Trian Kayhatu

​Over two decades of being in music, he has composed for movies, theatre, fashion-shows, and tunes for various Dutch pop acts. Trian Kayhatu touched all the components of music like no other, and all that talent did not escape the attention of the one and only Giles Peterson. Read more about Trian's creative expedition.

N-F: You've got quite an illustrious family background. What did you grow up listening to and what was the first record that you bought? T-K: My mom was pretty eclectic in her taste of just about anything, whether it was art, cinema, music, fashion etcetera. Of course I grew up with lots of jazz because my uncle Chris Kayhatu was one of Indonesia's first pioneer jazz musicians. But my mom played anything from Frank Zappa, Otis Redding, Hendrix, Abba, Shirley Bassey to classical music. One of the albums she played over and over again had a huge influence on me as a young boy, which was 10CC's "How Dare You" album.

N-F: Walk us through on how you began your career in music. T-K: I grew up in a small town in The Netherlands near Rotterdam, a place called Spijkenisse. Me and a local kid playfully started this imaginary music band where we wrote songs for, just childish tunes. But we soon went on creating vocal harmonies and from then on it became more and more serious. We ended up saving gear for synths and a 4-track recorder and started to make beats for local hiphop acts.

N-F: In 2011, you wrote and directed a theatre piece titled 'Minyak', what was the inspiration behind it? T-K: At first the idea was to create an audio-visual show revolving my own music that includes dancers, custom made visuals, light-show and live musicians.

Yet throughout the process it quickly evolved into a history lesson of how a specific large group of people from the Moluccan islands ended up in The Netherlands.

N-F: As a music educator, how did you develop your own method of teaching? T-K: From years and years of teaching other people's methods, I developed a more personal approach. I try to listen to what's already there and then yank it out that person, instead of just laying down the info for the student to learn and adapt. I teach skills, but I go deeper than that and truly try to find the chore of one's "signature". Hence, the name of my own academy: Signature Audio School.

N-F: How different is it from coaching someone on music production and working on your production? T-K: The difference is "distance". Whenever I coach someone, there's a distance which allows me to be more objective than usual. Sometimes this distance is needed when I'm working on my own music, but it's difficult. Only with time passing you can be completely objective. However in both cases, it's all about learning new truths.

N-F: "Returning The Flavour", the song you did with Potatohead People is one of those songs that you can just repeat over and over because it's too good. Care to share what was the process like, making the song? T-K: This one's an easy answer. Potatohead People sent me a complete Ableton project within a rough sketch of what later would become Returning The Flavour. They just basically gave me carte blanche to do whatever I want with it.

N-F: What do you love and what do you hate about making music in the 21st century?

T-K: I came from an era where you had to have access to huge studios or gatekeepers running the show in order to make music. Awesome that we are living in times where you don't have to be filthy rich to make music.Downside is that since everything is so accessible and disposable, (pop) music became flat, dumbed down and a lot of it sounds the same. But as history always showed, for every yin there is always a yang. Great musicians and music is being produced, distributed and channelled throughout social media and different platforms and I'm grateful to be living in these times where I get to be inspired by really amazing new young artists.

Trian is also the son of the legendary Broery Pesulima (Marantika), and you can find out more about him at www.triankayharu.net