Never Sol is the alias of musician, composer and producer Sara Vondraskova. Based in Prague, Czech Republic, her musical practice is interested mainly in combining vocals with synthesizers. Searching for deconstruction in forms, driven and inspired by rough, noisy-sharp sounds with dark harsh drone elements, she is exploring the relationship between fragility and massiveness of sound and finds time and work with time as the crucial element and lynchpin when creating an emotional context and environment for the listener.
We chatted with Sara on how she uses the Prophet ’08 in her music:
What made you choose the Prophet ’08?
Since childhood I was always writing music and songs with a piano and my voice, but as I was discovering new interesting music throughout the years, I started to feel this need for a unique and authentic sound language I could create with. I was searching for an instrument that I could speak through – some particular sound world that would feel true and that would help me articulate what I wanted to share in music, with possibility to expand the vocabulary further in future. So many years back I decided I need to explore this, and sound of a synthesizer became the only natural evolution that I could imagine, because most of the music I loved was built on a foundation of synth sound.
As I was new to synthesis, I was a bit confused how to choose the right instrument from all the possible ones, I loved what these beautiful instruments produced and felt driven towards it but really haven’t had the knowledge. I come from a classically trained music background, studying classical and jazz conservatory in Prague, where one doesn’t come around synthesis at all. I did some research online and then I ended up choosing between two instruments, one of them was Prophet ’08. I won’t ever forget this moment when I played Prophet ’08 for the first time. It was at a music shop in Berlin in 2014, I laid down a chord, heard the sound and it just hit me, I felt connected in that second. It was a feeling it’s the timbre and sound of my heart and all the emotions that are running through me. I knew it will be hard to learn with this instrument as I was a beginner, but the feeling was so intense that I just knew this is the one. It has been my anchor and main instrument since then… It’s the deep body of sound and its rich harmonics that really do some magic.
How are you using it?
It’s my main instrument for playing live shows, composing music for theatre, recording, improvising and it’s the lynchpin of my studio. Since the very beginning I found it very engaging to compose new music with it, the sound always washes me with inspiration and ideas. As I learned more, I started to sculpt sounds from scratch that would genuinely enable what I felt in resonance with sound-wise. It became the fundamental instrument of my music and even after these years I still find new approaches in path of sculpting a sound – although I of course reach into similar worlds, colors and dynamics. But the most beautiful thing I feel about the Prophet ’08 is that thanks to it I really did find my sonic language and it allowed me to communicate through sound.
What is one of your favorite things about it?
The depth of the sound. I use Prophet ’08 as the foundation on every track and I just love the space, complexity, texture and width it gives.
In this moment I really love to play around the LFO and envelope section, choosing different destinations and sources, just creating a bit of a random process in opening up the sound, searching for some interesting evolvements of how the oscillations travel through. I think modular synths opened my mind in another way in this and since than I also started approaching the Prophet in a new way.
What does it give you that other synths might not?
Complexity, all the technical aspects lead to a fact that it’s an instrument that can really do all the work on it’s one. I love to just stack sounds from the Prophet on top of each other and create soundscapes to which I add vocal to, drench it all in lot of reverb and that’s really it.
But to be honest I think for me the magic is mostly about the long relationship I built with it and the sounds I already created on this synth. If I find it hard sometimes to find a specific sound or if I seek for inspiration it is always the Prophet ’08 that brings me into the right place. I feel very grown-through with it and it feels very natural for me to play with this instrument.
Any interesting tricks or techniques you would like to share?
Maybe a tip for someone who is new to synthesis would be to go into the schematic and route of a preset and look what all parameters are set to and what changing and tweaking them slowly one by one does – that way you can learn what enables what and how the path of a sound is created. I myself learned much this way.
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