Given that he’s one of the most famous and revered composers in history, you’ve certainly got to admire the chutzpah of the EDM producers who’ve taken up the challenge to remix Beethoven.
The project - Beethoven Remixed - has been put together by streaming service Deezer as part of its Originals series, and is billed as “a pioneering classical-electronica crossover”.
Leading the charge is Steve Aoki, who’s put his own EDM-flavoured spin on Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 8, also known as Pathétique.
“Out of all the compositions that I heard from Beethoven that I was able to remix, I picked Pathétique because it spoke to me the most,” Aoki explains.
“When I’m in the studio and I’m listening to all the different samples or different ways that I could remix, I heard elements in Pathétique that I knew I could start tinkering with. And as I went down that road, it just felt natural.”
There are also three takes on the iconic Moonlight Sonata, courtesy of Dutch duo Blasterjaxx, Parisian producer Anetha and Australian twins NERVO, who said: “We chose the Moonlight Sonata because the piano playing is nothing we could ever do. It was such a privilege to be able to work with that, and 132 bpm is great for a dance record and the sample worked well with that!
“We added the main melody with a cello, which added warmth to the record. We played around with this, we thought we would go harder with a synth sound, but ended coming back to the cello.”
