Meet Mr. Victor Haskins | Multidisciplinary Artist, Composer, & Educator

We had the good fortune of connecting with Mr. Victor Haskins and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Mr. Victor, what is the most important factor behind your success?

The most important factor behind my success and the authenticity of my brand is my knowledge of self and my attentiveness to my imagination. An endlessly curious mind and an equally endless desire to seek answers, understanding, and still more questions.

Knowing oneself is of paramount importance if one is to grow and become the highest version of who they are meant to be. You cannot necessarily know who you are supposed to become in 10 years. However, you can deeply understand your essence; what makes you unique, what makes you come alive, what harms you, and makes you feel drained. Knowing these things about myself helps me stay aligned with the activities and daily mindset that keeps me winning.

This is another part of self-knowledge: how do you know if you are, in fact, winning? The sooner you define what you want (and what you don’t want) in life, the sooner you can start to play and master the game YOU were meant to play in life. Imagine judging a fish on its ability to climb trees. This would be nonsense, and it devalues the fish. Similarly, knowing what games I desire to play and what games that I am able to play in life help me to figure out which rules within the universe I must heed, and which rules and limitations do not apply to me. Part of the game is continuing to monitor and update one’s knowledge of self. And remember, everything is a game, somehow.

Sometimes, our growth allows us to supersede limitations that previously shaped what we could do. However, once those limitations no longer hinder us, we must reimagine what is possible. Much like a caterpillar emerging from a chrysalis, a butterfly has a whole new set of possibilities available to it than a caterpillar does. That butterfly needs to figure out who and what it is so it can effectively play the new game it finds in life (and subsequently follow the rules which govern that game).

Knowing the self + feeding the imagination = success. The more you feed your imagination new and stimulating experiences, the greater your capacity to imagine new things. This is part of the goal of the work that I do–I seek to expand the minds of those who come into contact with my art by creating powerful, story-based manifestations, mostly through sound. You never know what idea or experience or conversation will touch you in a way that changes your trajectory. For this reason, it is of paramount importance to remain open to new possibilities, as well as to actively seek new and uncomfortable situations. This can only stimulate more growth in your spirit.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?

My main projects are called ImproviStory™ and Victor Haskins & SKEIN.

ImproviStory is a one-man-band where multi-instrumentalist/sound artist Victor Haskins (that’s me!) creates improvised, story-like soundscapes. The soundscapes provide a cinematic soundtrack to our imaginations. Audience members are immersed in each ImproviStory and have their own personal, internal experience with what kind of story is suggested to them based on their perception. Imagine a live band crossed with a DJ crossed with sounds from a mystical realm…all generated and performed by one person in real time without any pre-recorded elements. This is a powerful, one-of-a-kind experience for the emotions.

Sometimes, other artistic mediums, such as film, theatre, or dance, are combined in collaboration with the soundscapes. The result is an even more impactful, transformational journey of the mind, senses, and heart. ImproviStory performances include a talkback element with the audience during the event to answer questions, discuss themes, and investigate artistic choices and processes.

Victor Haskins & SKEIN performs music that inspires the human spirit. As the ensemble’s name suggests, the members of Victor Haskins & SKEIN weave together improvisational threads of emotional melodies and infectious rhythms. The result: dynamic tapestries of uplifting spiritual stories rendered in sound, song, and groove. Scintillating, synthesized tones meld with rumbling drums and sizzling cymbals as dark, smoky cornet notes dance in the air atop a deep, lithe bass. Victor Haskins & SKEIN’s ethereal and electrifying performance of all-original music takes the audience to another dimension; the journey is as beautiful as the destination.

Most recently, Victor Haskins & SKEIN recorded my 3rd album of all-original Haskins compositions entitled Ikigai.  It features bassist Randall Pharr and drummer Tony Martucci. “Ikigai” is a Japanese concept which loosely translates to “reason for living” in English. The music on this album is directly inspired by the philosophies that guide my life and personal interactions. Some of the activities of Victor Haskins & SKEIN have been supported by grant funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Virginia Commission for the Arts, and Richmond CultureWorks.

Both of these projects are based on generating new, original work that is rooted in the power of story and deep interactivity. Spontaneous composition is an integral part of both projects, too.

My primary instrument has been the cornet for over 20 years. However, something I realized in 2014 about my artistic aesthetic is the importance of accessing a wider variety of sounds, colors, and functions in my creations. To this end, I taught myself how to play the Electronic Wind Instrument (EWI). An EWI is a synthesizer that uses wind input to control some of the parameters of sound creation. The most important thing about this instrument is that I can both design new sounds/instruments for it to play, AND it can be used to play samples of existing instruments (bass, percussion, etc.). This allows me to have access to an entire orchestra of sounds—literally.  This tool allows me to let my compositional imagination fly freely when I perform and create.

