Soulspeak With Dani Valdés a.k.a. "El DJ Del Silencio" (In English)

 

BARCELONA, SPAIN

Today is another memorable day for me, this is my very first interview translated in Spanish. Thanks to my dear friend traveler and translator Alice Suzana Iftimie I am able to present this interview in English. 

Today’s guest , Dani Valdés is also known as “El Disc Jockey Del Silencio” (The Disc Jockey of Silence). Since his early teens he already showed a special interest in music. At 13 he got a mixer, two turntables and started to create music and for 15 years tirelessly managed to improve their technique in all facets that every good Disc Jockey should cover. He played in leading dance music radio shows of the moment on the national scene.  From there he began his career as a DJ  and for the last 15 years have been constantly working to master his craft until today, his career has been on constant rise which clicked on some of the most prominent theaters in Barcelona. With a strong reverence for Zen tradition , in his most his current platform, his musical maturity has helped him to compose and produce projects that other formations have been asking a result of the fruits harvested, experimenting with new genres like Chill Out, Electro-Pop or Electro-House; period has combined working in partnership with Sutil Records, serving as assistant A & R and administering SutilcoffeeShop on Line store. 

I am blessed to have Dani today on Soulspeak and I am happy he breaks a bit of his silence to speak to all our hearts.

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Who is Dani Valdés?

That`s a good question! I promise to let you know as soon as I discover it myself! But I’m going to try to specify a few things: Dani Valdés is a human being born on September 27, 1974. My mother worked as a teacher (mostly with children about 10 years old), my father was an appliances technician, repairing industrial washing machines and stuff like that.

I used to be (and still am) a very stubborn child, I would set my mind to do something and would not stop until I managed to achieve it, my parents considered it a lost cause so knowing this, I learned to make the effort and only be stubborn with things that are really worth it.

Ever since my teenage years I felt a special attraction towards creativity, especially in two aspects: playing music and playing with words.Interestingly enough, when I got older, I ended up being a DJ and a writer. It is a peculiar combination, I guess I have integrated the two fields with Zen, which has been the cornerstone for my spiritual practice.

Tell me about the birth of your music and your work as a DJ. 

As a child I loved music. I used to enjoy the songs that my dad listened to at home, that was one of the perks, and then my brother,  who was two years older than me became a teenager and started listening to  dance  music.I became totally fascinated with the melody and the effects. Back then, the so called ‘mega-mixes’ were very trendy; they were actually nothing else but different songs mixed, cut and put together with lots of sound effects, and this became my passion. 

With a little help from my parents, I managed to buy all the necessary equipment (second hand)  to be able to put together my own mega-mixes at home. I seemed to be pretty good at joining music together and by the age of fifteen I had already made a popular name for myself in the music industry of the small town I was living in. 

One day, while at a music store, the DJ of a famous club in town came in and the store owner introduced us. It turned out that the DJ was going to fulfill his military service and was in need of someone to replace his ‘work’ at the club while being away. My face lit up and I had a bright smile, two meters wide and one meter deep…  Two weeks later I started working in that club and that DJ is still one of my best friends to this day.

I don’t think I actually chose to be a DJ, it was simply the thing I had always found to be most exciting for me.

What are your other passions?

Oh, many! It seems that anything I find attractive ends up turning into passion. But to be specific  I’ve always  been passionate about martial arts,  specifically Karate.

What do like most about your job?

As a DJ, I mostly enjoy sensing that  synchronicity between the people who are dancing and me. It’s not always the case, but there are sessions that create a harmonious circle that is never-ending: I feel the vibe seeing how the public enjoys the music that I play, and they vibrate… enjoying the music while feeling my vibe. It’s an amazing feeling!

As a writer, I find it fun to try and make use of my words to make people feel at a deeper level rather than  how our own rational mind would normally allow us to feel. I guess you could say that I use words to attempt and create an open balcony with views from the heart and the mind of people.

Are you in a relationship?  If so, how does your work as a DJ affect it? 

I`m not married and for the time being I`m also not in a relationship. Working as a DJ has only affected them as far as schedules are concerned, it’s not easy living with someone who has more daytime habits than me, but if there’s love and good will, everything is possible. It’s actually me who’s more difficult when it comes to relationships than the actual schedule itself. I tend to shy away from any situation that restrains me from feeling as free as I need to feel, which means that it’s not easy finding a person to share my concept of relationships — this instead of taking it to a place where ‘anything goes’.

Where would you be if you could be anywhere in the world at this very moment?

I try to cultivate a lot of quality moments so that when asked a question of this sort I can state: ‘I would be in this same place that I am at, doing what I am doing.’ Nonetheless, there are plenty of places on this planet I have yet to see that I`d love to visit: Japan, Tibet, Canada, Iceland, the list is endless!!

Any other dream you’d like to pursue? What is keeping you from achieving it?

