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Robert Miles and Trilok Gurtu
Biography
Italian dream-house DJ Robert Miles rose from relative obscurity to score one of the biggest and most unlikely hits of 1996 with his monster single "Children." Born Roberto Concina in 1969 to a military family stationed in Switzerland, he did not return to Italian soil until the age of ten, settling in the town of Fagagna. Raised primarily on the classic American soul sound of the 1970s, Miles began studying piano as a teen, and at 13 began DJing local house parties. By the late '80s he was regularly spinning hardcore trance sets at Venice area clubs under the name Robert Milani, eventually adopting the name Miles as symbolic of the musical journey awaiting him. In time, he assembled a basic studio system comprising a sampler, mixer, keyboard, and 32-track digital board, accepting production work with the Italian label Metromaxx.

"Children" was inspired by a collection of photos taken by Miles' father while stationed in war-torn Yugoslavia; the DJ was equally disturbed by the growing number of deaths plaguing the Italian rave community, and he soon began work on "Children," a simple, piano-driven instrumental anthem produced at a cost of only £150. Originally issued in 1994, the single slowly emerged as an international blockbuster, topping charts in Germany, France, Holland, and Belgium on its way to becoming the biggest European single of 1996; it also fell just shy of reaching the Top 20 on the American pop charts.
Selected Discography