Tech trance

Tech trance, also known as techno-trance or techno/trance, is a sub-genre within EDM that draws upon the techno and trance genres as the name suggests.

History

Tech trance was pioneered by among others Oliver Lieb in the mid-1990s. Other early examples of tech trance producers are Humate, Chris Cowie and Marmion. Tech trance evolved in a new direction during the early 2000s. By 2006, the most widespread variant of trance was the still growing and evolving genre of tech trance, pioneered by the likes of producers such as Tiesto, Marcel Woods, Marco V.^[1] The new style appealed to Trance DJs such as Ferry Corsten and Armin van Buuren, who then started incorporating tech trance into their sets. Since then tech trance has continued to evolve as a subgenre of trance, with many established trance producers and newcomers incorporating the style in their sets or focussing solely on it.

Style

Tech trance incorporates traditional elements of techno, with its repetitive nature and strong 4/4 beat, while deriving the melodic elements from Trance. Tech trance compositions tend to have a tempo of around 128-150 beats per minute, which is still significantly slower than hard house or hard trance.

Defining features of tech trance are complex, electronic rhythms, heavily quantised and usually driven by a loud kick drum, with filtered, dirty or slightly distorted hi-hat sounds and claps; harder synth sounds, usually with a large amount of resonance or delay; minimal pads, often with sidechaining to increase the volume off the beat. While earlier variants of trance often featured piano, strings or acoustic guitar, tech trance almost exclusively features synthesized sound, though electric guitar sounds occasionally feature.^[1] The synths are short, repetitive and contain fewer note changes than Trance, often having the same note played in an interesting sequence. One example of this is Sam Sharp's "Deep".

While breakdowns and builds within a song are important elements of many electronic genres, they are less prevalent in tech trance. As a result, more abrupt stops and starts are used to increase the effect of sudden changes within the music. Vocals are also quite rare within the tech trance genre, with only short phrases or single words normally incorporated.

Evolution

Tech trance started as an underground genre, but in recent years has grow in popularity due to its hard-edged nature and growing list of producers.

Since the development of tech trance, hard house producers have evolved their style and incorporated it into the tech trance sub-genre. This style usually incorporates the use of hard house percussion/drums, techno keyboards/samples and trance breakdowns. See such producers as Vinylgroover, The Red Hed, Anne Savage, Chad Hardcastle, and M Project.

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