Tallinn

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James Castelijn

In 2012, James joined the DJ collective BANGANAGANGBANGERS, focusing on producing and releasing their own work. Strongly inspired by artists like Noisia, Eprom, Hudson Mohawk, Ivy Lab, G Jones & Joker, they immersed themselves in the world of underground bass, (half-time) DnB, and glitch hop. Despite operating in a niche market, the energy of both the music and the DJ act brought the collective to stages such as Mysteryland, We Are Electric, Woo Hah, Melkweg, Solar Festival, ADE (own event), and many more.

After completing his private study in Audio & Studio Engineering at the Volver Academy in Tilburg in 2013, James began his studies at the Herman Brood Academy in 2015. Here, he connected with rappers who asked him to handle the mixing and mastering of their songs, marking the official start of his career as a mixing and mastering engineer. Following his graduation in 2017, demand and workload increased, quickly adding major Dutch Urban names like Henkie T, Snelle, Young Ellens, Latifah, Kimono, Chivv, Defano, Numidia, and record labels such as Quatro Vision, Trifecta, Avalon Music, and Rotterdam Airlines to his credit list.

Since 2017, James has also been involved in the development of Wisseloord Studio’s House of Music and Wisseloord Publishing in Hilversum. In 2020, James took on the role of both Mastering Engineer at this facility and A&R Manager of the House of Music and Wisseloord Publishing, a collaboration between BMG BNLX and Wisseloord. As the A&R manager of the Wisseloord Publishing, James has been involved with organizing numerous international writing camps and has been responsible to connect both national and international writers.

Noah Smits

Noah is one of the most recognized music marketeers and data analysts of The Netherlands. Working as consultant for numerous artists and labels, Noah is one of the figures of the field that cannot be missed out.

Kertu Mägar

Kertu Mägar is running an independent publishing company FAAR Music, which represents Baltic and Nordic songwriters/producers, helping them with all the aspects of their projects.

FAAR Music works globally and their roster includes many established and well-known Estonian pop music makers as well as new upcoming talent. At FAAR, Kertu takes care of international relations and partnerships, contracts & administration, and manages the creative department.

Prior to her role in FAAR Music, Kertu worked in the music industry in various roles, incl. PR & Marketing Manager for Dutch electronic label Future House Music, artist manager for electronic artists signed to her own management company and event producer of Estonia’s biggest young artists competition.

Kertu has a Bachelor’s Degree in Music & Choir Conducting and a Master’s Degree in Art Management.

Vallo Kikas

Vallo Kikas has produced, mixed and mastered over the years for a variety of award-winning Estonian artists such as Karl-Erik Taukar, Liis Lemsalu, Elina Born and nublu. This year, he was nominated in the mixing/mastering/recording category at the Estonian Music Industry Awards.

Vallo is part of electronic music duo ‘Kisma’, whose most popular song ‘Fingertips’ has over 11 million streams on Spotify and over 21 million views on Youtube. In 2019, Vallo co-wrote the topline for Syn Cole’s track ‘Discovery’, which was released by Martin Garrix’s record label STMPD RCRDS. In Spring 2021 he co-wrote and produced ‘Doomino’ by Liis Lemsalu and Stefan, which became number one played on Estonian radios for the whole summer.

Stig Rästa

Stig Rästa has been in the music industry for over 20 years, establishing him as one of the top songwriters in Estonia. He has his own solo project and is also a part of electronic music duo ‘Kisma.’ Their first single ‘We Are’ was released in 2017 by No Copyright Sounds and has been played over 7 million times on Spotify and Youtube.

In 2015, he represented Estonia in the Eurovision Song Contest with his song ‘Goodbye to Yesterday’, which placed 7th in the final. The song has over 12 million streams on Spotify and won ‘Song of the Year’ award at Estonian Music Awards in 2016. Stig has written for many award-winning artists such as Victor Crone, Joakim Lundell, Elina Born, Traffic and Karl-Erik Taukar.

Stig co-wrote ‘Storm’ by Victor Crone, which represented Estonia in Eurovision in 2019 and kick-started Victor’s further career.The song was played over 15,000 times on Swedish radios. Stig was also the writer for ESC 2016 Estonian entry song ‘Play’ by Jüri Pootsmann.

Karl Killing

Karl Killing, at mere 22 years old, has immensely proven himself over the past few years in the Estonian music scene. He is actively working with many loved Estonian hip-hop and rap artists such as 5MIINUST, säm, Pluuto, nublu and villemdrillem.

Two years ago, Karl participated in the Eesti Laul contest (Estonia’s national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest) where he placed 7th with his song ‘Kiss Me’. His solo project kick-started in 2020 when he released his debut single ‘High Heels’, which came out with Canadian record label found/red. This year was massive for Karl as he signed to Warner Music Baltics, released a video single ‘powerless’ with them, and intends to release his first album in 2022. While his solo project is on the softer, pop side, for his producing, he definitely has a weakness for hip-hop.

Hugo Martin Maasikas

Hugo has a solo project Whogaux and is also part of two successful EDM projects WATEVA and Cartoon. Cartoon’s most successful track ‘On & On’ has 170M+ streams on Spotify and 400M+ on Youtube, making them an absolute flagship in Estonia’s electronic music scene.

Hugo has released music with many well established record labels such as Armada Music, Selected, NCS, Future House Music, Enhanced Music and Liquicity. Hugo with this talent and passion for sure has a lot to provide for the lovers of fine electronic music.

Gevin Niglas

Gevin Niglas is a producer for a number of different award-winning artists such as nublu (Estonian Male Artist of the Year 2019 and 2020) and 5MIINUST (Artist of the Year 2020). In 2021, nublu released his debut album ‘Café Kosmos’, where Gevin co-wrote/co-produced four songs. The album was very well received by both critics and Estonian radios. In 2020, they produced ‘paaristõuked’ by 5MIINUST together with Karl Killing and ‘niiea’ by Elina Born and Villemdrillem – both some of the most played songs on Estonian radio that year.

Gevin is also actively working with several new stars in Estonian music scene like Maian, Heleza and Anett Kulbin. In 2021, he started working on his solo project. “My solo project – I’d say it’s trap-rnb influenced pop. When I write or produce for others, I don’t have a specific favourite genre – everything that’s authentic is appealing to me,” Gevin says.

Kristine Kebbinau

Kristine Kebbinau has been active in the Estonian music industry for ten years, taking on roles from label management, marketing & PR to organizing festivals and events. She was the organizer of the Estonian Music Industry Awards (2021) and developed the youth music scene via Estonian Youth Band Award (Noortebändi konkurss). Kristine has also been involved with festivals like Tallinn Music Week, Black Nights Film Festival (seminars Music Meets Film) and Intsikurmu Festival, where she was the CEO.

Since Kristine has taken on many different roles in the industry – being an artist, working with artists, organizing events and done strategical marketing and PR, she really understands the different parts of the sector. Nowadays Kristine mainly focuses on bringing the Baltic Music Markets together to broaden the opportunities for the talents of the region.

Module 4

Multiple

These coaches will be teaching this course

4h on Saturdays, every 2 weeks

DAW Production

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