Kordz: Promising Georgian DJ & Composer Hits the Int’l Scene
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
Alexandre Kordzaia is a young Georgian artist and DJ better known by his nickname Kordz. This newly emerged musician and producer masterfully combines various sounds to produce amazing pieces that stir cheerful feelings and trigger positive emotions within you. Born in Tbilisi, Georgia, in January 1994, at the age of five he moved to Switzerland where he went into the Music Academy there and started creating his own signature music. Alex simultaneously plays on piano and synthesizer, as well as composing classical pieces and house music. His music is a mesh of carefully balanced oppositions: deliciously snappy transients punctuate shimmering soundscapes, gently morphing into funk; while a melancholic post-soviet feel pays sentimental homage to a private vision of the 80s.
The artist hosted GEORGIA TODAY at his grandma’s house, where he usually stays when he is Tbilisi.
“At the age of 15-16, I got interested in electronic music and started discovering how to do it on my computer. From early childhood, I was playing classical piano and taking part in music competitions. Then I also got more and more into jazz, followed by house music. After experimenting with various sounds in the garage, at some point I decided to make an album and worked on it for a year. Over time, I got more serious about it and ended up doing my Bachelor’s degree in Sound Engineering and Electronic Composition in the Basel Conservatory, Switzerland”, Kordz told us.
The artist has performed throughout Europe, in Switzerland, Prague, Germany, Vienna and The Netherlands. He first appeared in front of the Georgian public in Tbilisi two years ago. “When I first did a live set in Tbilisi, strange as it may sound, the audience at the show was mostly elderly people, friends of my grandparents, and it was somehow funny, but they enjoyed the music and had fun. Afterwards, I gradually got invited to play more in Tbilisi and the modern generation got to know me better,” the artist said.
Even though the musician now lives in The Netherlands, from time to time he is invited to play for a Georgian audience at various venues. Kordz has performed in Heaven, Lolita, Mtkvarze, Fabrika, as well as at the Tbilisi Open Air Festival and Black Sea Jazz Festival in Batumi where he delivered his piece together with Giorgi Zagareli. The combination of the sound and energy of the live viola, played by Zagareli, with the electronic compositions of Kordz, impressed listeners greatly.
The DJ has also collaborated with other celebrated musicians, conductor Nikoloz Rachveli and Natalia Beridze. He recorded his own successful piece “We have been” together with Rachveli and an orchestra. His collaboration with foreign DJ Frederic Robinson, with whom he released several pieces under the German label Prrrrrrr Records, and their joint performances both in Georgia and abroad have been well received.
On January 1, on his birthday, Kordz will take to the stage at SPACEHALL in Tbilisi before he heads back to The Netherlands, giving both locals and visitors the chance to celebrate the New Year at best.
Kordz was recently nominated for the prestigious Tsinandali Award in music. He was also asked to write a piece particularly for the award ceremony that was performed by the string ensemble and the musicians of the Georgian Philarmonic Orchestra. The artist told us that, in future, he plans to get a string ensemble inside a club and pair it with his electronic music.
One of his truest and biggest fans is his grandmother. “The funniest thing is that when I started playing here in the clubs, my grandmother, who lives in Tbilisi, told me she was curious about what I was doing and wanted to come to my concert. She enjoyed it a lot from the first, and started coming regularly. Now, whenever I’m playing, no matter what time it is, even 3 o’clock in the morning, she’s always there, all dressed up and ready to party.” Alex’s grandma herself confirmed it, when she suddenly entered the room to offer us churchkhela and sweets. “My ear is so used to his music, that I can’t listen to any other,” she told us.
In parallel with performing in different countries throughout Europe, Kordzaia is doing a Master’s in Acoustic Composition in Hague University, in The Netherlands.
“I’d like to collaborate with as many Georgian musicians as possible from the orchestra and the Conservatory,” he said. Before coming back to Georgia to perform at the Close Encounters Festival in September-October, he has a thoroughly planned agenda of cities he’ll be playing in over the next few months.
“My next show will be in Vienna with my record label, bringing together various artists, then in Amsterdam in the Muziekgebouw, which is the main concert hall for contemporary classical music, where my new piece that I’m writing right now will be performed. After that is a concert at the Elbphilharmonie, a new concert hall in Hamburg, where I’ll be accompanied by an orchestra,” he told us.
Lika Chigladze