MORE LOOPS?

["RICK WALKER" <looppool@cruzio.com>]

In recent threads and frequently on this list  I
hear people complain that this or that device doesn't have
enough separate loop capability.

Just because I've done a lot of duet, trio and quartet live looping 
performances
in the last 12 years,   I've come to believe that the biggest problem
with onstage live looping improvisation is that TOO MANY LOOPS get recorded
a good deal of the time.

I think a lot of loopers forget that if three people play and create 
synchronized loops
that a six person band has now been created.

In a conventional band setting,  if you have six people playing it means 
that you have to
think of being just 1/6 of the entire musical output when you play and 
attenuate your musical
output accordingly.

I have found in my own playing (and as a drummer percussionist,  I can 
frequently
have more overdubbed instruments than is typical of guitarist, 
keyboardist, 
horn players
or vocalists)  that I rarely have more than two loop layers playing at 
once 
just because
it limits what can be played on top of the music.
Frequently I will only lay one loop down in music I'm playing (unless I'm 
purposefully
attempting the 'one person band' approach.     Even in that instance, I've 
discovered that
the more minimal a part is on a given instrument,  the more the piece of 
music can
handle additional parts or more interesting focal improvisation over the 
top 
of it.

Even the most successful experimental players seem to have economy in their
approach..............things are so 'out' as it is, that a kind of 
minimalism helps
an audience to hear the really clear ideas they put out.

Of course, it's silly to be black and white about this,  but I run into a 
lot of musicians
who believe that music is just a series of elements layered on top of one 
another, as opposed
to a bunch of elements that are meticulously arranged to interact with 
each 
other:
some things purposefully played to support focal elements in the music; 
some things
played that are rhythmically, harmonically or timbrally subsets of focal 
elements.

It could be that as a life long drummer who's role has been to accompany 
musicians
that I'm more intrinsically inclined to have this arrangement approach to 
things, but
I have found that the most successful improvisers in this live looping 
business are the ones
who really get how every single element in the music interacts with every 
other one.

So,  my long winded point is that there is a distinct danger using this 
technology
to play TOO MANY LOOPS at the same time.     Why am I 
shouting.............................I DON'T KNOW WHY!!!!!

your thoughts?