 Jacques Mathias was born in São Lourenço, a small and peaceful city in the Minas Gerais state, Brasil. At 12 years old he began his first acoustic guitar lessons with his father, José Manoel. At 14 his intensive musical training with Victor Lobo commenced while playing electric guitar in a professional band, crossing almost the entire country playing all genres of music in bars and clubs. Developing his talent quickly, by the age of 16 he had played all works of Heitor Villa-Lobos and many important pieces from the acoustic guitar universe such as J.S.Bach’s Chaconne in D minor, Joaquim Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez and many others.
At 17 Jacques won the III Acoustic Guitar Competition of Souza Lima Conservatory in São Paulo, a Brazilian partner of the Berklee College of Music. However, he decided to put on hold his concert performing career, seeking to improve his compositional skills and found great opportunities working with "real players" in many recording sessions. Having acquired an excellent technique for composing for bands, string quartets and orchestras Jacques has worked on several projects as composer, arranger, producer, programmer, engineer and musician, both with established artists such as Milton Nascimento, Lenine, Toninho Horta and independent bands and singers. More recently Jacques has expanded his career even further into designing soundtracks for film.
Jacques has recently created two inspirational new demos. ‘Little Tribute to John Barry’ combines BFD Jazz and Funk with the ‘Screaming Trumpet’ library from WARPIV. In his atmospheric instrumental ‘Nadis' Jacques has used eclectic sounds from BFD Percussion and the ‘Cinematic Duduk’ library.
Jacques gives us an update on his current projects and how BFD fits into his studio setup.
FX - What are you working on at the moment?
JM - I am working on a score for a 3D animation short movie, composing new works for my website and mixing a finished score for another short.
FX - What made you decide to take a different direction from your career as a concert performer?
'BFD was the first time I got to feel my drum programming sounding good and alive. When you get to choose the snare you wanna use, see it on the screen, listen to it before you load, it’s awesome!' JM - Well it´s not that easy to explain. It was a couple of things. First of all, I love composing music and if you are a concert performer you need to use almost all of your time to keep studying. Actually to maintain a perfect technique (which you need to play classical music) means lots of practice hours. And I am enjoying it, we live in an exciting time, where many things are changing in the musical scene, particularly the way music is performed and composed (although I don't mean we won't use real performers anymore, they are unrivalled , but several low budget projects get a huge benefit from new technology) So, I guess that my passion for technology and composition have changed the course of my life. It does not mean that I don't play classical music anymore, I'm just not trained enough to play it live.
FX - Coming from a classical musical background how did you become interested in using software to create music?
JM - I wanted to listen to my own compositions and arrangements. Obviously, it´s not very easy to find an orchestra to play your music. So, the next step was to find out a way to test my stuff. Computers. Suddenly, it became my main way to compose, and later an important part of my job.
FX - Has music software altered your approach to making music and if so how?
 JM - No and Yes. It DIDN’T due to the fact it didn’t change my way of thinking in music. And IT DID because it has become an invaluable tool to study music, arrangement, composition etc...I never would have been able to test my music easily before software. How could I hear if my woodwind sessions are balanced enough without samples? Ok, you can imagine in your head, listen inside, but let’s be honest it really helps our study. How could I have professional drum tracks without BFD and all the percussion/drum software we have today? I think it brings to all musicians from all countries an incredible possibility to develop their talent, and of course a new way to make money with music, either for developers or users.
FX - What software programs have impressed you recently?
JM - I need to say, BFD interface has really impressed me so much, that’s why I’ve been using it. It was the first time I got to feel my drum programming sounding good and alive. When you get to choose the snare you wanna use, see it on the screen, listen to it before you load, it’s awesome! Thanks to fxpansion!
Another software program that has impressed me is Kontakt 2 from Native Instruments because of their scripts thing. It’s really impressive how a single “one dynamic layer” instrument sounds through a legato script.
'all my drum tracks are made with BFD, each pack has a particular flavor and utility' FX - Which FXpansion products do you own and how do you use them?
JM - BFD, XFL pack, DLX pack, 8 bits pack, Jazz & Funk pack, Percussion pack and Guru. All my drum tracks are made with BFD, each pack has a particular flavor and utility. I use GURU to create my electronic loops as well. GURU provides a lot of fun!
FX - Are there any engineering techniques that you use a lot with BFD?
JM - Well, nothing special. I guess the same everyone does. I like to bounce each mic separately:
Closed Mics:
Out and In Kick, Bottom and top snare, hi hat, all the toms and the cymbals if I need more focus on some ride, for example.
"Far" mics:
Overhead , Room and PZM mics. The tip is while bouncing these mics, try balancing the level of pieces until you have the natural level balance you would have recording a drummer. It´s important and obvious. Overhead has more cymbals...Room mics are an overall...etc.
After that, EQing, Compressing, Reverbing what you need.
FX - What would you hope to see next from software developers?
JM - Actually, there is something I would like to see. I think there are so many good enough sample libraries. But, I realize that we study less than before, I mean software is so cool to deal with that after we become accustomed to it, it becomes hard to do anything else out of the digital world. So why not an incredible educative software, plenty of examples? There are many areas to cover, from orchestral to Rock. I guess, there is already some of them, but it’s what I would like to see...
FX - What do you have planned for the future?
JM - I have been working for many years as a musical producer, recording bands and artists. It was a very important task learning to deal with deadlines, different people, sorts of studios, budgets etc. After all of that two years ago I returned to my first career as musician and composer. And that’s what I expect to do until my last day of life, because it’s really what I love. Then, nothing else just trying to do good music, this is already a big challenge.
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