As an early member of Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze was an electronic music pioneer who pushed aside trends to explore what was in his heart. The Berlin School alumnus and Ash Ra Tempel founder’s experimental solo work has long been associated with epic soundtracks, his best known being Dune. His passion for Frank Herbert’s sci-fi novel was rekindled with Hans Zimmer on the recent award-winning remake, and on his latest album, Deus Arrakis, which is to be released on July 1, following his death in April at the age of 74.

Words: Jeremy Allen

Klaus Schulze, the wunderkind of the ‘Berlin School’ of electronic music, died on April 26, 2022, just three months shy of his 75th birthday. The German multi-instrumentalist was in the process of readying Deus Arrakis, the 47th album released under his own name. Although Schulze had been suffering with ill-health for some time, the suddenness of his passing still came as a surprise to those closest to him. He’s survived by his wife and two sons.

The flamboyant showman of the 1970s had become more private and reclusive in the 21st century, but Schulze was nevertheless open in interviews about the fact he had a regular dialysis regime that he had to contend with, stopping him from getting out and about, and he curtailed face-to-face interviews in favour of the internet. He communicated almost exclusively by email with journalists and collaborators, such were the day-to-day difficulties he faced.

Ever sanguine, being housebound wasn’t the disaster it might have been for some. Schulze embraced the technology that allowed him to easily share online files with other artists for his many collaborations, including an extensive series he recorded over a number of years with Pete Namlook and Bill Laswell – the marvellously monikered The Dark Side Of The Moog, which included another Pink Floyd-referencing movement entitled Obscured By Klaus. Moreover, he was clearly a doting family man, and he was instinctively a musical loner too.