Yes, certainly… My biggest dream is to contribute, as much as I can, to making the world a happier place. It is a dream that I try to live every day, it is not something unattainable but a rather inexhaustible dream.

Do you believe in destiny?

I am of the idea that looking at fate as this irreversible chain of events preset even before we are born is a trick of the mind. Our destiny is happening now and it is in constant movement, our rational mind is the one trying to break it down and categorize it into past or future. Best thing anyone who wants to get acquainted with their destiny could do is to center themselves with full attention in their life, in the now, without taking anything else into consideration. That would be the moment when they can be one with their destiny.

How do you connect to your audience?

I am not sure I can give you a logical answer because what moves me as a DJ has nothing to do with logic. When someone has been doing this job for so long, there’s no need to think about what to play, they just know. There is a perception of a certain ‘something, (we could call it energy) that’s becoming your guide towards what type of sensation you want to create for your public. Let’s just say I don’t think about songs but about sensations (even though I know sensation does not have much to do with thought, it’s a figure of speech). I have simply gained experience in knowing what vibe to transmit to keep people in order to keep them feeling alive; once that’s done it’s only a matter of choosing the right song. 

What have you learned from yourself from this experience?

I have learned that one should never forget about themselves. If you know yourself, you have it all; if you are not in touch with yourself, you have nothing.

If you could be a song, which one would you be?

If I were a song, I’d like to be: ’5ème Soleil’ by Keny Arkana.

What is LOVE?

Ok, next question…

But seriously now…Trying to describe love is literally impossible simply because just trying to label it with words already means we’re limiting it. 

The only words that limit it less which occur to me right now are: Love is the most intimate and infinite essence of each and every one of us. Nonetheless, I would recommend anyone reading this interview to forget the silly description of love I just came up with and focus on simply feeling it instead. 

In relation to this I recall that while being in the presence of a great Tibetan master a girl asked him whether it is preferable to love yourself in order to be able to love others or if we should focus only on giving love to others, as the ‘general spiritual literature’ describes both ways. The words of Tulku Lama still resonate in my memory: “To Love oneself is the goal, while Loving others is the method.”

What motivates you?

Hope motivates me; I am very childish and uncomplicated about this… I find what motivates me are the things that are very appealing and whatever doesn’t move me does not seem to catch much of my attention.

What gets me excited these days is the idea that we, as human beings, should try to go beyond our crazy mental hum/our regular thinking pattern and break the barrier of what  is our comfort zone in that respect in order to feel the very essence of what and who we really are. 

The book I wrote, entitled “The DJ of Silence” (in reference to the silence of our minds), and everything else that I do nowadays as a writer, spreading ideas, going to promote the fact that people should be able to perceive themselves in their full potential in a practical, simple manner. That`s one of the things that make me really happy, after all, Hope is one if the vehicles that Love travels in. 

What are some of the ideas that you left behind?

There`s many but I think that one of the most important ideas that I have given up is that I am this little being with a pre-determined personality that is here to survive whichever way possible. Everywhere we turn it is implanted in our heads that we are these insignificant creatures surrounded by monsters (as in other people) that we have to compete against. We`re being told that life is a tremendous struggle and we hear it so many times until we start believing it, which leads to achieving it; even more so, we surround ourselves with people that believe and, by that, create the same reality and this way we start going down a disgusting spiral that we end up accepting as normal. But that`s all a bunch of rubbish, it`s a shitty idea (excuse my saying so), a putrefactive, contaminant piece of trash with a disgusting smell and a heavy weight… The best thing to do is to get rid of it as soon as possible and enjoy the lightness that life has to offer when we treat it as if it were our best friend, and in reality it is so…

I`d tell them that most people, especially adults, have forgotten who they are; they cannot seem to remember that they are awesome and fun beings that came onto this world to play. The trick to avoid getting there is very simple: we got to live life having happiness as our guide, and respect everyone else while doing so.

What makes you smile?

It`s impossible to say that only one, two, three or five hundred things make me smile because I spend a large part of the day smiling!

Joy, Love and Peace are the three ingredients of our Original Nature, whenever we do not find ourselves in one of these states, it is because we are thinking too much, and the distance between us and our own Happiness is measured in thoughts; I for one try to think as little as possible!

Your ONE MESSAGE to the world. 

Let us not pay attention to the negativity that is constantly transmitted to us through the media. Evil is so ephemeral that it needs to be scandalous and publicized periodically. Love, on the other hand, is stealthy..it secretly moves and does not need a publisher , it`s the central pillar of existence and it is everywhere at all times. Let’s center our attention on Love and fully trust life, after all, it does not make mistakes… There are no seals in the Sahara. 

Click HERE to access Soulspeak With 

Dani Valdés (In Spanish/ En Español)

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For more on Dani visit 

www.danivaldes.com

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