Re: Paul Dresher / Was Re: essential loop recordings

[Mark Landman <mlandman@sonic.net>]

I remember seeing Paul Dresher looping with his tape deck looping rig at 
Macy's dept. store (!) in San Francisco  in the late 70's or early 80's. 
Macy's was promoting it's line of Casio stuff, including keyboards, and 
had lined up a week's worth of rather unusual music that was presented 
inside the store during business hours.

Dresher's music was wonderful. he only used a funky little Casio (no 
aftertouch, velocity, etc) for input, yet the music was dynamic and 
alive. Rinde Eckert  sang along with Dresher's swirling tape loops.

When I drove back in for the next day's scheduled performance, a 
salesman told me that the rest of the week's music had been cancelled, 
and described Dresher's music as "weird".

Mark


On Friday, June 27, 2003, at 09:45 AM, Richard Zvonar wrote:

> At 10:06 PM -0700 6/26/03, Kim Flint wrote:
>> you mentioned a couple of other albums featuring Paul's looping in the 
>> early 80's - Way of How and Are/Are. But I don't see them on Paul's 
>> discography. Are these still available anywhere? and if you are 
>> familiar with all of these, do you think those two are a better 
>> representation of his looping style of the time, or would "This Same 
>> Temple" be a better choice?
>
> I don't know if either of these was ever released as an "album" though 
> there was a cassette version of "The Way of How." You'd probably have 
> to approach Paul directly to get a copy.
>
> The music for these two performance pieces was well integrated with the 
> visual performance by singer/actors John Duykers and Rinde Eckert and 
> mime Leonard Pitt. A lot of it consisted of textural "beds" to 
> accompany mimed activity, so these sections are represented in 
> abbreviated form on the tape. Paul played electric guitar and Casio 
> keyboard, and the two singers doubled on flute and trombone.
>
> As to what is "a better representation of his looping style of the 
> time" I'd say that you'd really want to listen to both the material on 
> "This Same Temple" and "The Way of How." It's clearly the same composer 
> working with the same technology, but with different source material in 
> the ensemble work. Note that Paul was a member of George Coates 
> Performance Works for three productions, the third of which did not use 
> the loop system. He then formed the Paul Dresher Ensemble with drummer 
> Gene Reffkin and writer-performer Rinde Eckert in 1985. The loop system 
> was essential to their first production "Slow Fire" and is another 
> representative recording.
> --
> ______________________________________________________________
> Richard Zvonar, PhD
> (818) 788-2202
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