Nils Frahm on SHEETS: "The more disposable, digital and virtual everything goes, the bigger the desire for something which lasts"

This is the latest project from the composer who gave us Screws, nine pieces released in 2012 as a free download, with an invitation to fans to record remixes of the work. SHEETS too, is designed to get people playing and re­working his compositions. “I’m not protective of my things” says Frahm. The book’s last chapter, To Be Composed, is blank manuscript paper. “I made a point of saying hey, you can all just write some dots on five lines and call it a piece, you know – that’s how I did it.” As ever, being a Frahm fan means taking part.

For a solo artist, Nils Frahm is a keen collaborator. The Berlin­ based composer and keyboard player uses his own success as a platform for showcasing the work of a wider network of artists. Black and white pieces by photographer Stuart Bailes are beautiful illustrations, monochrome riffs on a piano colour palette that reflect the shapes of Frahm’s improvisations. The music itself comes to life on the page as visual pieces too: patterns of spareness and densely­packed refrains.

Frahm was classically trained (he was taught the piano by Nahum Brodski, a Tchaikovsky protégé), but although there is something deeply traditional about his return to sheet music, it’s playfully done – and the result is as much an exercise in cross-­arts curation as it is a music book. It comes with a download code for audio copies of the works, and attractive illustrations by artist Paul Paetzel accompany instructions on how to make a budget damper and create Frahm’s “Felt” sound by sticking a t­-shirt between the strings and hammers.

There’s a tongue-­i-n­cheek pseudo-­science about this Nils Frahm how-­to manual that fans will enjoy. There’s also a liveness to it. As a companion piece for Frahm’s latest album, Spaces (being sold alongside it) it makes sense. Spaces (2013) is a compilation of live recordings; SHEETS is a written record of live performance. Both highlight the participatory nature of music­-making, putting the listener centre stage.

After his set at Latitude Festival, I asked Nils Frahm how he came up with the idea for the project – and whether we’re likely to see more beautiful objects coming out of the music world in the digital age.

What led you to make SHEETS?

My father is a photographer and a book collector, and I love the feel of a real book. My friend Torsten Posselt, who does all my artworks, is an expert in bookmaking and printing and we’ve always wanted to make a book. We finally decided to just collect some of the more memorable, straight-forward pieces from my career and issue a sheet music book so that people can play them themselves.

A lot of people have asked me for sheet music – on Facebook and stuff. I wasn’t really sure if there was a definite version of my pieces so I told the guy who transcribed the music into the notes to just use the versions on the CDs, exactly as they are.

So you didn’t make decisions in setting down fixed versions of your improvisations?

No, because then I would probably go over them completely and change them too much. They are more like transcriptions. You find transcriptions a lot in jazz music: you have a solo and the task is to transcribe it by ear. You learn a lot by doing that and then playing it. You get into somebody’s ideas and their musical universe. I wanted to give people who were curious the possibility to get into my universe by playing the pieces, and for a lot of people it’s not easy to hear and transcribe for themselves.

You were classically trained. Tell me about your relationship with sheet music.

For a long time I had to play sheet music a lot, and it was the most disheartening part of making music for me. Getting it in my fingers takes a long time. I can play it but it’s almost like I’ve not the talent to be fast at it. I’m quite fast at remembering, so once I’ve got it, I just close it and put it away and play it by heart.

I had help in writing the pieces down for SHEETS from a guy who has studied jazz piano playing. It was fun to see how a piece looks. When you open the sheet music book, the notes make a picture.

The photographs in SHEETS bring a visual element to the book, too. Tell me about this.

The photographs were a commission. I asked my lighting designer, who’s a photographer, to give a visual element to the book. I feel like there are not many formats where photographers can really highlight or promote their photos. It was more common back in the day to have that visual element with music, because vinyls might have artwork. And this is why I thought if we have a beautiful format it would be a waste not to put photos in there.

Will you be producing more multimedia work?

Yeah, it’s always a nice chance to include all the artists I’m hanging out with. My buddies basically, who do art works, books, videos and photography. My idea is to bring all these talents together and since I get a lot of requests for doing something, I always try to see the opportunity to make it a little bit more than just a piano concert. So I take each and every opportunity to curate art projects. I like cross-over collaborations, where a musician meets a photographer and they think about common ground.

The Wu-Tang Clan recorded a single-copy album to tour festivals before being bought by a single wealthy individual. SHEETS is being marketed as a ‘deluxe artefact’. Are we going to see more such beautiful objects coming out of the music world, do you think?

As music goes more and more digital and in the direction of things like Spotify, where you don’t own it any more, you’ve got to think philosophically about the relationship between owning art and making art: what does it change when you own a record? You commit to buying it. So even if you don’t like it at first, you still feel forced to give it a second and third shot, which you probably wouldn’t do on Spotify. Owning somebody’s artwork changes the relationship you have to that artefact. Just think of the sixties, where you were the lucky kid who had the only Beatles record in your village. All your friends would come to listen to it. So the Beatles would make you popular. With this book, it’s about not just owning it as a PDF somewhere, but having it on your piano so people see it and you have something to talk about. That relationship is something we are about to lose.

The good news is that the more disposable, digital and virtual everything goes, the bigger the desire for something which lasts. We wanted to make a book that will still look great in 50 years time and which your grandchildren will find on your shelf and ask, what’s that? That’s also why I like vinyl: because it will have a life of its own, while digital might just get lost in the world of forgotten links.

People hearing about SHEETS may be reminded of Beck’s song reader, a new album released in notation form. SHEETS is a collection of pre-existing recorded material, but was this an influence?

Well, Beck had a good idea doing that – a very classy idea. In making music that people have to create themselves in order to listen to it, he encouraged people to pick up their instruments, and obviously this is what I want to do: to bind as many people in front of the piano as possible. When people are in front of the piano they are less likely to mess anything up. Playing the piano is a peaceful, sensible way of spending your time – making music of any sort is. If you have a conclusion that makes sense to you then you find a way to get there. For me, this sheet music book is one step on my agenda to make people play the instrument – and not only play the keyboard, but play a real piano too – because real pianos are much better than keyboards.

Buy purchase SHEETS via the official website or Faber.

Nils Frahm tours the UK this October, and plays Jabberwocky Festival on 16 August.