Performance

Monthly Listeners

Current

Followers

Current

Streams

Current

Tracks

Current

Popularity

Current

Top Releases

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Photay

21M streams

21,016,209

Onism

14.5M streams

14,452,995

Waking Hours

3.4M streams

3,436,558

Sadie

2.7M streams

2,710,582

The People (Ensemble Entendu Remix)

2.3M streams

2,266,102

On Hold

1.2M streams

1,178,173

Dream

911.9K streams

911,907

All That I Need (Photay Remix)

818.2K streams

818,152

The People

504.1K streams

504,136

Roaming

423.2K streams

423,167

Biography

From the perspective of people who categorize music by genres and types, Evan Shornstein, better-known under his production moniker Photay, has created lots of different kinds of sounds over the past decade. There’s the Hudson Valley-raised, Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist composer’s quasi-IDM and electronic almost-pop tracks with the occasional vocal; the improvised organic and and experimental music sessions he participates in alongside new age giants, Laraaji and Carlos Niño; the diaspora electronic folk-jazz he makes with veteran musicians from all over the globe; and the disco and house adjacent records he tag-team DJs with Brooklyn producer Cesar Toribio and engineer Phil Moffa (who also masters all of Photay’s records — and those of dance-music dons around the world). But if you’ve listened closely to Shornstein’s prodigious output, you know that separating and classifying the work is actually contrary to the energy of Photay music. That what on-the-surface may lazily appear as differences, is actually brought together by a shared sonic warmth, a hardware pastoralism at play. Whatever category he engages, Photay makes outdoor music under the spell of the elements, for the purpose of different human movements — some physical, some spiritual, some emotional, some philosophical.