“I started going raving before I was 18, and I fell in love with electronic music and the whole clubbing scene. That inspired me to try and learn how to DJ by myself in my parent´s storage room, which became my first DJ Studio”.
DJ and producer, Daniel Orpi fell into the world of music properly while studying Advertising & PR at college. Despite always loving the hip-hop movement, as well as being a graffiti artist who would listen to old school rap & hip-hop which soon became a big influence on his music production, DJing soon came to the forefront of his career.
“When I finished my degree, I started to work as a creative designer, but I wasn’t feeling fulfilled or enjoying the work I was doing. Aside from my job I started a DJ course at an academy in Barcelona to learn some technical stuff I missed from being self-taught. It didn’t take me that long until I realised that’s what I wanted to do with my life”.
Image sourced from MITAMagazine.com
When Orpi started to learn, he used samples and experimented by mixing them together to create a coherent track. Nowadays he tries to do something new through sound design, combining sampling sounds and processing them to make it sound unique to him as an artist. This led to his release of ‘Perceptions’.
“It all started with an edit I made from the original song ‘Giving you the best’ from Anita Baker. After watching the documentary from my childhood idol Michael Jordan, I found out that was the track he would listen to before every match, so apart from loving the track it felt really special to put my own touch on to that song”.
“Another song from the album is ‘Grown & Sexy’, the original is made by LiTek, after listening to the original I was inspired to do something with it. The rest of the tracks are edits of songs that I used to listen to when I was younger and wanted to transmit that hip-hop influence through other genres that aren’t club tracks. My main goal is to make the people feel good and give them hope in these weird times, which has been challenging for us all”.
As well as blessing the people with tracks such as ‘Lusty’ (2020), ‘The One’ (2020) and his 2018 EP ‘Burning Man’, Daniel also collects money from Bandcamp, raising as much as possible to donate for the cause against racism. He tells MITA that 100% of the benefits go to BlackMindsMatter UK, an organisation that helps black people with mental illness.
Image sourced from MITAMagazine.com
Orpi is currently working on his own label brand, producing music for other labels, and planning the strategy for his next release in collaboration with the likes of Rawthentic, Percomaniacs and La Pera Records. While doing so, popular DJs such as Eli Brown, Solardo, and Chris Lake are playing his tracks in their sets, as well as Daniel performing shared line-ups with the likes of Darius Syrossian, Steve Lawler and Richy Ahmed, which he tells us was one of his favourite sets to date.
In the future, Orpi believes he will be touring the world playing his own shows, running his own label and own clothing brand, releasing music, and living lavishly in a house in Ibiza in front of Es Vedra.
You can find more about Daniel Orpi and his work here.
This article can also be found on the MITA Magazine website via this link.