Halina Rice crafts electronic music with precision, delivering live sets that unfold as immersive audiovisual experiences, each note resonating with clarity and depth. Read our discussion below!
Describe your sound in 3 words
Emotive, electronic, thrilling
Congratulations on the release of EVOLVE! What inspired the concept for this album, and how did your exploration of spatial audio influence the music’s composition?
In spatial audio you separate sounds into granular objects. Each sound, however small, has its own life and space. When combined a whole new textured composition evolves and emerges. Ultimately the aim is to orchestrate and unify these sounds together – along with visuals and lights in live – to create evocative and moving experiences. Some of the tracks I have been performing in live environments to experiment and give them time to literally evolve into the final released versions. Much of my process revolves around experimentation in order to innovate.
What made you gravitate towards Electronika? Artists and people that have influenced you?
I used to play with synths and drum machines as a child – my brother owned a lot of electronic music equipment – so it’s always felt natural to me. I think it’s emotional but contemporary music that appeals to me. Huge inspirations were Jon Hopkins and Rival Consoles for their incredible and moving compositions.
Your music ranges from ambient, avant-garde soundscapes to beat-driven tracks. How do you decide on the mood and direction of each composition, and what guides these stylistic choices?
I often start with just a small snippet of sound that inspires me and gives me the central mood or feeling. The more I play live the more I enjoy creating tracks that inspires people to move so I’m definitely creating a lot more dance-related work at the moment.
Which is your go to synth (analog or digital) when you start a project?
Always the Roland SE-02 boutique synth – it’s an analog synth but with digital settings so it’s easy to recall patches I’ve made. It’s so amazing that you can get such huge sounds from such a tiny portable instrument. That and U-he’s Diva VST emulation – also has some fantastic analog sounds. I tend to blend, warp and change almost all sounds though using a lot of effects and adding organic foley recordings to these to bring an added sonic dimension.
How do you envision VR evolving as a medium for music and art, and where do you see your own work within that evolution?
I think the way people are experiencing culture is changing with so many more immersive and interactive events and installations appearing everywhere. I worked recently with a company called Condese to trial a metaverse concert and have also created visuals using elements of mixed reality. I like the idea that at core what I create is a creative concept that can be realised in many ways – audio can be spatial audio, visuals could surround the audience, I could be performing as a hologram! I’m keen to explore different media and ways to interact as it can create interesting emotive experiences for the audience.
With venues like Abbey Road Studios and Iklectik Art Lab hosting your shows, how important is the location and audience atmosphere to the overall impact of your performances? What would be your dream performance venue?
Venues can of course have an impact but I like to adapt venues to my vision of an immersive experience. I bring audiovisual equipment in and bespoke LED lighting which we mount around the venue. I like the audience to feel that they are coming into a unique experience, even if they have visited that venue before I like it to feel different and special.
Which Superpower would you choose?
Not really a superpower but I’d just like to go back to not having glasses – I fear losing them all the time and can’t read my setlist on stage!
Thank you!
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