Re: review of Looping Festival / much looping comment

["Doc Holiday" <docholiday@ij.net>]

Hey Daryl,

I am new to this whole looping art form... so bear with me, here. I like
your comments about your experience at the Looping Fest... I am a sitarist
of about 24 years and want to take that and my percussion to the next 
level.
I like live, but I want to do more. I have been in a tradition of Indian
music-- studying and learning from my own teacher Roop Verma, a student of
Ravi Shankar and himself a great performer. I have been out playing
percussion with a latin band for a long time, but also play sitar in a
different setting and accompanied by a wonderful didgeridoo player plus 
lots
of hand percussion! So here we go... I discovered Boss's loop station and a
digiverb. So these are my first tools of the trade. Any help along the way
would be appreciated. I think I like this whole loop-age.
Best,

Dr. Bhangra Das

----- Original Message -----
From: "Daryl" <highhorse@mhorse.com>
To: <Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com>
Sent: Friday, January 24, 2003 1:54 PM
Subject: review of Looping Festival / much looping comment


>
> So last night I went to check out the Looping Fest in Palo Alto,
> featuring Rick, Goddess, Andre and Jon.  As it was the first time I've
> seen an improvisational multi-looper performance, and one of the first
> times I've seen such heavy use of an EDP and Repeater, it was kind of a
> clinic in contemporary looping techniques for me personally.
>
> I had a great time, first off!  I loved seeing different combinations of
> players, as well as percussion instruments - I realized how boring a
> standard trap kit can be when compared with all the possibilities of a
> clay pot, a steel saucepan, cymbals, tablas, or frisbees (!). The
> EDP-mangling was really entertaining, especially when combined with
> Rick's facial expressions and Andre's subtle hip-swaying.   The high
> point was a screaming duet between Goddess and Andre, as the EDP's
> provided an evil dub bassline and a ghostly whine, while Jon and Rick
> synced up on 32-second note hi-hats and cymbals.  Yeah!  Each of the
> solo sets was also particularly enjoyable, everyone involved clearly has
> developed a really unique interaction with their little magic boxes.
>
> The glitching and repeating was really nuts, to hear and to watch.
> Still, as wonderful and musical as it was to hear Rick turn
> throatsinging into a children's chorus, or Andre turn a bent harmonic
> into god-knows-what, I had to think about the question posed earlier
> this week about the difference between an instrument and an effect or
> processor....and I came out of this event feeling that looping equipment
> isn't really an instrument.  An instrument is something that generates a
> tone, by definition.  And though the EDP can do insane things with any
> tone fed to it - you could probably snap your fingers once into a mic,
> then entertain a crowd all night with warpings of that initial tone - it
> doesn't actually generate a sound.  I think this is important, for me at
> least, because that initial tone is SO crucial, even after twisting it
> every which way.  The most interesting and musical things last night
> that happened with loops were interesting and musical because of the
> source; tweaking it made it exponentially more so.  But when a dry or
> flat sound was fed to a loop (which happened rarely, I have to say),
> processing didn't really take it anywhere, in my opinion.
>
> I guess my point is that to make good loops with your instrument, you
> gotta be good on the instrument.  Even if that instrument is a piece of
> Tupperware (Rick!), you have to know how to get a good sound out of it.
>
> For those who feel that an EDP actually is an instrument, I'm curious
> whether a turntable would also fit the definition...?
>
> thanks to Jon, Rick, Goddess and Andre for a wonderful time!  I'm bummed
> I had to dash off to catch a train and couldn't meet each of you
> afterwards.
>
> Daryl Shawn
> highhorse@mhorse.com
>
>