[Interview by Jacopo Vigezzi, originally published in Prog Rock Journal, July 10; republished with permission. Link ]
While Paul Haslinger provides the architectural and creative backbone of noion, Christian Wittman represents its poetic and sculptural soul. A founding member of the legendary French ensemble Lightwave, Wittman has spent over four decades exploring the "geography of the unconscious," moving from the modular Cosmic explorations of the 1980s to a refined form of "ambient chamber music."
Based in Paris, Wittman’s work at Nina Studio has long been at the crossroads of sound design and surrealist philosophy. With the launch of noion and the dual release of “Mallarmé” and “Borges,” he invites us into a realm where silence is as vital as the notes themselves. We spoke with Christian about the “automatic writing” of sound, his shared history with Haslinger, and why literature remains the ultimate compass for his electronic explorations.
Christian, you have been a key figure in the French electronic scene since the founding of Lightwave in 1984. How does the launch of noion feel different from your previous label experiences, such as with Hearts of Space or Signatures?
I don’t know if I was a key figure, but thank you…! Since Lightwave’s early days, we’ve weathered the massive shifts in the music industry. We were first signed to “traditional” record labels, like Erdenklang, which allowed us to release our first CD, “Nachtmusik,” in 1990. Then came Hearts of Space, with the “Fathom” sub-series, for slightly experimental ambient music, where we found ourselves alongside the big names of the California scene—Steve Roach, Robert Rich, and Michael Stearns. Then came “Signatures,” a label created by Radio France, which marked a new phase in our music, as we moved away from space music and dark ambient toward a more abstract and experimental form of chamber music, combining electronics and acoustic instruments. This took us up to the early 2000s… Then came the crisis of independent labels and the rise of streaming platforms, the dominance of the mainstream, and a reluctance toward musical experimentation, which closed many doors… Like many others, I opted for self-production in the early 2020s, using Bandcamp and a DSP that gave me access to streaming and download sites. These changes made musicians independent, free to create, and gradually building their audience. The rules of the game, however, are ruthless, even rigged, in an ecosystem driven by opaque algorithms and dominated by Spotify. To understand what goes on behind the scenes, you must read Liz Pelly’s enlightening book, *Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist* (2025). The diagnosis is terrifying… The tidal wave of AI-generated music today is introducing another major upheaval—a tsunami, in fact—that is hitting all players in the music industry with full force: labels, publishers, artists, instrumentalists, as well as the designers of virtual instruments and sample libraries...
As our collaboration project with Paul Haslinger began to gain momentum (in the spring of 2025), we approached a number of labels. But we finally opted for a different path: creating our own label, noion music, and taking full control of every aspect of our music’s production and distribution. Creative independence, control over our compositions at every stage, control over publishing, control over visuals and artistic identity… With Paul, we fully embrace going against the tide of the major currents that, day by day, are upending the entire music ecosystem. Rather than going with the flow and losing our (artistic) soul, we’ve opted for a consistent approach and a long-term plan, without ignoring the difficulties that await us in the short term. There is something exhilarating about building a new label with strong artistic ambition and envisioning its gradual development over the years. We have a small team with us that helps us approach this project as rigorously and professionally as possible in terms of management and promotion...
noion is described as a platform for "atmospheric minimalism." From your perspective in Paris, how do you see this aesthetic fitting into the broader European tradition of "modern classical" and electro-acoustic music?
— Paul and I have followed parallel paths, even though Paul has had a much more prominent professional career and media exposure than I have. For his part, he started with the up-tempo, percussive electronic music of Tangerine Dream in the late ’80s, before successfully branching out into film and video game soundtracks in Hollywood—a world that offered creative freedom but also came with its share of constraints and stylistic clichés. At the same time, he developed a more personal and experimental solo project, gradually refining his music toward more intimate atmospheres. As for me, with Lightwave, we broke away from our early image—a French clone of late-70s Tangerine Dream, both in terms of instrumentation and music, quite Berlin School-esque, with sequences, etc. We shifted toward a more experimental sound, on the one hand by emphasizing abstraction and electro-acoustic atmospheres, and on the other by involving guest musicians on our albums and in our concerts, particularly Jacques Derégnaucourt (viola, voice), Renaud Pion (wind instruments), Pierre Chaze (electric guitar), and Jon Hassel (trumpet), as well as Paul himself for several projects, which led us toward a form of mixed and hybrid chamber music...
For my solo music, in parallel with and following Lightwave, I believe I pursued two main directions. One was ambient in the vein of Brian Eno and Harold Budd, who remain my absolute references; their albums are the ones I would take with me to a desert island, and not a week goes by without me listening to their music… The second direction led me toward “atmospheric classical,” as Stephen Hill—our label manager during the Hearts of Space/Fathom era and still a radio show programmer on the American public radio network—called it.
I’ve always been passionate about new music—from the New Albion label in San Francisco, the ECM New Series, and more recently from Another Timbre and Kairos, not to mention the albums by Ólafur Arnalds, Nils Frahm, Max Richter, and Jóhann Jóhannsson. It’s true that there’s something very European about the latter, which also connects to the ECM New Series productions, and I’m also very inspired by composers like Arvo Pärt and Valentin Silvestrov. On the American side, the minimalist musicians of New Albion have also influenced me a lot—Pauline Oliveros, Stuart Dempster, Ingram Marshall…. That doesn’t stop me from really loving Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Terry Riley, and John Adams, but I haven’t pursued those directions.
As a French musician, my musical sensibilities have also been shaped by listening to the works of the Groupe de recherche musicale (GRM) and Ircam, which take an exploratory and experimental approach… I’d particularly mention Michel Redolfi, Bernard Parmegiani, François Bayle, and Luc Ferrary, but I also listen a lot to Pierre Boulez and the concerts of the Ensemble Intercontemporain...
So yes, I think my contribution to noion leans toward “atmospheric minimalism”—it’s a philosophy Paul and I share… “Minimalism,” in the sense that we try to refine our music, strip away the superfluous, open up our compositions, and get to the essence. Too many musicians overload their compositions, adding track after track, saturating the listening space—I’m thinking of Jean-Michel Jarre’s latest concerts, which I find unlistenable sonically and unbearable visually. With Paul, we’re going against this trend, and our mixes lean toward simplicity and highlighting what’s truly essential to a track. “Atmospheric,” too, because in our choice of sound palettes and processing, as well as in the mixing, we try to create music that breathes, that diffuses into the listening space like colors or a scent, like a dream or memories...
