He is the chameleon musician of Huddersfield acoustic nights.
Few musical genres remain untouched by Aescer, who has been inciting memorable collaborations at Bar 1:22 for the last couple of years.
A 26-year-old multi-instrumentalist and composer, he is on a mission to challenge musical boundaries and encourage those with musical talent to realise their own skills.
Born into a family of professional classical musicians, a love of the form and a desire to explore its possibilities is in the lifeblood of Aescer, who’s real name is Michael Ford.
He said: “My dad is a travelling flutist and my mum is an accompanying pianist, so I pretty much crawled around orchestras when I was young.
“I grew up in a strictly classical environment, which is where my interest in composition began, but I rebelled a bit and studied music technology to break away from that strong classical streak.
“Through that I became obsessed with producing and writing music and it’s stuck with me ever since.
“I love performing at the acoustic club because it allows me to try out my experiments of sounds that don’t easily fit into any one genre and gives me the chance to collaborate with lots of different people who come to the night with different styles.”
Among the instruments he incorporates into his music, which he also records at home, are piano, guitar and percussion.
“I’ve got so many influences I just thought that I’d put them all together to see what sounds I could create.
“Tori Amos is a big influence, as are many electronic and acoustic musicians, 19th century composers and bands such as Nine Inch Nails and the Tea Party.
“I like to embrace everything because I want to make my music as diverse as I can.”
Rather than a cacophony of sounds, the results are impressive.
To date Aescer has created two albums and two EPs, all of which contain songs markedly different to the one before it.
One such example is his latest album, Nature Vs Nurture, where tracks happily bounce from electronica infused classical piano tracks with ethereal harmonies to folk, dark ambient and much more, creating sounds which cannot be easily categorised.
Aescer is now busying himself with composing a new EP, which he is writing with other musicians in mind.
“I’m trying to create songs that I think would suit some of the musicians and singers I have collaborated with.
“I hope it will showcase what they can do with their own instruments and hopefully it will come out at some point in the summer.”
But for Aescer, he does not want the realise of his own material on its own to become the basis of his professional career.
“I don’t want to put out these types of releases to make some money because I don’t want it to have an impact on what I produce.
“I see it as a great personal interest that I hope will run alongside what I am interested in doing professionally, which is working with music for films and games.”
