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1[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thumb_74739_photo_big.jpg]]
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3Klaus Schulze (4 August 1947 - 26 April 2022) was a German electronic music pioneer, regarded by genre fans as the "Godfather of {{Trance}}".
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5Schulze began his music career as a member of Music/TangerineDream, before leaving the group over {{creative differences}} with frontman Edgar Froese. Shortly thereafter, he formed a new band, Ash Ra Tempel, with bandmates Manuel Göttsching and Hartmut Enke. Less than a year later, he chose again to leave a newly formed group after only one album, this time to mount a solo career. He then proceeded to release more than 60 albums over the course of his long and successful career.
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7He occasionally recorded albums under the pseudonym of "Richard Wahnfried".
8
9!! Some of his albums:
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11* ''Irrlicht'' (1972)
12* ''Cyborg'' (1973)
13* ''Blackdance'' (1974)
14* ''Picture Music'' (1975)
15* ''Timewind'' (1975)
16* ''Moondawn'' (1976)
17* ''Body Love'' (1977)
18* ''Mirage'' (1977)
19* ''Body Love Vol. 2'' (1977)
20* ''X'' (1978)
21* ''Dune'' (1979)
22* ''[[LiveAlbum ...Live...]]'' (1980)
23* ''Dig It'' (1980)
24* ''Trancefer'' (1981)
25* ''Audentity'' (1983)
26* ''[[LiveAlbum Dziekuje Poland Live '83]]'' (1983)
27* ''Film/{{Angst}}'' (soundtrack) (1984)
28* ''Inter[=*=]Face'' (1985)
29* ''Dreams'' (1986)
30* ''En=Trance'' (1988)
31* ''Miditerranean Pads'' (1990)
32* ''[[LiveAlbum The Dresden Performance]]'' (1990)
33* ''Beyond Recall'' (1991)
34* ''[[LiveAlbum Royal Festival Hall Vol. 1]]'' (1992)
35* ''[[LiveAlbum Royal Festival Hall Vol. 2]]'' (1992)
36* ''[[LiveAlbum The Dome Event]]'' (1993)
37* ''Le Moulin de Daudet'' (film soundtrack) (1994)
38* ''Goes Classic'' (1994)
39* ''Totentag'' (1994)
40* ''[[LiveAlbum Das Wagner Desaster Live]]'' (1994)
41* ''In Blue'' (1995)
42* ''[[LiveAlbum Are You Sequenced?]]'' (1996)
43* ''Dosburg Online'' (1997)
44* ''[[LiveAlbum Live @ KlangArt]]'' (2001)
45* ''Moonlake'' (2005)
46* ''Kontinuum'' (2007)
47* ''Farscape''[[note]]no relation to [[Series/{{Farscape}} the TV series]][[/note]] (with Music/LisaGerrard) (2008)
48* ''[[LiveAlbum Rheingold]]'' (with Lisa Gerrard) (2008)
49* ''[[LiveAlbum Dziękuję bardzo]]'' (with Lisa Gerrard) (2009)
50* ''[[LiveAlbum Big in Japan: Live in Tokyo 2010]]'' (2010)
51* ''Shadowlands'' (2013)
52* ''[[LiveAlbum Big in Europe]]'' (with Lisa Gerrard) (2014)
53* ''[[LiveAlbum Stars Are Burning]]'' (2014)
54* ''Eternal: The 70th Birthday Edition'' (2017)
55* ''Silhouettes'' (2018)
56
57!! Provides examples of the following tropes:
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59* {{Backmasking}}: The orchestra rehearsal recording Schulze used on ''Irrlicht'' was played in reverse.
60* BoleroEffect: Much of Schulze's material from TheSeventies, particularly the triptych of ''Picture Music'', ''Timewind'', and ''Moondawn'', follows this trope, starting with an ostinato comprised of one or two synthesizer leads and progressively adding further layers of synth, organ, sound effects, and percussion. Appropriately, many consider him a forefather to the trance genre.
61* ConceptAlbum: ''X'' is an album of six "musical biographies" evoking both contemporary and historical intellectuals whose works influenced the artist.
62* DroneOfDread: "Death of an Analogue" from ''Dig It'' plays out like a synthesized legato funeral dirge, complete with strange chanting run through a vocoder. Perhaps with this in mind, it was later used as the main theme in the 1982 Australian horror film ''Film/{{Next of Kin|1982}}''.
63* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: ''Irrlicht'' is far more experimental than any of his later works, featuring no synthesizers and instead consisting of unearthly organ drones and heavily modified tape recordings of a classical orchestra rehearsal.
64* EpicRocking: One of Schulze's trademarks. In fact, it would be easier to list the number of Schulze tracks with a length of under five minutes than those with a length of over five minutes. It was not uncommon, especially in the 70s, for a LP of his to have only two songs, each about 20 to 30 minutes long. And the advent of the CD allowed him to go even further, with lengths over 40 minutes actually being the norm rather than the exception.
65* LastNoteNightmare: The ending of ''Bayreuth Return'' from the album ''Timewind''. 30 minutes of tranquil, repetitive music and then ''that'' ending out of nowhere.
66* MeaningfulName: ''X'' (10 in Roman numerals) is the artist's tenth studio album.
67* OminousPipeOrgan: Schulze used ominous electric organ [[DroneOfDread drones]] on several tracks of his first few albums, notably "Ebene" and "Gewitter" from ''Irrlicht'', "Ways of Changes" and "Voices of Syn" from ''Black Dance'', "Wahnfried 1883" from ''Timewind'', and "Mindphaser" from ''Moondawn''.
68* PlayingTheHeartStrings: His final album, ''Deus Arrakis'', poignantly features cello by Wolfgang Tiepold during its second suite, "Seth".
69* PunBasedTitle: ''Trancefer'', ''Audentity'', ''En=Trance'', and ''Miditerranean Pads''.
70* RecurringRiff: "Mindphaser", the b-side of ''Moondawn'', reprises a melodic phrase from "Wahnfried 1883", the b-side of the preceding album ''Timewind''. Likewise, his 2000 track "Windy Times" references the sequencer ostinato of "Bayreuth Return".
71* RockMeAmadeus: The main synthesizer riff of the "Seth" suite from his final album ''Deus Arrakis'' echoes Bach's "Prelude in C minor" from the ''Cello Suites''.
72* {{Sampling}}: "Friedemann Bach" and "Ludwig II. von Bayern" from ''X'' include samples of a modest string orchestra looped on tape. ''Irrlicht'' also uses orchestral samples, but they're so heavily filtered as to be unrecognizable.
73* SelfCensoredRelease: ''Body Love'' and its sequel album began as the score to a pornographic film of the same name.
74* ShoutOut:
75** "Bayreuth Return" and "Wahnfried 1883" from ''Timewind'', as well as Schulze's alternate name, are references to the works of Music/RichardWagner. The former refers to the town where Wagner built his opera house for the first performance of ''[[Theatre/TheRingOfTheNibelung Der Ring des Niebelungen]]'', while the latter two refer to the name of the composer's home, where he was buried upon his death in 1883.
76** ''X'' includes tracks named for Creator/FriedrichNietzsche, Georg Trakl, Creator/FrankHerbert, Friedemann Bach, UsefulNotes/LudwigIIOfBavaria, and Creator/HeinrichVonKleist.
77** ''Dune'' is named for the famous [[Literature/{{Dune}} novel]] by Frank Herbert, while the cover art is a screenshot from ''Film/Solaris1972'' with the title overlayed which Schulze photographed directly from his television screen.
78** ''Trancefer'' includes a track named "Silent Running", after the [[Film/SilentRunning film of the same name]].
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