Gonzales

Known interchangeably as Gonzales or Chilly Gonzales, the artist fuses MC delivery, keyboard production, and vocal performance into a singular practice. Childhood exposure to the piano, arranged by his parents and an accomplished older brother, supplied an outlet for personal expression that soon expanded into production. Hollywood connections through that same sibling later allowed him to score soundtracks under assorted pseudonyms.

Though Canadian-born, he settled in Europe—chiefly Germany and France—soon after joining the Kitty-Yo roster. His characteristically humorous concerts, which incorporated MC segments, led to a vocal collaboration with labelmate Peaches on the 2000 single “Red Leather.” The debut album Gonzales Uber Alles appeared that year and was followed by The Entertainist before the calendar turned. Joint touring and recording with Peaches raised both artists’ profiles, prompting journalists to label the pair the Bonnie and Clyde of Prankster Rap.

Studio work produced 2002’s Presidential Suite, after which Gonzales left Berlin for Paris in 2003 and formed a co-production partnership with Renaud Letang, already known for his work with Manu Chao. He shaped Feist’s award-winning Let It Die from early demo stages onward and accompanied her on tour. The same team worked with French pop figures including Jane Birkin on her 2004 duets album Rendez-Vous, Christophe Willem, and Charles Aznavour until Aznavour canceled the sessions.

Returning to solo work in 2005, Gonzales released Solo Piano, a set of sixteen themes written for left-hand accompaniment beneath right-hand melody and explicitly informed by French impressionists Erik Satie and Maurice Ravel. Soft Power followed in 2008 on Mercury, an assured collection of piano-led pop that recalled the production sheen of 1970s and 1980s rock and pop.

Two years later, after staging piano battles with Andrew W.K., recording with German rap group Puppetmastaz, and setting a Guinness world record for the longest solo piano performance (twenty-seven hours), he completed Ivory Tower, the soundtrack to a film he co-wrote with Céline Sciamma and directed by Puppetmastaz member Adam Traynor. The cast included Gonzales, Peaches, Feist, and Tiga, the last of whom portrayed Gonzales’s brother. Additional appearances have occurred on several Jamie Lidell albums. A second volume of solo piano, Solo Piano II, arrived in 2012. Further keyboard material surfaced in 2014 as Re-Introduction Etudes, an album and instructional book intended for former players seeking to resume study. Chambers, recorded in 2015 with the Kaiser Quartett, recast contemporary pop melodies in chamber-music form.