PATRICK  COWLEY

" THE  SAN  FRANCISCO  SOUND "
OFFICIAL  BIOGRAPHY: 1950-1982

by  Daniel Heinzmann

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"This site has been dedicated in memory of Patrick but also to Jo-Carol Block sadly passed away in the early 2003."

Patrick Cowley : The Magical Man who gave us amazing sound and beautiful music.

WELCOME  TO  THE  COWLEY  PAGE :
 All that I know about Patrick Cowley is expressed here, it is meant as my modest tribute to this real genius of synthesizers.

With great effort along a patient and very intense research, I have shaped this story for all of you:  Fans and Lovers of his musical production. 

But my intention was not only a  biographical page, because of the magnitude of  Patrick , so I do mention everytime those talented people surrounding his life and very close to Patrick's world :  Artists,  Friends and Fellows .
Also you will  see pictures, will read  details of his art and his work that we have  never known till today . 

I am plenty sure you will enjoy reading these pages, and of course the other sections of this website.

For many people, he was one of  Hi-NRG music's fathers, as well as  incredible producers like Bobby Orlando, Bill Motley, Ian Levine, John Hedges,  Ian Anthony Stephens, among others. Though he himself was not known  as an stage artist, his reputation as exceptional performer and musical producer had no border or nationality limits. His productions are still alive, and we consider them epic and magisterial; he is the major musical talent in Hi-NRG history.
And particularly for me he is inmortal. 

"Patrick Cowley forged an electronic sound so new and exciting that it shook the foundations of dance music for years and is still influencing current artists with its haunting simplicity and powerful, driving energy.               
                               While many of his contemporaries in the field of electronic music used the technology to create synthesized replications of already existing sounds and rhythms, Patrick Cowley brought the future to them and laid it at their feet." ( DAVID DIEBOLD )

"Patrick Cowley is inmortal because he lives now in each keyboard or computer and in every heart of the people  who love him and listen him actually." (FELIPE NIEVES CRUZ -fan and producer-México)

                      "Patrick Cowley is unique, incomparable, and, though years go by, his music always sounds fresh. Yet, up to now, there has been  nobody in the world who can be like him." (GUADALUPE HUITRON -fan-México)

PATRICK  COWLEY : THE  FAMILY

1974 : Patrick Cowley playing drums at Arthur Adcock's  house.(San Francisco ) 

PATRICK JOSEPH COWLEY , " Pat ", as he was named, was born on October 19, 1950, in Buffalo, under the sign of Libra. He grew up in the north of New York, with his brothers.
Patrick was the second of them. James was the oldest (born in 1948 ) , then Patrick, then Mariellen and lastly Madonna, the youngest (no relation with the siger ). 

His father, Kenneth Cowley, sadly passed on January 2005 at 85 and his mother Ellen died about 13 months after Patrick. Patrick's grandfather was Bernard Cowley.

The branch of his family tree comes from the Horseheads and Corning NY area. There he was a drummer in garage style bands. He could play guitar, and keyboard, but his keyboard playing was by ear, though limited, but it contributed to keep his songs simple yet strong. He studied English at Buffalo's university.

Patrick used to bring his nephews great gifts from wherever he had been on tour and bring them the tapes of his concerts that they would dance along to.
 Patrick had his drum in the basement and would drive everyone crazy with the loud music, as his sisters can remember today, but Patrick's parents were very supportive of his dreams of making music. 

BEGINNING : Arthur, Maurice and Pat

1976 : Maurice Tani and Patrick Cowley, cut out of a band publicity photo. 

In 1971, at the age of 21, he moved from Rochester to the San Francisco Bay Area  to begin his synthesizer studies at the City College of San Francisco. and later making his own recordings and productions.

In 1972 Jerry Mueller started the Electronic Music Lab at City College of San Francisco. There were three students in the class : Arthur Adcock, Jerry Judnick and Patrick Cowley. 
Six months later Maurice Tani joined the group. They used to meet for class in Mueller's basement until a room became available at the college.

                            " Patrick and I played in a couple of bands together, created radio jingles, songs, electronic pieces, costumes, back up singers....all kind of stuff. His disco music was really just the latest thing he has done. He was the student in charge in the Electronic Music Lab while other student used the school's equipment. 
                           Patrick, Arthur and I continued to do a lot of experimental music, blending various types of music and adapting them to the synth. Some avant-garde, artsy stuff.
                           After Patrick made some money with Megatron Man, he bought his own Electrocomp synthesizer and an Otari 1/2'' 8-track machine. " (MAURICE TANI )

At the time there were only three brands of synthesizers available : 'Moog', which was the name that most people associated with music synthesis and which was expensive, 'Buchla', also expensive, and 'Putney', made in England and relatively cheap.

