Re: logistics nightmare?

[Joe Cavaleri <cavaleri@simi-valley.ate.slb.com>]

                Just a thought..

        If and when this performance were to happen, it seems that several
        performers might set-up on stage in advance. The advantages would
        be reduced over-all set up time.(There's that damm mfg. language
        kickin' in). It will also allow the opportunity for some of us to
improvise with others. I think the "new music night" in L.A. is a
        good idea, but I'm open to just about anything.
        
        

                                joe


At 04:29 PM 11/6/96 -0800, you wrote:
>On Wed, 6 Nov 1996 KILLINFO@aol.com wrote:
>
>> > Mind you, an hour isn't exactly the model of brevity!
>> 
>> Well perhaps not. But to drive 400+, miles lug heavy gear
>> with a bad back (remember some of us are no longer as
>> young as we once were), spend 15 to 20 minutes setting 
>> up and dialing in a complicated rig (and our muse), for 
>> a mere 15 to 20 minute spot does not seem to be that 
>> much of a trade off. My wife thinks I'm crazy to do it
>> for a mere hour (3 kids, 18 years of marriage and I still 
>> can't get no respect--ha!). 
>> 
>> I'd do it for the smaller spot, but I'm affraid that I'd 
>> just be warming up and have to stop. It's not so much 
>> that "brevity" is a problem per se--it's more a matter 
>> of "invoking the spirits" (for lack of better terms) 
>> that seems to take all of the time (particularly under 
>> harried and stressful circumstances). 
>
>This is a very good point; the main inclination for an hour-long set 
>would be to ensure that all participants had some opportunity to play.  
>But as it seems more and more likely that the "gig" will in fact be 
>divided between the different state regions, it does seem that longer 
>sets would be both more feasible and more appropriate.
>
>And I definitely agree as far as the tradeoff of set-up time vs. 
>performance time; I try to operate under a maxim that I don't spend more
>time setting up and tearing down geat than I spend actually playing music,
>and hour-long sets could well walk the border for some of us (myself
>included).  And there's no point in creating an environment where
>everything is so harried and rushed that it's a struggle just to try and
>get yourself into a solid frame of mind. 
>
>The flip side is that, as Dave @17 indirectly alluded to, if you've got
>just four people playing an average of 90 minutes to two hours for their
>set, and you figure in *at least* a half hour between sets for changeovers
>of gear (any realistic scenario will probably be more on the order of at
>least 45 minutes), then you've got somewhere between 8 and ten hours of
>gig time for four people!  This was the main thing on my mind when I
>suggested the "short" set length of an hour as a guideline. 
>
>It looks more and more like we'll have to do seperate northern and
>southern gigs, both for the logistical purposes and for the sheer amount
>of time involved in accommodating the performance needs of a handfull of
>people.  More problematically, just the fact that the average desired set
>length seems to be in the 90 minute to 2-hour range means that the whole
>program will be far too long to stage in a situation such as Nels Cline's
>New Music night (or any club for that matter), unless the proceedings are
>spread across several nights or weeks.  And then it becomes less of an
>actual gathering than it does a series of seperate solo gigs.  Not a bad 
>scenario by any means, but definitely not the same sort of thing as a 
>summit concert. 
>
>Damn, it gets complex, don't it?  8-/
>
>Thanks to Ted and the rest for the very astute suggestions.  Any ideas on
>where to go at this point?  I must confess I'm a bit stymied. 
>
>--Andre
>
>
>
>