craig padilla
Being of Light
Craig Padilla is an internationally celebrated and award-winning electronic music artist (and video producer). After more than two decades of performing live and recording his own music using many vintage analog and newer digital synthesizers, his style reflects the classic electronic musicians of the past, while finding new sound and music styles that are unique to the true ambient electronic music genre (often found in categories from New Age to Trance to Electronica).
His music and creative environment is inspired and influenced by the lands surrounding Coeur d’Alene, Idaho where he once resided, and by his earliest influences of being raised in far-northern California where he resides again, where he first explored the works of Wendy Carlos, Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream, Kraftwerk, Steve Roach, and many other pioneers of the electronic form.
Never letting technology overcome the humanity in his compositions, he creates electronic music that is rooted in tradition while still sounding new, interesting, and fresh.
Craig has always endeavored to paint musical landscapes with a rich palette of infinite timbral complexity, guaranteeing to take the audience to a different place on each listen, making every disc a recording that is a highly sculpted, crafted musical experience to be treasured and played indefinitely.
He has composed soundtracks for various television, theatrical, and film productions. His music is heard on XM Satellite Radio and radio stations throughout the US, and on celebrated radio programs “Echoes” and “Hearts of Space” repeatedly. He is a top-selling established artist on the Spotted Peccary Music label and has appeared on releases on the Lotuspike, Fruits de Mer Records, Groove Records, Space for Music, Monroe Institute Hemi-Sync, and Ultimae labels.
Craig plays:
Synthrotek/MST & Division 6 Modular Synthesizer
Mattson Mini Modular
Division 6 / Mattson Sequencer
Akai MPC Live
Moog Little Phatty
Moog Voyager
Mooger Fooger’s MF107 & CP251
ARP 2600 Synthesizer
ARP 2600 Sequencer
ARP Axxe
ARP 2500 Sequencer Modules
Roland JP8080
Roland SynthPlus-10
Roland SH-32
Roland U220
Dave Smith MoPho
Dave Smith Prophet08
Sequential Circuits Pro-One
Novation UltraNova
Korg EA1
Ensoniq ESQ-1
Ensoniq Mirage Sampler
Yamaha TG-33
Alesis QuadraSynth Plus
Emu UltraProteus
Reason and Atmosphere soft-synths
1.8.16 HEAVEN CONDENSED is released and available on CD now!
7.15.15 We are down to the LAST REMAINING CDs of VOSTOK, GENESIS, and PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE. I'm told by the label that this is all that's remaining of these releases with no future plans of re-releasing them on CD!! (ON NO!!) So, get your CDs now before they're gone for good.
6.18.15 WELCOME TO OUR NEW WEBSITE!! Please support the artist by buying music directly from the artist. Your support is greatly appreciated.
Structured like a four-paneled work of sacred art, Heaven Condensed forges a philosophically spiritual vision of another dimension, abstracting the existence of Heaven as one might experience it either internally or externally, in four diaphanous movements that convey a wide range of organic, tangible, physical energy to amorphous, floating inspiration.
Four lengthy tracks of kaleidoscopic celestial currents!
Containing three long analog synthesizer songs that have never been released anywhere else, this is an extremely unique and very limited edition lathe-cut record that can only be described as a true piece of artwork! The record was cut on thick vinyl, and the stereo sound quality is excellent! Only 30 of these were individually made to be sold with the Sonar LP as a "deluxe collector's set" at a music festival in England. We only have 3 copies of the Short Circuits LP available to sell. Get this collector's item while you can because once they're gone then they're gone for good!
Life Flows Water was recorded live and is a collaboration between Spotted Peccary Music’s founder and creative guru Howard Givens (Brain Laughter) and SPM veteran electronic virtuoso Craig Padilla. It is a meditation in form, opening and closing with tones from a Tibetan bowl, and flowing, evolving continuously through seven impressions of deeply nuanced ambient electronic artistry. Featuring a profound array of electronic instruments from classic vintage and modular synths to modern digital keyboards, this delicately choreographed work is really about inward expansiveness – like true meditation – focused on a purity and simplicity in an abstract fullness.
The music is inspired by the moments and experiences that brought these artists together for this collaboration, and by the realization of a consciousness awakened from the steps taken on the discovery of this new path. Padilla states: “We had been waiting to perform live together for quite some time. Finally, due to numerous life changing events, the opportunity to create and perform new music had arrived and once we got started, the music continuously and effortlessly flowed from our hands and into the synthesizers; two collaborative energies finding a common singularity of creation. The music describes this creative moment perfectly: getting lost and found in the present moment; taking an inward journey to communicate with the soul."
Craig Padilla’s vinyl double LP released on Fruits de Mer records in 2014.
Sonar is a compilation of recordings by Craig from 1996 onwards, none of which have appeared on CD or vinyl before. Although they span nearly 20 years of recordings, Craig selected them to provide a consistent feel across four sides of listening – music influenced by the kosmische sounds of the 70s, but fed through 21st century equipment. Immerse yourself.
Craig Padilla and Sendelica split this limited edition vinyl release on the UK-based Fruits de Mer label in 2013. Side One contains two Craig Padilla tracks, and Side Two contains a long track by Sendelica.
