Chilly Gonzales

Jason Charles Beck (born 20 March 1972), professionally known as Chilly Gonzales or just Gonzales, is a Canadian musician, songwriter, and producer.

Currently based in Paris, France, he previously lived for several years in Cologne and Berlin.

Gonzales’ career spans numerous genres.

He is known for his rap albums, his collaborations with pop musician Feist and rapper Drake, his albums of classical piano compositions (including the Solo Piano trilogy), and for his collaborations with electronic musicians Daft Punk and Boys Noize, the latter of whom he also produces under the moniker Octave Minds.

In 2022, he and Plastikman released a piano rework of the latter's 1998 minimal techno classic album Consumed in collaboration with Canadian musician Tiga, titled "Consumed in Key".

Gonzales broadcasts a web series Pop Music Masterclass on WDR, the documentary Classical Connections on BBC Radio 1, The History of Music on Arte, and Music's Cool with Chilly Gonzales on Apple Music's Beats1 radio show.

He has written several newspaper and magazine opinion pieces in The Guardian, Vice, Billboard, and others.

He is the younger brother of film composer Christophe Beck.

In the 1990s, he began a pop career as the leader of the alternative rock band Son, with Dominic Salole and Dave Szigeti.

Son was signed to a three-album deal with Warner Music Canada in 1995, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Records.

Their first release, the Prince/Elvis Costello-flavored LP Thriller, was moderately successful, spawning one single that received heavy radio airplay ("Pick up the Phone") and leading to several opening gigs for the Barenaked Ladies.

The album's production values were limited; Warner Bros. simply released the band's hastily recorded demo as a record.

Son's second release, Wolfstein, was recorded at a fully equipped studio in LA with the assistance of his brother Christophe.

Nominally a concept album about a man who starts turning into a wolf after hitting one with his car, it features a darker, more complex sensibility than its predecessor.

To Warner Music, the album represented too radical a change in direction, and it lacked any singles deemed acceptable for Canadian radio; the most upbeat tune on the album had the radio-unfriendly title, "Making a Jew Cry".

The label gave little promotional support to the release, and dropped the band soon after.

Finding dealing with the expectations of the Canadian music industry difficult, Gonzales moved to Berlin in 1999, despite speaking no German.

He declared himself "The President of the Berlin Underground" and adopted the stage name Chilly Gonzales in 1999.

With this change in image came another major change in Gonzales's musical style.

His four albums on the German label Kitty-yo (Gonzales Über Alles (1999), The Entertainist (2000), Presidential Suite (2002), and Z (2003)) were recorded as rap records, though his skills as a keyboardist were demonstrated on a series of interspersed instrumental tracks.

European critics and audiences were more receptive to the eclectic and experimental nature of Gonzales's output.

His first Kitty-yo single, "Let's Groove Again", became a dance floor hit upon its 1999 release.

The output of the latter collaboration – Feist's 2003 album, Let It Die, became a bestseller, won critical acclaim and industry awards.

In 2004, Gonzales released an album of instrumental material, Solo Piano.

Praised by public and critics, it drew comparisons to the work of Erik Satie and so attracted a new global audience to his work.

Solo Piano remains Gonzales's best-selling album to date.

It was used in a 2007 BBC promotional trailer for their new TV programme The Restaurant.

Gonzales performed regularly at nightclubs and on the summer pop festival circuit.

Gonzales returned as a contributor on Feist's 2007 album, The Reminder, which was nominated for four Grammy Awards and won five Juno Awards.

Apart from his solo career, Gonzales is also a member of the Berlin-based hip-hop band Puppetmastaz.

Gonzales played keyboards in the song "Give Life Back to Music" and piano on "Within" from Daft Punk's fourth studio album, Random Access Memories, which won a Grammy Award for Album of the Year.

Gonzales won a Grammy award for his work on Daft Punk's 2013 studio album Random Access Memories.

Jason Charles Beck is the son of Ashkenazi Jews who were forced to flee from Hungary during World War II.

He began teaching himself piano at age three, when his older brother Christophe began taking lessons.

Beck graduated from Crescent School in Toronto, Canada.

He was classically trained as a pianist at McGill University, where he began both his composing career, co-authoring several musicals with his brother, and his performing career, as a jazz pianist.

He followed it up nine years later with Solo Piano II, long-listed for the 2013 Polaris Music Prize.

In 2015, he released Chambers, a piano and chamber piece recorded with Hamburg's Kaiser Quartett, to generally positive reviews.

The trio of Solo Piano albums was completed with the release of Solo Piano III, on 7 September 2018.

In the meantime, Gonzales continued to develop as a producer and songwriter for other artists, collaborating on singles and albums with Peaches, singer Jane Birkin and indie rocker Leslie Feist.