I began listening to Adrian von Ziegler because sometimes I just love listening to Celtic music and he popped up on my kid’s playlist one day while we were looking for some relaxing music. But, soon I found myself sucked into his fantasy music more and more. Whenever I wrote fantasy stories, I played his music.
Whenever I played video games that I wanted to get lost in, I would play his music. When Halloween came around, I realized he had more to offer than the standard composer. Adrian also creates dark music for the theme of the season.
When my kids needed theme music for their tabletop RPG, I made sure to suggest Adrian to them. After all, he has created his own race and language for them. It’s true, look at The Inra Language, which he developed over 10 years and which often features in his music.
“Music continues to tell a story where words end.”
Adrian von Ziegler, based on J.W. von Goethe
In other words, I am a big fan! I wanted to share him with you because he has built his fanbase and continues to be independent. For being an internet phenomenon, he is actually a very private person. His music is beautiful, mystical, and worthy of sharing on Untapped Sound.
Table of Contents
PERSONAL/ PROFESSIONAL HISTORY
Adrian von Ziegler born in Decenber of 1989 is a Swiss composer from Zürich. He has no formal musical training. Speaking of this, he states,
“…the only thing I had were basic guitar lessons for a few weeks when I was 16. I would say a certain amount of theoretical knowledge is very beneficial, but you don’t need a degree in it in order to compose. Maybe not knowing much about music theory is even liberating because you just experiment completely without limits and do whatever sounds good for you, and not what’s correct “theoretically”. That’s something I see in Nirvana, for example, Kurt Cobain did a lot of things in his songs that are flat out wrong, but they sound fantastic.”
Adrian von Ziegler to GuitarGuitar; 2019
Von Ziegler was a drummer in a local rock band by age 15. However, wanting more melodic expression. He quit the band and started to compose music independently, using only a headset microphone and guitar.
From 2007 to 2009, he recorded under the artist name “Indigo”. But he was adapting his music from a more guitar-based sound to keyboard and orchestral arrangements. In 2008, he began releasing music on the social networking site Myspace.
Adrian started using Magix Music Maker with his old keyboard to compose his music (He still has this keyboard, but now mainly uses Cubase).
After dropping the Indigo pseudonym in 2009, he began releasing music under his own name, starting with the albums Requiem and Lifeclock in 2010. Since then he has steadily released songs or full playlists of themed music on his YouTube channel and associated that with his other social media and streaming platforms.
Adrian’s YouTube channel has over 1,000,000 subscribers as of May 2021! He broke from his normal music-only uploads and had a wonderful “Thank You + Q&A” after.
In August 2021, Adrian released – a full collection of Japanese Fantasy Music. It’s the first time he has released anything like it since 2012’s Immortal. The Instruments are all Japanese (Koto, Shamisen, Shakuhachi, Taiko).
STYLE AND INFLUENCE
“I’m a composer from Switzerland who creates Celtic Music, Emotional Music, Relaxing Music, Dark Music, Oriental Music, Fantasy Music, Movie Scores, Symphonic Metal and many other genres.
I just want to take a minute here to thank all of you who support me and make it possible that I can call composing my profession, it would have never been possible without you. So thank you from the heart!
I also want to tell you that I’m really proud of our community that we have on this channel and the openness to all kinds of music, no matter what style it is. That is quite impressive and I appreciate that enormously.”
Per Adrian himself, on his YouTube Channel
Much of von Ziegler’s music is distinguished by traditional and orchestral instrumentation that is digitally composed and synthesized. His inspiration originates from a variety of sources, including mythology, movie and video game soundtracks, and fantasy literature.
His earliest influences were the soundtracks of video games. In an interview with GuitarGuitar, Adrian mentions Koji Kondo and Nobuo Uematsu as reasons he stuck to instrumental music that resembles game soundtracks.
He later got into grunge – Nivana and symphonic metal – Nightwish. He is also a big fan of fantasy and often lets that influence his music compositions. Being an introvert, he feels that both Tolkien’s version and versions such as Final Fantasy are comforting worlds for him.
Though he has attributed his orchestral style to the influence of composers such as Hans Zimmer and Jeremy Soule, he also credits his emotions, natural surroundings, imaginary worlds, and wife as inspirations for his music.
COLLABORATIONS & CONNECTIONS
Adrian’s music is so well-liked that other social media creators use his music or mix his music to use on their own channels. I know I have. We reached out to him while we were streaming our game time and purchased his music to use on our channel while giving him credit and linking.
This artist’s YouTube videos easily make it into the millions of views and countless other social media users have made their own successful playlists featuring exclusive mixes of his music. But he doesn’t tour, doesn’t play festivals, and prefers his online fame to real-world fame. He’s actually a very private person.
Will he work with other artists who want to collaborate with the composition of the music? He has stated that he prefers to work alone. He means no offense, but his music is his music and he has failed to be able to work with others well and so does not do so. There are a select few people that he will work with and that is it.
He keeps his work simple but from the heart. He hopes that is what connects people to his music and any fame just baffles him.
One thing he has done that I found inspiring was that he provides his sheet music and even electronic lessons of some of his compositions online. Therefore, anyone who is interested in learning can do so.
Similar Sounds – BrunuhVille, Celestial Aeon Project, Peter Gundry, Nox Arcana
ADRIAN VON ZIEGLER DISCOGRAPHY
Albums
- Requiem 2010
- Lifeclock 2010
- Across Acheron 2011
- Wanderer 2011
- Mirror of the Night 2011
- Mortualia 2012
- Spellbound 2012
- Starchaser 2012
- The Celtic Collection (Compilation) 2012
- Odyssey 2012
- Feather and Skull 2013
- Vagabond 2013
- Libertas 2014
- The Celtic Collection II (Compilation) 2014
- Queen of Thorns 2014
- Atmospheres 2016
- Moonsong 2016
- Celtic Guitar: Dance with the Strings (with Łukasz Kapuściński) 2017
- Saga 2018
- Fable 2019
- The Celtic Collection III (Compilation) 2019
- Veiled 2020
- Moondance 2020
- Darkness Eternal 2020
- Traveler 2020 For The Pack 2021
FIND OUT MORE:
YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/c/AdrianvonZiegler
As always, if you want to share more, or feel I’ve missed something, let me know by emailing untappedsoundnc@gmail.com.
SOURCES:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_von_Ziegler – Wikipedia.org
https://www.guitarguitar.co.uk/news/140571/ – Interview by Ray McClelland for GuitarGuitar
