Cellist Peter Gregson's New Self-Titled Album

Released on Decca Records US, the album combines Gregson’s cello playing with a modular synthesizer

British cellist and composer Peter Gregson has released his self-titled album, Peter Gregson, on Decca Records US. Inspired by Felix Mendelssohn, the album is a collection of nine “songs without words.” Gregson recorded the songs using his hand-built synthesizer and says it's "the closest to what I hear in my head that I’ve ever reached."

You can listen to the album, here.

Gregson’s unique synthesizer set-up "only has a mic input for the cello,” he explains. “So everything that runs through it is a cello, and everything that comes out of it was created on a cello.

“I would start with a melody, or even just a sound, and then flesh it out from that,” he added. “I think there's something about the friction of that. I could create a delay or a harmonized line in a few mouse clicks on the computer, but it's not the same process. And sometimes that friction leads you down a different path of discovery.”

The album was recorded in the "Big Room" at Peter Gabriel’s Real World Studios.

“It is just a very big room — but it is basically that dense '70s, '80s rock-vocal sound,” Gregson says. “It doesn’t flatter anything: if you sound good in there, you sound good. I wanted to make it very honest, so it's not rolled in reverb, it's not heavily processed.”

As a composer, Gregson's music has also been featured in popular television shows like Bridgerton and The New Pope, plus video games like Blackbird, BBC’s BAFTA nominated Lost Boys and Fairies and PlayStation’s Boundless. He has also composed for fashion campaigns for Balenciaga, Bvlgari, and Burberry. As a cellist, Gregson has premiered works by composers such as Max Richter, Jóhann Jóhannson, Steve Reich, and many more.