Nicolas Bougaïeff^CA/DE

Photo credit : Diáne Zillmer

A decades-long love of club music has compelled Nicolas Bougaïeff to challenge conventional wisdom, delivering genre-busting Berghain sets that expertly blend contemporary classical, moody techno with hypnotic ambient. A classically trained musician, he studied electroacoustic composition at the Conservatoire de Montréal and earned a PhD in minimal techno from the University of Huddersfield. Launching his debut EP Movements as a producer in 2013, Bougaïeff has since released singles on a number of labels, including minimal techno label Trapez and his own imprint Editions Denkfabrik. He released Cognitive Resonance, his first EP on acclaimed label NovaMute, in 2017, and his highly praised full-length album The Upward Spiral was launched on parent label Mute in 2020.

In addition to music production, Bougaïeff co-founded the software company Liine with Richie Hawtin and others in 2010, with Bougaïeff designing controllers for Hawtin’s Plastikman Live tour as being jointly responsible for launching the MIDI/OSC controller app Lemur, now used by a number of major artists around the world. From teaching - he founded the Berlin Academy of Electronic Music - to writing his PhD thesis on minimal techno, Bougaïeff goes the extra mile with every project, overcoming the techno orthodoxy and pushing its boundaries ever further.