What has been both difficult and rewarding is that there is no manual for learning how to be myself. I have to figure out how I want to play my instruments to solve the problems and accomplish the goals I create in my compositions, or in the situations I render in real time. This takes time, risk, vision, and intellect to accomplish. Along the way, I realized different skills I need to teach myself in order to reach the next level of this unique existence I am so fortunate to author.  Some of these skills include learning how to play bass, understanding how to composite rhythms in an effective manner, how to be a professional recording engineer, how to fly an aerial drone (I am a licensed drone pilot), how to create new media and experimental video/visuals, how to design sounds for performance, how to stage performances that combine multiple artistic disciplines in a meaningful and novel manner, how to market my unique projects to the public, and the list goes on. Through all these challenges, I have become a better musician, a more complete artist, and a better leader and planner. It has also provided the kind of struggle that has led to me becoming a better person.  Becoming a better person is not an automatic result–it is an intentional practice alongside the skill-based work I do.

Despite all the skills and information I have learned and mastered, I continue to seek new avenues of expression and growth. I am writing new music for SKEIN as we tour our current album. For ImproviStory, I am learning how to design immersive, audio-reactive video elements which I will combine with my audio performance to create a reciprocally interactive, improvised, cinematic performance experience.

Both Victor Haskins & SKEIN and ImproviStory continue to push the boundaries of expression and connection with life, with the imagination, and with the human condition.

Besides these performance-based projects, I also teach at William & Mary, and apart from that I teach and create educational materials independently.  All of these things keep me plenty busy.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I would take them to a park in the morning–maybe Pocahontas State Park or Powhatan State Park–both have nice trails.. We’d hit the Moore Street Cafe for breakfast.
Go to Belle Isle to hang out near the river. Actually, if we planned ahead, we might even go kayaking on the river.
Eat birria tacos at TBT El Gallo.
Play some pickleball.
Sit next to the lake at Byrd Park.
Eat some Indian food at Tulsi.
Check out some improv comedy (or perhaps participate in an improv mixer, on the right night) at the Coalition Theater.
Then some salsa dancing.
Boom. That’s a solid day of eating, enjoying nature, and hanging.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?

I would like to give several shoutouts to some different musical entities throughout my life:

First, shout out to my mom and dad and brother for supporting (and continuing to support) what I do in music from the start.  They have listened to many, many, MANY hours of my loud practicing.

I have to shout out Tim Willson–my first band director in the 6th grade during my last year in India. He’s the one who got me started on the cornet. The cornet (similar to a trumpet) has been my primary instrument since that first day until the present day.

I want to shout out Doug Armstrong–he was my high school band director, and I learned so much about being an effective ensemble member and getting my ears to understand the concept of blend quite deeply. These ensemble skills have been so useful in many, many different situations.

I want to shout out Rex Richardson, who I met while in high school and he was one of my main teachers in college. The most important thing I got from Rex was having my eyes opened to the world of being a professional musician. As much as I loved playing the cornet and was dedicated to it, I didn’t really set it as a goal to play music as a career until I met Rex, who is the first musician who I met who was a professional player (and on a world-class level, to boot). This hearkens back to my answer to the earlier question–you have to feed your imagination so you can have an idea of what you might imagine next!

I want to shout out Sylvia Alimena–she runs a youth brass choir in which I participated called Brass of Peace. That group was a really positive musical influence because the ensemble is comprised of the best young brass players in Northern Virginia. (Important sidenote–Rex was also a part of this group when he was in high school under the baton of the original founder of the group, Gil Mitchell. Rex recommended I try out for the group to join). She is also the reason I got connected to the Kennedy Center’s National Symphony Orchestra Educational Department after I graduated from school and was looking to do more educational/outreach work. Through the NSO Education Department, I created and presented my Jazz In-School Ensemble program from 2014-2020 (ending with the pandemic). Administering presentations for so many different students in the DC-Metropolitan area over the course of 6 years led me to become quite adept at not only presenting, but presenting to young people in an effective and dynamic manner. That is a hugely valuable skill that doesn’t come about automatically and it definitely takes hands-on experience to develop. Every presentation was a chance to tweak how I did things to get the best results. Repeatedly being in a space where I could experiment while providing very necessary, powerful educational and performance experiences is a blessing.

Finally, I want to shout out Skip Gailes, John D’earth, and Doug Richards. Each of them were very important teachers of mine during my college years, and they were instrumental in guiding me in my journey to understand improvisation and composition more deeply during formative years where I was really trying to put my foundation together.

Website: https://www.victorhaskins.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/victorhaskins/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/victor-haskins

Twitter: https://www.threads.net/@victorhaskins

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/victorhaskinsmusic

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/victorhaskins

Other: Hear/Buy original Victor Haskins music: https://www.victorhaskins.com/music Links to all other things Victor Haskins: https://www.victorhaskins.com/links

Image Credits
Image credits: Jawfox Photography-photos 1 and 7; Keshia Eugene-photos 2, 3, and 4; Tania del Carmen Fernandez-photos 5 and 6