Jesse James Allen Interview
Q: Can you talk about your history as an artist?
A: I have had a very successful but unusual run as an artist. Back in the late ’80s, I fell in love with much of the electronic music being produced by artists like Jean-Michel Jarre, Michael Stearns, and Vangelis. I spent a lot of time and spare cash buying hardware synthesizers and learning to program them as a result.
In the ’90s my skill set of understanding digital sampling technology scored me several gigs as digital editing first became a thing. I also became a vinyl record mastering engineer at the time electronic dance music became popular in the US. Since I had the ability to produce music and make acetate records to take down to dance clubs, I was able to try out music on live audiences in the coolest way. Word got around that I could do this and I ended up collaborating with several local DJ’s as a remix artist under the alias “Kid Sonic,” for several years. Unexpectedly I helped remix a #1 Billboard Dance Album in 1996 with Joi Cardwell and the Pound Boys and through that was able to get a full-time job in the post-production industry.
From there I worked in both post-production for film and TV and live sound theatrical recording through the Denver Center for the Performing Arts. There, I learned a ton about working with choirs, orchestras and extraordinary musicians.
Perhaps the most interesting twist was from 2002-2016, I worked on 50 AAA video games as a sound designer, and later audio director, for Electronic Arts. Specifically from 2002-2010, a common job of a sound designer was to provide some supplemental music for the various modes of the games we worked on. The studio would of course license major artists for the main titles and cinematics. So my team and I created a lot of supporting music for games like Tiger Woods, Nascar and the other sports franchises. My most recognized track was used in Mass Effect 2 in lower Club Afterlife, but that is a whole story in itself.
From 2016-2020 I switched up my career entirely and started down the visual side of things working as an editorial director for Falcon’s Creative Group. We did a lot of extraordinary theme park and museum work. One of those projects was Heroes and Legends & the Astronaut Hall of Fame at Kennedy Space Center. That project profoundly inspired me and furthered my lifelong interest in space.
Currently, I have stepped away from my career to support my father in his battle with Alzheimer’s. So this album at the end of this creative journey brought me full circle.
Q: What was your recording process like for Cassini: A Musical tribute?
A: The entire project was recorded inside of a Digital audio workstation called Reaper. This is a tool I have been using since my days at EA. The pandemic slowed things down so much for me that I really had the time to dig deep, really deep, into programming virtual versions of synths that I loved in the ’80s and ’90s. For many months I was just experimenting with music styles and sounds but by mid-summer, I had started laying down a collection of themes and motifs that I would build out as the 14 milestones of the Cassini-Huygens space mission. From there I would start to orchestrate layers of various synths to give it that rich and definitive space feel.
Q: What is your creative process like?
A: I tried to keep things simple and often practiced iconic melodies from John Willams and Jean-Michel Jarre to frequently remind myself that great music can come from just a handful of very well-placed notes, and silence.
I am someone strongly influenced by visuals. Thanks to a bit of synesthesia, I often started with just looking at the images from the Cassini mission and building a template of sounds for each of the aspects. It’s a lot like arranging an orchestra but with synthesizers: Native Instruments Reaktor might be the bass frequencies, the Arturia CS80 might represent the mid-tone/tenor section, Kontak samples of choirs might be the tenors, and an Oberheim Matrix 12 the soprano lead. I feel the sound choices are as important as the musical note choices.
Musically I often start building things off a drone sound or note, sometimes this note is chosen scientifically as many of the moons and planets have an actual pitch or frequency they vibrate at. That is kind of a fun and geeky way to go about it.
Other times, like in the case of “Enceladus,” it starts by creating a mood with specific sound effects and melody. For “Enceladus,” this was cracking ice and this building of anticipation before the geyser is heard launching water into the heavens that become a choir. This track was largely inspired by the Cassini imaging team’s description of the moon in various scientific talks about the mission.
During the actual composition in Reaper, I often use the daw as both an arrangement tool and sampler to work with longer sound effects and sounds with real-time manipulation of effects (reverbs, EQ, resonate filters etc.). Often the score is built from the middle out, creating the main feel first and adding the build-up or variations later. This process often takes a few days.
Being someone who came from an era of all hardware synthesizers I am in complete awe of what you can do with VST’s these days, especially with great controllers such as those from Arturia. You now have the best of both worlds, the classic synths with unlimited potential and the tactile nature of knob/slider programming. Your average composer now has more synth power than the greatest studios on earth in the ’90s. If you can’t make great music with that it’s not the technology holding you back anymore.
Q: Can you talk about your history as an artist?
A: I have had a very successful but unusual run as an artist. Back in the late ’80s, I fell in love with much of the electronic music being produced by artists like Jean-Michel Jarre, Michael Stearns, and Vangelis. I spent a lot of time and spare cash buying hardware synthesizers and learning to program them as a result.
