the only mean of this project is all the impossibilities I find in my life. I never will split-up the project having all the conditions to record. If I split-up one day, it will be certainly because I am in prison, in a sanatorium, in a hospital or in a cemetery. My music is the steps of my life.

How come Lebensessenz music developed from the early synth music with agonizing screams to the later piano neo-classical pieces?

Well, my father had a piano. But I developed an interest for Piano only in the beginning of 2004. That was when my keyboard was abandoned and I started doing things on piano. Today Lebensessenz play a kind of noble music for noble spirits, inspired in things related to my personal life and works of German literature.

            I guess I have created now my own identity doing piano music. You know, there are many projects of ambient (I mean into the underground where I release my works), but piano is very rare. Many people are surprised that Lebensessenz is exclusively piano oriented music. I don't have plans to record things with other elements. Maybe I will do something with an ancient friend with 82 years, something like a waltz of the German immigrant. Maybe I will put some voices or some samples of movies, but basically Lebensessenz will remain simply as piano music. I think that is not necessary to add other elements, the piano have its very own spirit, when I sit down before it, during nights of nostalgia or just inspiration because things of my reality, I feel myself complete while playing piano and looking through the window, thinking about things, I can imagine universes throughout my simple melodies.

Your compositions are really inspired. Did you ever took piano lessons or studied music?

            Oh, thank you. No, I never got piano lessons. My father tried to help me, but I did not want it. You know, I was too young and I didn't want to "waste" my time reading theories. I was like 12 years, you know, living the hyper-activity of a guy who wanted to play videogames and make other things. When I have started to play piano I have asked my father to teach me, but he did not give me any attention, maybe the price of my "dedication" in old times.

            Today I have got my own way. I do not care about theories. I do not care if the musicians hear my music and say that it's too simple, because first of all I care about myself. I do know exactly what I felt when I have composed all of my Works. I do know exactly my anxiety to play the piano when I am, for example, at the University and I have ideas of melodies in the classroom. I do know exactly how I have expressed my inspirations throughout this amazing instrument. Sometimes you can play something very technical and in the same time you do not think about the theme, but for me the themes run in the same way of my music. You can hear my song Karls Traum and simply say: - it is too short. But I know that is short because the dream of Karl, after writing to his father, was too short, in a reference to the classic work "The robbers" of Schiller. Returning to the question, I certainly will never take piano lessons. I think I have my own way of composing and if I have dedication, step by step I can improve.

What composers/bands were/are important for the context of Lebensessenz?

            To be honest I got more inspiration from things that happen in my life than from other music. As I have said in an interview for Inmitten des Waldes, sometimes I'm listening to Pop music from the 80's and at the same time I'm writing a Black Metal or Classical song. It's because I am moved by nostalgia. I can listen to Pop and experience through it events from my past, so the music I make is a connection with my own sensibility, far away from what I hear.

            To write the tracks "Die letzten Momente von Werther" and "Die Räuber," for instance, I did not listen to classical music.], I have read a lot these books for inspiration. I did not read it to make a thematic work, but the inverse happened: these works were very important to me and so I have decided to pay a tribute to them by creating a kind of expression of my impressions on these classics of German literature throughout the piano. After done I have discovered some operas about Werther and other things, but I did not hear to them looking for influence. My piano is at the room and I play without any rules, thinking that I need to play like Mozart or Beethoven: I play accordingly to my feelings, with the capacity to create melodies and to make them the essence of my moment.

            Certainly I listen to music that can be said to be an influence. In the beggning I used to listen to things like Vinterriket and Burzum as ambient and Regnum, Wigrid, Marblebog, Draugurz, as Melancholic/Ambient Black Metal. With classical music I had some contact since when I was a child, traveling to the fieldtaste for classical music. But to be honest I did not know so many things. What I listen to classical it's mostly to Chopin (specially the nocturnes), Beethoven, Mozart, Vivaldi, Strauss, Haydn and Brahms. I have been listening to some other piano songs like Sagitarius and Yan Thiersenn, and I am also looking for Philip Glass because some guys who heard Lebensessenz told me that my sound runs in his vein.

You have several black metal projects besides Lebensessenz, including Namelezz Projekt, Inmitten des Waldes, Valium, Feuerberg, etc. Give us a short description of each one of these projects.

            First of all I would like to say that I am not the kind of guy who creates projects just because it's "cool" to have a bunch of projects. I have many projects specially because the music I make for them runs the essence of my life. I am at home most part of the time. Luckily, my father played in some orchestras, had a great love for music and bought many instruments during his 75 years of life. He certainly died happy concerning that, because he saw that his son could create worlds throughout his instruments. So I have many projects because I feel the need for different forms of expression for different aspects of my own personality. If I am feeling sad, I play; if am I am drunk and feeling sarcastic, I play; if I am feeling sick, I play; if I am feeling distant of everything, living in the times of Goethe and Schiller, I play. Music will be forever the essence of my life. It's throughout the music that I start to establish values in this world. One day my corpse will be rotten as the corpse of my father is now, but what can be immortalized are the noble values, and that's why I live. By my capacity of creating music I will try to follow step by step the path of endless questions about the meaning of life, through the projects I play:

            Inmitten des Waldes is a project of Melancholic Black Metal. I play in this project with a great friend of mine. The project was started in '04 and actually we have changed some things, but the essence runs the same: simple and hypnotic Black Metal. I play the drums and the piano, but I also write some lyrics, make some riffs and I am responsible for the all of the layout ideas. The other friend of mine, Jean Held, plays all the guitars, bass and makes the vocals, and sometimes he also comes with some suggestions of themes. Actually we have 3 demos done and we are working on new works and in the possibility to play live. We also try to make all of the songs with German lyrics – our music is also a connection with our ancestors. It's a different point of sensibility, to express the pride we have to be descendants of the noble folk which got so many difficulties to get established in a different land called South of Brazil. The modern world is destroying the old values of Germany, but we are proud of having the blood of this land which gave to the world its sense of art besides of many other things. Goethe, Schiller, Eichendorff, Strauss, Beethoven, Mozart, Zweig, Hesse, Ranke, Friedrich, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Heidegger and many others.