So they bought a 'Putney'; It had a pin-matrix instead of patch cords, but it worked quite well. Later, they switched to an E-mu system (which Patrick used ) and finally to a 'Serge' synthesizer, which was ,and still is, excellent; It's the only analog piece of equipment left in the City College's digital studio nowadays.

"E-mu system" sinthesizer. In 1973, Patrick was a Master performing at the City College.

                             "Patrick was a master of the E-mu system, but he did it intuitively. 
                          Everyone else could talk the lingo: 'This oscillator is modulating the filter', but Patrick couldn't tell you how he got his sounds; he just did it." (JERRY MUELLER )

                      "One day,  I came into the studio and heard a tune called 'A White Shade Of Pale". I assumed Patrick was playing a tape, but it turned out he'd synthesized the whole thing ! Not an easy thing to do !
(JERRY MUELLER )

" Arthur Adcock had a little money from his family and bought his own Electrocomp system. He was very generous with his equipment and would let Patrick come over and use the gear a couple days a week. Patrick introduced me to Arthur and we all shared the gear for the next few years. 
                           Patrick, Arthur and I formed a production company called Short Circuit that produced musical segues, 'stingers', sound effects for radio stations, etc. " (MAURICE TANI )

His career as a songwriter began when Sylvester, another San Francisco based musician, asked him to join  his studio, after listening to what he was doing with synthesizers. He was amazed with Patrick's innovative technologies.
  Here is a review of the main dance music clubs that existed  in San Francisco at the end of the 70's and wherever "disco Music" was developing :

1976 : Patrick Cowley in a band playing at Embarcadero Center in downtown San Francisco. (below the white  arrow ). Sexy Candida Royale on the stage and Maurice Tani. (second guitarist).

Mind Shaft ( on Market Street) , I-Beam (on Height Street),  Dreamland ( on Harrison Street) ,  Disco International ( in Oakland) ,  Trocadero Transfer ( on Fourth Street),  Dance Your Ass Off ( in North Beach) and most famous of all  “The City” ( on Montgomery and  Broadway).

Patrick was employed as The City's light technician ,in North Beach,  in the basement showroom where Sylvester's band was making shows.  The City was the biggest and most important gay disco club in the Bay Area and Sylvester with his band played a demo ("You Make Me Feel") so  Patrick could make the modern arrangements.

The band had no idea at all that he was doing music, he kind of kept it under the hat for a long time. He let them hear some tapes he had recorded . He asked them if they would like to go down and do backups music on some songs he'd been working on.

1976 : Jorge Socarras (singer of Indoor Life) and Patrick Cowley, proposed record cover for the duo 'Catholic'. Artwork shot by Archie Connely, aka Archie Style.

Jorge Socarras & Patrick

                 " In the mid-late 70's, before I started 'Indoor Life' , Patrick and I were best friends for many years and  produced over an album's worth of very edgy new-wave material under two names: 1) Catholic 2) Lesser Man. 

                  We tried to get his label to release it, but it was way too out there for him. These songs, highly influenced by the likes of Eno, Devo, Nico, and other two-syllable names, feature him playing most synths parts, and my singing, with some guest spots by Sylvester's band. 

                 Patrick was surrounded himself with people from many styles of music: disco, rock, gospel, new wave, ... and I was the most new-wave. That was so amazing in Patrick."      ( JORGE SOCARRAS )

It was really quite astonishing for them to hear those powerful and innovative sounds. Patrick did "kickin' In" and "Love Me Hot" which have  never been released as well as  many others which surely  still remain in Megatone's vault  (today Unidisc) . It was just at that moment when Sylvester became very intent on somehow integrating that synthesized music into their basic R&B (Rhythm and Blues) sound of that time, hired Patrick who, since then (1978) would go with him on tour by Southamerica and Europe with his keyboards and synthesizers.     

1982 Left to right: Michael Finden, Frank Loverde, Linda Imperial, James Tip Wirrick and Patrick Cowley having a good time in San Francisco.

By then, Sylvester was working on his second album, with his guitar player and songwriter James 'Tip' Wirrick ,who  later became his producer. Patrick and Tip Wirrick were neighbour in San Francisco; they would  become very close friends. There was a little tension in the beggining between Patrick and the other band members. They didn't give him much credibility as a player at the time because his sound and techniques were quiet ahead of the times for 1978 .However things really started to change after a while and he eventually became a very respected and beloved member of that group. 

"Patrick Cowley came along and basically created a sound in music that became known around the world as a San Francisco identity sound. It was a druggy sound. It was an 'up' sound. Patrick created a synthesized sound that would enhance a drug induced high and the song which really launched that sound was 'Menergy'. " (CASEY JONES)

"Patrick has a lot of fun to work with. He'd say : 'Hey, let's have a joint and make some music', and that's just what we did. Of course that was before he ever started getting sick. We always had a good time." (LAUREN CARTER)

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