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Loopstock footage and tutorial DVD's in general...



Hi all,

Greg said, about Loopstock footage,

Looping9string@aol.com wrote:

> I mentioned this idea a while back to Andre but got no response...
> 
> I know he's busy! ;)
> 
> And hey, maybe artists could donate their percentage to LOOPERS
> DELIGHT?
> 
> Crazy idea I know but I would be very willing to work it all out and
> compromise!
> 
> Any suggestions, or takers?

First off, sorry for the delay, Greg - as you say, I have indeed had my
hands full.

Here are a few quick thoughts:

1) Sorting through this sort of footage is not an easy thing.  Hans and
I filmed the EDP tutorial about half a year ago, and I still haven't
been able to really sit down and seriously sift through his rough cut,
compare it with the alternate takes he chose not to put into the cut
(but sent me on an alternate disc, bless his heart), figure out what
works, and then give him my serious feedback so he can finish editing. 
It's a serious deal, and it needs to be handled with a lot of attention
and communication with people.

2) There's no guarantee as to how the clinics will go, how happy the
artists will be with their clinics, how comfortable they'd be with
releasing this footage, and how much work it might take to get footage
together into a satisfactory finished form.

3) By way of reference: there was a lot of footage filmed for last
year's Loopstock (held in March) and the Y2K2 festival in Santa Cruz in
July, and no "released" audio or video footage from either event has
materialized yet.  That doesn't mean that it won't eventually happen,
and it doesn't mean that it won't be well worth the time and effort if
and when it does.  It's just another way of underscoring the serious
time and hassle this can take.

4) Last, but not least, there's the issue of the people involved being
compensated for their work and time.  To put it in perspective: I've had
about 6,000 page views for the index of my tutorial web site, and over
14,500 seperate downloads of my solo EDP music over the last 15 months.  

But in that same amount of time, the amount of money I made from CD
sales through my web site wasn't even enough to cover the cost of my
internet access and web site (which is about $40 a month).  I got very,
very few inquiries into the custom discs feature on my web site, and
I've had to cancel it anyway because manually compiling and burning the
discs is more work than I can justify spending for the amount of money I
would (hypothetically) make on each sale of such discs.

I don't say this to complain, but simply to say that I personally can't
comfortably continue to give away all of my services as a clinician or
educator by putting lots of stuff out for free, or donating funds from
the sale of such footage to another cause.  Lately I've been forced to
start looking for part-time, non-music work for the first time in years,
and when thousands of people are downloading my music and reading my
lessons for free while I'm struggling to scrape a couple of bucks
together, it puts things in a pretty brutal perspective.  It's a drag,
but it's the truth.

So even if good, usable footage exists, it's not an easy thing to figure
out how to disseminate all of this information without passing up a
potential source of income.  One of the things Hans and I need to figure
out is the best way to approach our tutorial from a strictly economic
point of view, and that in itself is an obstacle I'm dreading.

So: hopefully some good footage will be shot at Loopstock, and hopefully
the artists and editors (whoever they may be) will be able to find a way
of getting it out into the word in an aesthetically and economically
viable way.  Cross your fingers for us!

Best wishes,

--Andre LaFosse
The Echoplex Analysis Pages:
http://www.altruistmusic.com/EDP