            Namelezz Projekt is a project that we have started just for the pleasure of playing something very uncompromised. We have recorded a lot of demos, most songs were recorded and composed at the same time. Until the 5th demo everything was recorded directly on tape. The Idea of Namelezz Projekt is to be borderless. Sometimes we talk about some moment of sarcasm, sometimes we play something talking about some book we have read, sometimes we play talking about the impressions of a season we are living, you know, many things. As I like to say: who wants to learn about myself just have to hear my music, because the music is the expression of my personality. This project is formed only by me and the same member who plays with me on Inmitten des Waldes. There are no rules: I can do vocals, guitars, drums, bass, and he too. Actually, we have 10 demos done and we are doing more 7 works, many splits and other things. Originell!

            Valium is a project of Dark Metal, again formed by me and Jean Held. Our influences are principally Bethlehem and Amen Corner, besides some other bands of Dark/Doom Metal like Saturnus. We have three demos and we are slowly recording the first album that is to be called "Horates sui caedere", something like "Asylum of suicide". This project is about our most sick side. We try to write about how sick we can become from the contact with this poor and sad society, living and dying because of stupid values imposed by the media. In this project I play drums most part of the time, but I also help with lyrics. The main responsible is Jean, who does the guitars, bass, vocals and lyrics.

            Hyperborean was an old project of Jean, formed in '99. Actually the project has just 4 demos. It was stopped because of some problems with our former drummer, so we lost the excitement to compose and play for the project again. In Hyperborean I was doing drums at the beginning and later I was doing only vocals, but perhaps I can return to the drums when we record the first album.

            Feuerberg is a project of ambient music but with drums and guitars and bass. I have done some songs in grey days of the Autumn and Winter '06, feeling empty inside. You know, moments when you are walking around the rooms at home without any objectives, you just look outside the window waiting for nothing, you just want to sleep and dream a lot. This first songs were inspired by things like Tangerine Dream, Ancient Wisdom, Marblebog, Draugurz and Vinterriket. The second work is much better, with influences from Pink Floyd, Empyrium and King Crimson, to Vinterriket and certainly Lebensessenz. With this project I like to deal with abstract things, feelings inside that make me feel far away of every sick value of this society. It's completely different of Valium, for example, which contemplates the reflections of sick souls destroyed by the contact with society: Feuerberg is far away, beyond society, beyond sickness, beyond the material world. I do everything in this project, with session guitars. For the future I have plans to record a work including as musician a friend of mine, and this work will be a mix of the traditional ambient music I do with melancholic atmospheric Black Metal like the old Rotting Christ and old Dimmu Borgir.

            Benflogin started not as a project, but as a way of doing funny things to test and learn how to word with some audio softwares. But this joke ended up acquiring a meaning. The second demo is full of things that can be taken as a description of my personality, in the same way of Namelezz Projekt, but made by myself alone. The result is "Into the effect", Benflogin's second demo, with some songs like Plasma Pool, others like Radiohead, and it goes like that: total instability. Recently I have been working in the 6th demo, which has as guest musician a friend of mine from the project Vento Sulino. This work runs a way of acoustic and ambient music, with touches of Ulver, Valkyrie, Noctívago and Empyrium. Benflogin is the name of the medicament I have used for a long time, to create insomnia. I have a work called as "Dreams of artificial insomnias" which talks about it, because it is not a kind of natural insomnia. I have used many times this medicament, but today I'm not much affected by its results, so I try to drink a lot of coffee and schimaron to stay awake. I don't like to sleep. I want to be awake most part of the time to make music which is the essence of my life. I don't want to sleep because I want to dream awake throughout melodies.

            Ecce Hommo is a recent project, created by Jean. I am doing the vocals in it. This band was born from the roots of the deceptions concerning Hyperborean. The sound is extreme, in the vein of Behemoth, old Mayhem, Gorgoroth and Amon Amarth, with lyrics related to a skeptical vision of the world. We have played live once and we are looking forward to play more gigs. In our gigs we play a Hyperborean song.

            I have done some other things as well, like the bad and rough drums for the first demo of Forest Poetry, a project with a Draugurz member. This project was in the vein of Ildjarn. Currently I don't know about the status of this project, I don't know if it is still active. I can not compose for it because I guess I am not the leader of the project, so I can do nothing. I have also played some drums and recorded some piano intros for the Black Metal band Lenhador, and an intro for Aderlass. I've been also cooperating with the band Giboraltar, doing piano interludes for them.

Feel free to add anything you want.

            Thanks a lot for the opportunity. I am sorry if I have wrote too much, I like a lot to write when someone opens a space where I can tell something about the things that are the very meaning of my life. People who want to get in touch can write to: n_schner@hotmail.com or nschner@gmail.com I always reply with all the possible attention, I just can't promise to answer immediately because I can't access Internet from home.

(For now I've internet at home, but sure I prefer to trade letters, specially with girls, hehe)