A JOURNEY INTO SOUND: GILLES PETERSON

A pioneer of the Acid Jazz movement of the late 1980s and early ‘90s, Gilles Peterson is a renowned FrenchBritish DJ, broadcaster and record label impresario, known for his wide-ranging (and always on-point) tastes in jazz-inflected sounds.

- CHRISTIAN BARKER

Co-founder of the influential record labels Acid Jazz and Talkin’ Loud back in the day, Peterson now busies himself broadcasting eclectic beats on BBC Radio 6 and his online radio station, Worldwide FM, staging the annual Worldwide Festival each July in the south of France, and DJing at events internationally.

Signature caught up with him at one such gig, the rebrand party for Singapore's Marina Bay Sands hotel, where Peterson imparted wisdom gleaned during a lifetime of journeys... into sound.

The dude

In 1992, I was curating a night at the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland. Quincy Jones was curating the main festival; I was invited separately to do a night in a smaller room for about 300 people. I brought over Omar, Galliano, Incognito. My label, Talkin’ Loud, was pretty hot at the time, and the room was packed. Meanwhile, Quincy’s main room was half empty.