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Florian Schneider

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Florian Schneider was born in 1947 in Öhningen, on Lake Constance in southern Germany. His father was an architect. When Florian was three, the family moved to Düsseldorf. In 1968, while studying, he met Ralf Hütter. Together they played improvised music in the group Organisation, with Schneider on flute and Hütter on Hammond organ. In 1970 they founded Kraftwerk together in Düsseldorf.

Music and breakthrough

At first the flute was his main instrument. Schneider shaped the sound with electronic effects such as tape echo, ring modulator, fuzz and wah-wah, so that his flute could even sound like a bass instrument. He also played violin and electric guitar, and used synthesizers. After the album Autobahn (1974) the acoustic instruments gradually disappeared from his playing. Later he said that he found the flute too limiting: first he bought a microphone, then loudspeakers, an echo unit and a synthesizer, until he finally got rid of the flute.

Influence

Schneider was above all a sound designer. Hütter called him a perfectionist who was only satisfied when the sound was exactly right. He worked a great deal with the vocoder and with speech synthesis, and developed the Robovox, one of Kraftwerk's characteristic sounds. In this way he contributed to the image of Kraftwerk as man-machine. David Bowie named an instrumental on his album Heroes after him: V-2 Schneider. Schneider last played with Kraftwerk in 2006 and left the group in 2008. He died in 2020.

Listening

Listening tip. Listen to a Kraftwerk track in which a robotic voice sings or speaks, such as Die Roboter. Notice how the human voice has been changed electronically, the field in which Schneider specialised.

Discography

Studio albums

In School of Rock

The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.

Categories: Artists