Santè: "I want soul, vocals, swing and something people can actually remember afterwards"
Santé has built a career spanning music production, DJing and label curation. His roots in Berlin’s electronic music scene have taken him to clubs and festivals around the world, while his sound continues to move across different shades of house and techno.
In 2012, he founded Avotre, a label that has become an important platform for artists across the electronic music scene. Alongside his own releases and performances, curating the label and its events has remained a central part of his work.
His interest in sound also extends beyond the dancefloor to original music for film and advertising. These experiences inform an approach shaped by attention to detail, a willingness to evolve and an enduring connection to club culture.
"Superman" sees you teaming up with Ronnie Spiteri. How did the collaboration come together, and what did each of you bring to the track creatively?
Ronnie and I have known each other and each other’s music for a while, so the collaboration felt very natural. We both come from a club-focused background, but we have slightly different ways of approaching a record. Ronnie brought that direct, driving energy and a really strong instinct for what works on a dancefloor. I’m always looking for the the musical element that gives a record some personality beyond being just a tool. With “Superman” those two sides came together quite easily. We wanted to make something uncomplicated in the best sense something with energy, character and a hook that stays with you, but that still feels credible in a proper club.
Your music has always balanced underground club energy with a warmer, more uplifting side. How does "Superman" reflect where your sound is heading right now?
That balance is probably becoming even more important to me. I still need a record to work in a serious club and have enough weight and groove to carry a room, but I’m less interested in making tracks that are only functional. I want soul, vocals, swing and something people can actually remember afterwards. “Superman” has that club foundation, but there is also a warmth and an openness to it. That is very much where my sound is going now: contemporary house music, but with the musicality and personality that made me fall in love with house in the first place.
You’ve been based in Portugal since 2018 after growing up in Berlin. How has that change of environment influenced the way you approach house music, both in the studio and as a DJ?
Spend hours in a club, hear DJs really tell a story and learn that the groove and the selection matter more than the obvious moment. I still carry that with me everywhere.
Portugal gave me something different. There is more space, more light and a different rhythm to everyday life. I think that changed the way I listen and also the way I produce. I don’t feel the need for everything to be dark or aggressive to have credibility. There can be warmth, soul and positive energy and it can still be underground music. As a DJ I probably think more in contrast to tension and release, deeper records next to something uplifting, old records next to completely new music. Berlin gave me the foundation; Portugal gave me another perspective on it.
Through AVOTRE, you’ve consistently supported forward-thinking house music and emerging artists. What qualities make a track or producer stand out to you today?
Personality. There is so much technically good music now that production quality alone is not enough. I want to hear something and have the feeling that there is a person behind it with their own taste.
With a track, the first thing is always: does it move me and can I imagine playing it in a room? Then I listen for groove, tension, sound choice and whether there is one element that makes it unmistakable. It doesn’t need twenty ideas. Sometimes one amazing bassline, vocal or drum groove is enough if it has identity.
With younger producers especially, I’m much more interested in somebody developing their own language than somebody perfectly reproducing whatever is currently working in the charts. Trends move incredibly quickly. Taste and identity last much longer.
You’ve collaborated with artists from different generations, from Marshall Jefferson and Ann Saunderson to newer names on the scene. How important is that dialogue between house music’s history and its future in your own work?
It’s fundamental to how I understand house music. House has always been a conversation between generations. You can make something completely current and still hear Chicago, Detroit, New York, UK garage or the records we were playing twenty years ago somewhere inside the DNA.
Working with people who were there at important moments in the history of the music gives you a different perspective because they understand where certain sounds and ideas actually came from. At the same time, younger artists bring a completely different energy, technology and way of hearing club music.
I’m interested in the point where those things meet. I don’t want to recreate an old sound and I’m not interested in nostalgia for its own sake. The exciting thing is taking everything you have learned from the history of house and using it to make something that belongs in a club now. For me, that connection between history and the present is one of the things that keeps house music alive.
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