Re: backing solo performances

["Christopher White" <magicicada@mindspring.com>]

hmm..it is different for all of us david..it is possible to use these
prerecorded sounds in such a way as to manipulate and capture and destroy
them to quite an effective and off the cuff end...in a keyboard you are
using a preset sine wave that is mallable and changeable by you the player.
The same thing applies to pre-recorded tape you can gab that sound source
and loop it, change... annihilate till your heart is content and that is
improv. I find if i want to bring sounds of the outside world to a live gig
it is nice to have minidisk or a sampler to present them. I cannot make the
sound of a mike in a 30 foot hole in a live space unless i happen to be
playing in that hole. the sound of crowds and tanks being rubbed in an
outside enviroment with all the ambience is not possible to recreate on a
live stage without the use of field recordings.it may be different for me 
as
all i do is concentrate on making and manipulating recordings from the
field.In the end it does not matter it is all an ends to a means and if 
your
audience enjoyed and most of all you enjoyed it than it does not matter. 


backing tapes can be the sine waves in your keyboard grab the knobs patch
the holes and twist.





----------
>From: David Myers <dmgraph@pulsewidth.com>
>To: Loopers-Delight@annihilist.com
>Subject: Re: backing solo performances
>Date: Sat, Jul 3, 1999, 1:48 PM
>

>Once I used a small looping/soundmaking device I called "the shoebox" due
>to its size and shape.  I was accustomed to working with my more eleborate
>machines and maybe was nervous that what was a pretty big gig for me (the
>Kitchen here in NYC) might come off as too sonically limited, so I fed a
>tape of prepared sounds into the box for "transformations" along with the
>realtime stuff.  Now this was very experimental/noise/soundscape
>material--not the obvious instrumentalist with invisible band thing--and
>the audience didn't really have a clue.  People raved about the
>performance, and I even got asked for my autograph (unheard of in this 
>sort
>of music!), but I felt crummy about it.  I did this twice but would not do
>it again.
>
>I think that in purely electronic music, it is enough to ask that an
>audience find enjoyment in watching someone produce sounds largely
>disconnected from physical gestures; for pre-existing sounds to play a
>large part in the performance seems like cheating.  Oddly perhaps, my
>audience did not feel that way--but I did feel as though I cheated;
>something was spoiled for me.  In this situation, the audience should get
>something special; I feel I should be able to say "no one will hear these
>sounds in this shape ever again".  But I suppose that applies only to my
>sort of "abstract electronics"?
>
>David Myers
>
>