Beardyman
Darren Alexander Foreman (born 14 May 1982), better known as Beardyman, is a British multivocalist, musician and comedian from London known for his beatboxing skills and use of live looping. Early life After studying at Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School for Boys, Barnet, Foreman moved to Brighton in 2001 to study at the University of Sussex. Although he started making noises at the age of three by imitating Michael Winslow from the Police Academy movie series, it was seeing Rahzel perform live that convinced Foreman that beatboxing could sustain a whole show rather than simply provide interludes within the context of a broader presentation. Beardyman's first musical venture was composing a symphony for his school orchestra at the age of ten. At fifteen, an introduction to drum and bass led to his long-standing obsession with music technology. Darren was given the nickname "Beardyman" because a name was quickly needed for a flyer for an early show, and he had a beard at the time. He is the brother of comedian and YouTuber Jay Foreman, with whom he sometimes collaborates onstage. Career Musical style In 2006 Beardyman battled to become UK Beatbox Champion and retained his title in 2007 making him the first beatboxer in UK history to win two championships in a row. He was on the 2008 judging panel. Already an accomplished solo beatboxer in the modern tradition, Beardyman was further inspired by MC Xander to use music technology such as the Korg Kaoss Pad 3 to loop and sample his vocals. Through his use of loop pedals and effects tools, he effectively produces whole DJ sets via live production—entire sets where the songs (both covers of well-known hits and his own original material) are constructed, live, from his vocalizations. His music frequently contains elements of drum and bass, dubstep, breakbeat, trance, techno and other associated forms of electronic dance music. He also incorporates other forms of music into his live sets, including but not limited to reggae and country music, often purely for the purpose of providing a comedic counterpoint to his beatboxing. Virtually all of his music is created using only his mouth and vocal cords to produce sounds, and incorporating music technology such as vocoders and software synthesis to alter the pitch of his voice, or to add various kinds of audio effects such as delays, reverbs or modulation effects. In various YouTube videos various pieces of electronic equipment can be spotted, notably the Korg Kaossilator Pro, the Kaoss Pad 3 (also known as the KP3), a Korg Wavedrum, a microKORG, a Boss GT-8 and a Boss RC-50. In a departure from his prior live work, Beardyman released his debut album I Done a Album on 21 March 2011. As of 2012 he has foregone the usage of Kaoss Pads in favour of proprietary software he has been developing, currently known as the Beardytron 5000 MkII. "Over the past 3 years I have worked tirelessly on the system, overseeing its development and testing, improving and configuring it.