Re: Okay, let's get philosophical: Performance Theory time

["Louis Collier Hyams" <hyamsl@rpi.edu>]

performance! ahhhh...

one thing I've started doing is to utilize computers/interface/whatever to
created visualizations of note data or performance data.
there are ways to do this with various software. my work is on an improv
basis... or as in jazz and live dubstyle reggae (my versions of course)
loosely based on a them - completely dictated by mood/feeling.

a piece I'm about to take on tour(iEAR MFA show) consists of an indian
classical dancer wearing white with the position of being a living dancing
screen, a looping trigger percussionist, and 
guitar/looping/synthing/dancing.

so, alot of what goes on from the midi outputs of the last two performers 
is
converted into pitch/hue and velocity/saturation. we communicate by sound 
and
visuals. i hope that this allows the audience to differentiate(along with 
the
dance/act). the two midi visual signals are then combined in a video 
switcher
with some added video footage and projected back onto us...

this piece is loosely based on hanuman.. and bits of the ramakien(kings 
story
in thai)

this all came about from gigging with a three piece worldbeat group ....
seems often times other musicians and audience members would ask if we were
sequencing. yeah, this hurt my feelings.

there seems to be a very fine line in performance with what is live... what
is triggered, what is sampled, what is sequenced. sometimes I'd like to 
tell
certain solo performers that they shoulda just used a portadat - over all 
the
mac gear/midi gear/digi audio gear/ and max programming and lickmachine
programming and all the junque and time that is spent and goes wrong in 
such
a performance.
background of this is a show I just teched/videoed... the performer read 
from
a score that had footswitch points along with music notation. as he played
flute he would trigger sequences, samples, effects patches and etc. yeah, 
it
sounded great, and it was cool.... but! I spent five hours with him fixing
his gear/soldering/testing/resoldering/reprogramming/resoundchecking....
and when it came down to the performance, would it have made any difference
to the audience?

I respect the pursuit and innovations involved. as a matter of fact I'm
studying the very topics and techniques... but jeez

collier