In the ’90s my skill set of understanding digital sampling technology scored me several gigs as digital editing first became a thing. I also became a vinyl record mastering engineer at the time electronic dance music became popular in the US. Since I had the ability to produce music and make acetate records to take down to dance clubs, I was able to try out music on live audiences in the coolest way. Word got around that I could do this and I ended up collaborating with several local DJ’s as a remix artist under the alias “Kid Sonic,” for several years. Unexpectedly I helped remix a #1 Billboard Dance Album in 1996 with Joi Cardwell and the Pound Boys and through that was able to get a full-time job in the post-production industry.
From there I worked in both post-production for film and TV and live sound theatrical recording through the Denver Center for the Performing Arts. There, I learned a ton about working with choirs, orchestras and extraordinary musicians.
Perhaps the most interesting twist was from 2002-2016, I worked on 50 AAA video games as a sound designer, and later audio director, for Electronic Arts. Specifically from 2002-2010, a common job of a sound designer was to provide some supplemental music for the various modes of the games we worked on. The studio would of course license major artists for the main titles and cinematics. So my team and I created a lot of supporting music for games like Tiger Woods, Nascar and the other sports franchises. My most recognized track was used in Mass Effect 2 in lower Club Afterlife, but that is a whole story in itself.
From 2016-2020 I switched up my career entirely and started down the visual side of things working as an editorial director for Falcon’s Creative Group. We did a lot of extraordinary theme park and museum work. One of those projects was Heroes and Legends & the Astronaut Hall of Fame at Kennedy Space Center. That project profoundly inspired me and furthered my lifelong interest in space.
Currently, I have stepped away from my career to support my father in his battle with Alzheimer’s. So this album at the end of this creative journey brought me full circle.
Q: What was your recording process like for Cassini: A Musical tribute?
A: The entire project was recorded inside of a Digital audio workstation called Reaper. This is a tool I have been using since my days at EA. The pandemic slowed things down so much for me that I really had the time to dig deep, really deep, into programming virtual versions of synths that I loved in the ’80s and ’90s. For many months I was just experimenting with music styles and sounds but by mid-summer, I had started laying down a collection of themes and motifs that I would build out as the 14 milestones of the Cassini-Huygens space mission. From there I would start to orchestrate layers of various synths to give it that rich and definitive space feel.
Q: What is your creative process like?
A: I tried to keep things simple and often practiced iconic melodies from John Willams and Jean-Michel Jarre to frequently remind myself that great music can come from just a handful of very well-placed notes, and silence.
I am someone strongly influenced by visuals. Thanks to a bit of synesthesia, I often started with just looking at the images from the Cassini mission and building a template of sounds for each of the aspects. It’s a lot like arranging an orchestra but with synthesizers: Native Instruments Reaktor might be the bass frequencies, the Arturia CS80 might represent the mid-tone/tenor section, Kontak samples of choirs might be the tenors, and an Oberheim Matrix 12 the soprano lead. I feel the sound choices are as important as the musical note choices.
Musically I often start building things off a drone sound or note, sometimes this note is chosen scientifically as many of the moons and planets have an actual pitch or frequency they vibrate at. That is kind of a fun and geeky way to go about it.
Other times, like in the case of “Enceladus,” it starts by creating a mood with specific sound effects and melody. For “Enceladus,” this was cracking ice and this building of anticipation before the geyser is heard launching water into the heavens that become a choir. This track was largely inspired by the Cassini imaging team’s description of the moon in various scientific talks about the mission.
During the actual composition in Reaper, I often use the daw as both an arrangement tool and sampler to work with longer sound effects and sounds with real-time manipulation of effects (reverbs, EQ, resonate filters etc.). Often the score is built from the middle out, creating the main feel first and adding the build-up or variations later. This process often takes a few days.
Being someone who came from an era of all hardware synthesizers I am in complete awe of what you can do with VST’s these days, especially with great controllers such as those from Arturia. You now have the best of both worlds, the classic synths with unlimited potential and the tactile nature of knob/slider programming. Your average composer now has more synth power than the greatest studios on earth in the ’90s. If you can’t make great music with that it’s not the technology holding you back anymore.
Q: What are some of the themes that are touched upon in your release Cassini: A Musical tribute?
A: One of the big things missing from modern-day sci-fi films is just the sense of awe for what is sitting in our own backyard. How impossibly spectacular would it be to take 20 years and explore Saturn and its moons? That is the emotion I wanted to create. We have seen the pictures from Cassini - what do they feel like? That was my goal.
The main themes though are the use of voices in the album. I very consciously used voices from around the world such as Hindustani chants at the beginning of “The Great Storm” and the Arabic overtones in “Enceladus.” This was to represent humanity not only as English but rather as the whole human race. The piano sound by Native Instruments Una Corda represents human curiosity. Each planet and moon on the album has its own theme. Some share sounds as some share elements and characteristics in real life. Track 13 (“Pale Blue Dot”) has a special theme dedicated to Carl Sagan, my childhood hero. It combines many of the sounds from the whole album to represent our fragile world, the hopes and dreams of all mankind to reach beyond. The whole album is a love letter to the spirit of the Cassini-Huygens team’s relentless curiosity
Q: Have you started playing shows or virtual shows?