This was a very limited edition vinyl release, most outlets have sold out…and we have only a few copies left in stock!
Imagine traveling through a solitary and vast expanse; a distant sojourn into the farthest reaches of space, searching for another planet to eventually inhabit. That is the sound and story of When The Earth Is Far Away, the third collaboration from synthesist Craig Padilla and flute master Zero Ohms. Hailing from opposite sides of a continent, the two veteran musicians have crafted a dreamlike tapestry of organic space music, showcasing a skillfully executed amalgamation of analog and digital synths, various wind instruments, field recordings and subtle electronics, that seems to suspend the perception of time.
Blended to perfection, the music on When The Earth Is Far Away has such an organic feel to it that it becomes difficult to tell where the synths end and the flutes begin. Craig Padilla explains, “I think the unique combination of electronic synthesizers and acoustic wind-instruments creates a hauntingly beautiful and dream-like aural soundscape.” Indeed, the sound sources and individual instruments disappear deep into the spacescapes, and all that remains is the music. Padilla continues, “The music creates a warm, cosmic, floating atmosphere with slow-moving organic waves of sound. It’s spacemusic with a sense of drifting on a sea of timelessness from beginning to end.”
Their unified sound is the result of a collaborative process that these two artists have developed over years of working together. Zero Ohms’ Richard Roberts explains, “The process is somewhat unique in that Craig and I both manipulated each others’ tracks instead of the usual ‘hands off the other guy’s tracks’ attitude common in most collaborations. This resulted in pieces that had a fresh sound and an innovative feel to them, performances with real heart and soul.”
The colossal expanse of deep space, the loneliness of the journey, the marvels of the cosmos; all of these things, filtered and expressed through the emotions of wonder and awe that they evoke, bring an honest purity to this album. Whether the epic journey through space that inspires this music is a possible reality or just a dream for the future, When The Earth Is Far Away pays tribute to the age-old feeling that we — the human race — as a manifest destiny, belong in the stars…to the stars.
Finalist - ZMR Music Award - Best Electronic Album 2012
Craig Padilla is a veteran electronic music artist, who has been launching listeners into his cosmic dreamscapes for nearly 20 years. His absorbing ambient sound pairs analog and digital synthesizers to create worlds of sound that are fascinating and full of creative spark. THE HEART OF THE SOUL is a very dreamy album, offering slow-burning synth-based melodies that are accentuated by the relaxed strumming of guitar and the gentle twinkle of piano. Whereas a lot of ambient albums have a spacey theme to them, Padilla’s work here is more earthy and organic, calling to mind warm sunshine and vast horizons. At times, the music has symphonic undertones and rhythms are subtle, often blending into the backdrop. Fans of warmer-hued ambient music will find this musical journey a truly breathtaking experience.
Intensely deep sonic structures.
Mesmerizing shapeless worlds shimmer.
Rich organic wind instruments mesh with sublime synthesizer textures to create an entirely unique experience.
Discover the world Beyond the Portal.
Acclaimed electronic music veteran, Craig Padilla, is back and better than ever with this fascinating collection of award-winning melodious deep-space analog synth & sequencer music! Inspired by his local surroundings near Mt. Shasta, Padilla weaves the beauty of the analog synthesizer sound with new digital technology to create a sonic masterpiece filled with awe-inspiring visions of majestic vistas within the inner and outer cosmos. This is very much in the tradition of Tangerine Dream, Steve Roach, and early Klaus Schulze!
Seasoned veterans of the ambient and deep-experiential forms of electronic music, Howard Givens and Craig Padilla continue their soul-searching quest to express a symbiosis of music with contemplative self-examination and enlightenment on their second collaboration, BEING OF LIGHT.
Please consider buying directly from the artist. Your support is greatly appreciated.
Seasoned veterans of the ambient and deep-experiential forms of electronic music, Howard Givens and Craig Padilla continue their soul-searching quest to express a symbiosis of music with contemplative self-examination and enlightenment on their second collaboration, BEING OF LIGHT.
Comprised of four tracks, the 70 minute BEING OF LIGHTconveys the duo’s interest in longer-form expressions of harmonic color and ambient electronic subtlety. Viscous sonic textures are extracted from an expansive palette of electronic and acoustic instruments as the music steadily unfolds, ebbing and flowing through muted moments of tension, release, mystery, and peace. As with the duo’s previous highly-regarded collaboration, LIFE FLOWS WATER, this album is built around a combination of modular, vintage analog, and digital synthesizers, only this time they are blended together with grand piano, electric guitar, and various other expressive instruments.
Weaving melodic phrases and rich textures through rhythmic structures and sequences, Givens and Padilla create deep interludes and expansive passages that exemplify the inspiration behind the project – to musically express the state of awareness that comes through the discovery of one’s “inner being” and pure essence. With BEING OF LIGHT, Howard Givens and Craig Padilla emphasize a visceral and enveloping experience, conceptually envisioning the album as a topology of energy where the individual is a single point of light, solitary and self-aware, yet melded into the sum of all light, complete in the totality of existence.