Marcel Mendel

Marcel Mendel is an enrolled ETHOS student at the University of Music Karlsruhe

Profile

Born and raised in south west Germany Marcel could enjoy a childhood between wine yards and the Palatinate Forest. At a very early age he discovered the old but detuned piano in his parent’s basement and started to sit in front of it, hitting the keys for hours.

Without knowing what he was actually doing he gained a sense of how to achieve specific sounds, putting certain detuned keys together. As if this wasn’t enough stress for his parents ears, at the same time he started constructing his very own drum set consisting of different saucepans, tupperware and a selected bunch of flatware and cooking spoons. Trying to play something in time he quickly became familiar with how to generate different sounds hitting and scratching the parts on certain locations.

Shortly afterwards, at the age of 7, he was introduced to classical music by his grandma who was a leading member of the local church and women’s choir. Apart from this he got some lessons in classical guitar from his uncle. Finally at the age of 10 he received professional classical guitar lessons for about two years until he discovered the electric guitar and continued taking lessons during the following years. Still pursuing his “sound search” on everything that could make noises including tape machines and synthesizers he played in several bands during school.

In high school, he began to teach himself to play the piano but this time on a tuned one. After finishing high school followed by a vocational training as insurance broker and financial assistant at Allianz Private Krankenversicherung AG he finally went to music college at the University of Music Karlsruhe where he currently studies contemporary music, sonic arts with emphasis on electronic music, music informatics (music technology) and musicology.

Started 2013 as a student worker beside uni, he works currently as an audio engineer and assistant of the tonmeister at the Institute for Music and Acoustics at ZKM Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe where he got the chance to work with professionals from all over the world such as IRCAM Paris, Ensemble Modern, Wolfgang Rihm and Brian Eno as well as SWR and ZDF. Occasionally he works also as a freelance guitar and equipment consultant. His “sound search” is by no means at its end and will most probably never be….

Studies

University of Music Karlsruhe, major in Sonic Arts/Electronic Composition and Music Informatics (Music Technology), minor in Musicology

Instruments

Acoustic Guitar/ Electronic guitar (Rock, Metal, Blues) / Piano

Work Samples

Video

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