Re: professional loopers?

[Richard Zvonar <zvonar@zvonar.com>]

At 8:04 PM -0300 9/29/01, Matthias Grob wrote:

>Do you create music that could not be played (or presented at a 
>suficient low cost) without loop technology and make a considerable 
>part of the income out of it?
>Do you know such musicians that are not on the list?

Pamela Z comes to mind. Though I haven't heard her perform in some 
years now, in the early '90s she was doing remarkable things with two 
or three modest delays and voice. As her career has developed she's 
been able to expand her performance resources, both technologically 
and with increased human resources (such as her group The Qube Chix).

I've seen similar progressions in other composer/performers' 
development. Paul Dresher is a good example, particularly since I saw 
some of the early stages of his loopism. Like many of us in the 1970s 
he was using live tape delay systems. He had a couple of funky tape 
decks hooked up as a guitar system, and he started perfecting looping 
techniques using the multitrack machines in the studio at UCSD. Then 
in 1979 he and one of the Music Department techs, Paul Tydelski, 
built a 4-track looping system out of a modified TASCAM 40-4 and a 
VCA-based mixer controlled by 24 foot pedals.

Over the next few years Paul performed solo guitar gigs with this 
system, and he used it in an ensemble context with the George Coates 
Ensemble. After leaving that group he formed the Paul Dresher 
Ensemble with drummer Gene Refkin and actor/singer Rinde Eckert, 
eventually adding other performers as his financial resources and 
musical vision increased.

At some point the tape system was retired in favor of (I think) three 
Echoplexes, and in recent years I believe all the Ensemble music is 
through-composed and performed live by a much larger group (perhaps 
Kim can elucidate).

This is a good example of both economic and aesthetic evolution at 
work. In the early stages his musical language was much more in a 
"classic" minimalist mode and the more restrictive formal structure 
imposed by tape-based looping technology was in keeping with the 
style. After a few years the musical limits of both system and style 
had been explored to a great degree and there was both a need and the 
resources to expand into new stylistic areas.

P.S. While looking back to the '70s and '80s, I'll mention a couple 
of composers whose principal work was created and performed with 
loop-related technology: Ingram Marshall and Daniel Lentz.

Marshall's earlier works used a recycling delay system based on a 
pair of 4-track decks with the tape threaded between them, and most 
of his work of that period was preformed solo or with one or a small 
number of live performers. Like Paul, Ingram began to explore the 
implications of delay and repetition using expanded performance 
resources, both with and without live electronics.

Daniel Lentz based many of his works of the '70s and '80s on tape 
systems. He used a process of accumulation to build up musical and 
spoken phrases out of fragments, initially with analog tape and later 
with digital multitracks. I'm not sure of his specific technique 
during the analog period, but the digital versions  were performed by 
successive record/rewind/overdub. I haven't heard any recent work, 
but he also seems to have expanded his performing forces to be able 
to accomplish similar musical processes without the use of recording 
technology.
-- 

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Richard Zvonar, PhD
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