Warrick Sony

Infobox Musical artist


Name = Warrick Sony
Background = composer / sound artist
Birth_name = Warrick Swinney
Alias = Kalahari Surfer, Wreck Sony, D.J.Ballard
Born = 1958 Port Elizabeth
Died =
Origin = South Africa
Instrument =studio, guitar, drums, bass guitar, tabla, sitar, trombone
Genre = electronic psychedelic world music
Occupation = Musician, record producer, composer, performer
Years_active = 1983–present
Label = African Dope, Recommended, Microdot
Associated_acts = Kalahari Surfers
URL = http://www.kalaharisurfers.co.za

Warrick Sony is a South African composer, producer, sonic artist, performer and sound designer, who has worked for 2 decades on a multitude of films, documentaries, art events, theatre, dance, and project albums. He was born Warrick Swinney in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, in 1958.

He is the founder and sole member of the Kalahari Surfers, solo recording projects working from Shifty Studios (Johannesburg) in the mid-1980s. Known for five albums of politically radical musical song/satire banned for possession in South Africa, the Kalahari Surfers work was released exclusively through the London-based Recommended Records. During this time the Surfers toured Europe with English session musicians and played concerts in East Berlin, Moscow, Riga and Leningrad.

Warrick has produced albums for Sony, BMG, Recommended, M.E.L.T. 2000, African Dope, Microdot, and Shifty Records and worked running the Shifty Music label at BMG (Africa) for two years in the mid-1990s, mostly concentrating on developing and promoting foreign African music in South Africa. He engineered the Brian Eno workshops at the Baxter Theatre

Under the name "Trans-Sky" produced “"Killing Time" (CD)” and "Heaven To Touch" " (E.P) with Brendan Jury and toured South Africa opening the Massive Attack tour.

Now based in Cape Town at [http://www.milestones.co.za/ Milestone Studios] , Warrick has released four albums through African Dope and Microdot Records, and been involved in various art and music and DJ events in the city, including Faultlines, Soft Serve, Vortex, and Mother City Queer Party. He is currently in a creative partnership with Murray Anderson doing mostly commercials and film scores and music for theatre.

International performances include the 2005 Wiesen Festival in Austria.
Composing and performance at the opening of “Turbulence” with Dizu PLaatjies at the South African art Exhibition in Salzburg – Red Bull Hangar 7 event. March 2007
As a specialist sound designer he has worked on feature films like"the Mangler"dir Tobe Hooper [http://www.acidlogic.com/im_tobehooper.htm] (POLTERGEIST, THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE) , "SMS Sugar Man" dir Aryan Kaganof,"the Shadowed Mind" dir Cedric Sundstrom [http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/title/] and multi media theatre productions such as William Kentridge's "Ubu and the Truth Commission" , "Faustus in Africa" and Handspring Puppet‘s “Tall Horse” and “The Chimp Project” as well as Museum installations like the San Rock Art Museum.
He has been invited as a guest lecturer to Rhodes University in South Africa, running post-graduate masters classes in audio post-production and sound design and was invited to present a performance for Unyazi: International Electronic Music Symposium at Wits University Johannesburg. [http://www.newmusicsa.org.za/unyazi2005.html] . He also appears in the documentary filim "UNYAZI OF THE BUSHVELD" (2007) directed by Aryan Kaganof.Warrick composed and performed at Unyasi 2008 " Fear of the Unknown"

Partial list of collaborations

* Compositions and sound design for William Kentridge's theatre productions "Faustus in Africa" and "Ubu and the Truth Commission"
* Compositions and/or sound design with South African artists:
Malcolm Payne [http://www.artthrob.co.za/02nov/artbio.html] on Faultlines,
Tracy Rose - "Last Supper" [http://www.artthrob.co.za/01mar/artbio.html] .
Rodney Place [http://hanelgallery.com/pages/Place.html] - "Couch Dancing" exhibition [http://www.artthrob.co.za/nov98/listings.htm] and "World Service" for Adelaide Arts Festival
Brett Murray - Muti Media and the Short Pants Opera [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brett_Murray]
* sound design for Lerato Shadi’s “Hema” shown at Michael Stevenson [http://www.michaelstevenson.com/contemporary/exhibitions/shadi/index.htm]
* Compositions and sound design for Handspring Puppet‘s theatre productions “Tall Horse” and “The Chimp Project”
* music for "Ochre and Water:Himba chronicles from the land of Kaoko" for Doxa Productions [http://www.doxa.co.za/] -
* An album with Sowetan poet Lesego Rampolokeng, including a series of concerts in Brazil.
* Co-producing and composing with Louis Mhlanga notably the "African Axemen" album and "Musiki Ye Afrika"
* Turntabla, an electro-dub project with ex-Orb members Greg Hunter and Kris Weston
* Co-composed music with Murray Anderson for John Boorman "In My Country" and the Canadian Broadcasting documentary "Madiba: The Life and Times of Nelson Mandela", for which they were awarded the Gemini Award for best music. [ [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm/awards Awards] , IMDb]
* Co-composing music with Murray Anderson for the Museum of Rock Art [http://rockart.wits.ac.za/origins/index.php?section=45] and "Origins" the film series from this
* composed music, sound design and final mix for "Zimbabwe"feature film directed by Darryl Roodt.
* composed music, sound design and final mix for "End of the Road" TV feature dir Greg Latter
* composed music, sound design and final mix for " Ugugu No Andile" (Romeo & Juliet)TV six part series dir Minky Schlesinger
* sound design for " Dreamtime" dir Brett Bailey
* sound design for " Cissie" [http://www.cissietheplay.com/] dir Nadia Davids [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadia_Davids]

Notes

References

*ArtThrob - the Limitations of Technique [http://www.artthrob.co.za/04aug/news/sony.html] [http://www.artthrob.co.za/00oct/listings-cape.html]
*Milestone Studio [http://www.milestones.co.za/Warrick%20Sony%20biog.htm]
* [http://www.24.com/entertainment/music/?p=downloadarc&filter=k]
*Chimp Project composers notes [http://www.handspringpuppet.co.za/html/frameind.html] [http://www.handspringpuppet.co.za/html/chimp.html]
*Handspring Sogolon Puppets - Tall Horse [http://www.handspringpuppet.co.za/html/frameind.html]
*New York Times [http://movies2.nytimes.com/gst/movies/filmography.html?p_id=&mod=main]
*Kagablog [http://kaganof.com/kagablog/category/contributors/warrick-sony-kalahari-surfer/]
*prof Jürgen Bräuninger [http://leoalmanac.org/journal/Vol_15/lea_v15_n01-02/guest.asp]

External links

* [http://www.artthrob.co.za/04aug/news/sony.html]
* [http://kaganof.com/kagablog/category/contributors/warrick-sony-kalahari-surfer/]