Sebastian Mullaert talks to Danny Turner about his mentorship programme In Bloom and live jamming with Dorisburg
I ntegrity lies at the heart of Sebastian Mullaert’s outlook on creativity and sound. Best known as one half of the production duo Minilogue, his solo projects have become increasingly emboldened in recent years. Prising himself from the comfort of his luxurious cabin studio, Mullaert has sought to test his creative ideals through collaboration with likeminded artists and students enrolled to his In Bloom mentorship programme. Mullaert’s latest partnership with Stockholmbased producer/DJ Alexander Berg (aka Dorisburg), typifies his newfound approach to creativity. Having found a common language with the fellow Swede, the duo returned to Mullaert’s studio in Röstånga to create a collection of audio jams. After a pandemic-induced pause, the duo then took the recordings to Malmö’s Inkost venue where, via a series of live improvisational sessions, they created the abstract electronic album That Who Remembers.
When did you come across Alexander Berg’s work, and what made you think that collaborating would be a good idea?
“I connected with Alex’s music when he started to release under his solo project Dorisburg. I felt a very strong connection with his album Irrblos on Hivern Discs and his releases on Aniara Recordings, which is why I released an EP on that label for one of my other projects. When I launched my Circle of Live project in 2017, I was thinking about certain artists I wanted to invite, and Alex was one of those. In connection with that, we played together live quite a few times and he came to my studio in Sweden to make music for the first time in 2018. What we did back then was the seed for this new album, That Who Remembers.”
Can you take us a little deeper into that process?
“During the pandemic, I evolved my studio process and started a mentorship programme under Circle of Live called In Bloom, which is now an educational platform where I try to inspire and share my tools and workflow to allow students to develop. By doing that, I understood more about what my workflow looks like and what works for me as a solo artist. With Alex, I felt so well-connected personally and musically that I wanted to invite him into that process to see how it would work. We did a number of very free and unpretentious jams in the studio, recording different tracks separately from each other using a few machines. During the pandemic, everyone’s focus navigated to new realities, but at some point in the middle we decided to pick up where we left off.”
Tell us more about In Bloom and exactly what you’re teaching students?
“It’s an educational branch of Circle of Live. I do most of the classes, but I also have a little crew of teachers who have their own mentorships. My class has three steps, th
