Oliver Coates Shelley's On Zenn La

In broad string strokes, British cellist, composer, and producer Oliver Coates went from
studying at the Royal Academy of Music to becoming an artist in residency at London's
Southbank Centre to contributing to works from Radiohead. His in depth understanding
of classical cello is met with his study and exploration of electronic experimental sound.
Earlier on, Coates received the Royal Philharmonic Society Young Artist Award and has
been commissioned for string and electronic arrangements with visual artist Lawrence
Lek and composer Jonny Greenwood (on the scores for Paul Thomas Anderson's There
Will Be Blood and Phantom Thread) and collaborated with musician Mica Levi on their
2016 album Remain Calm. Coates' foray into electronic leanings on Upstepping, his other
2016 release, have led to the more expansive architecture of his 2018 album, Shelley's on
Zenn-La, his first for RVNG Intl. Shelley's on Zenn-La is a cerebral dance record that
does much with liv e cello performance alongside synthesis. Coates made music mostly
in Renoise, composing complex drum sequences in numbers and pencil drawn
waveforms. Some of the compositions get into FM synthesis - "I like hearing how one
tone is enriched by another tone modulating the first, resulting in gleaming sets of new
harmonics," says Coates, "I started thinking about putting live cello playing into that chain
of antagonism resulting in beauty."