A: Since I am more of a technical composer and less of a live performer, not at this time. That would be pretty cool though. I would love to hear a live choir perform “The Arrival” from the album for sure. I also think Cassini: A Musical Tribute would be an excellent backdrop for a planetarium show about Saturn and its moons.
Q: What else should we know about your music?
A: This project is really just out there to get people interested in space exploration and celebrate the achievements of the multi-national team that made Cassini a reality.
Cassini was originally going to be more like a radio play. I had actually transcribed much of the mission control dialogue from the various Cassini Milestones. I had also done a lot of research into what happened in the various milestones that didn’t have any available commentary I could find. I was originally going to hire a group of actors to perform the lines. I had even recorded a full launch control narrative for “A Journey Begins” to be 100% accurate for the launch of Cassini.
There was some question by peers on the legality of quoting people and permissions for such a thing. I went as far as to get legal guidance and reach out to both JPL and NASA to pursue these rights, but just never heard back, never found the right lead. So yeah, there is this kind of unheard “Snyder’s Cut” of Cassini: A Musical Tribute sitting in the archive and I opted to just release an instrumental version. I hope someday this can all be brought back to its original design and can be used as an education and inspiration tool for the Cassini-Huygens mission and those who made it a reality. So that is where the webpage cassinitribute.com came from, to tell that detailed story that I couldn’t with commentary. Sadly though most people hear the music on Spotify or Itunes and don’t know about the accompanying web page, at least that’s what the analytics are showing me these days, so many don’t know the context for the story and sound effects heard in each track. I put out some streaming ads to help people find these amazing album notes and that really seemed to help.
This has inspired me enough to pursue a follow-up historic space mission album that will approach this in a completely different way. I am halfway finished with that score. So yes, space fans there will be more. Never underestimate the willpower of a space geek with a synthesizer.
A: One of the big things missing from modern-day sci-fi films is just the sense of awe for what is sitting in our own backyard. How impossibly spectacular would it be to take 20 years and explore Saturn and its moons? That is the emotion I wanted to create. We have seen the pictures from Cassini - what do they feel like? That was my goal.
The main themes though are the use of voices in the album. I very consciously used voices from around the world such as Hindustani chants at the beginning of “The Great Storm” and the Arabic overtones in “Enceladus.” This was to represent humanity not only as English but rather as the whole human race. The piano sound by Native Instruments Una Corda represents human curiosity. Each planet and moon on the album has its own theme. Some share sounds as some share elements and characteristics in real life. Track 13 (“Pale Blue Dot”) has a special theme dedicated to Carl Sagan, my childhood hero. It combines many of the sounds from the whole album to represent our fragile world, the hopes and dreams of all mankind to reach beyond. The whole album is a love letter to the spirit of the Cassini-Huygens team’s relentless curiosity
Q: Have you started playing shows or virtual shows?
A: Since I am more of a technical composer and less of a live performer, not at this time. That would be pretty cool though. I would love to hear a live choir perform “The Arrival” from the album for sure. I also think Cassini: A Musical Tribute would be an excellent backdrop for a planetarium show about Saturn and its moons.
Q: What else should we know about your music?
A: This project is really just out there to get people interested in space exploration and celebrate the achievements of the multi-national team that made Cassini a reality.
Cassini was originally going to be more like a radio play. I had actually transcribed much of the mission control dialogue from the various Cassini Milestones. I had also done a lot of research into what happened in the various milestones that didn’t have any available commentary I could find. I was originally going to hire a group of actors to perform the lines. I had even recorded a full launch control narrative for “A Journey Begins” to be 100% accurate for the launch of Cassini.
There was some question by peers on the legality of quoting people and permissions for such a thing. I went as far as to get legal guidance and reach out to both JPL and NASA to pursue these rights, but just never heard back, never found the right lead. So yeah, there is this kind of unheard “Snyder’s Cut” of Cassini: A Musical Tribute sitting in the archive and I opted to just release an instrumental version. I hope someday this can all be brought back to its original design and can be used as an education and inspiration tool for the Cassini-Huygens mission and those who made it a reality. So that is where the webpage cassinitribute.com came from, to tell that detailed story that I couldn’t with commentary. Sadly though most people hear the music on Spotify or Itunes and don’t know about the accompanying web page, at least that’s what the analytics are showing me these days, so many don’t know the context for the story and sound effects heard in each track. I put out some streaming ads to help people find these amazing album notes and that really seemed to help.
This has inspired me enough to pursue a follow-up historic space mission album that will approach this in a completely different way. I am halfway finished with that score. So yes, space fans there will be more. Never underestimate the willpower of a space geek with a synthesizer.