Looping Gig with Didgeridoo, Dumbek, Frame Drum, etc

["Krispen Hartung" <info@krispenhartung.com>]

I just got back from a totally amazing and mind-altering gig.adrenaline
still running through my veins and endorphins in the brain.  A new
percussionist and didgeridoo player (Vincent Miresse) just moved into
town, and I had him sit in with me tonight. This guy can play the
didgeridoo like a madman.  He had three with him on stage, and one of
them was tunable, sort of like a trombone.  He also had a dumbek, a
cymbal, frame drum, chimes, bells, and this interesting metal, bell-bowl
like instrument, where he rubbed the rim like a wine glass and made
singing sounds and overtones (Rick, perhaps you know what this is?).

Anyway, he is starting to get into looping, but he's not comfortable
enough to do it live. So..in addition to my EDPs, I brought along the
Boss RC-20 and ran the aux line from all his mic channels into the
RC-20, and then back into a separate channel. At any point in time, I
was able to loop whatever instrument he was playing.  Looping the
bell-bowl like instrument was interesting, and produced a nice backdrop
for layering.  And on occasion I would stomp on the RC-20 to capture
about 30 seconds of him going to town on the didgeridoo.and after he got
used to being looped, he was starting to play off his own looped phrase.
I think we both felt like we were astroplaning on a few of the longer
improvisational pieces.   

Another technique that I used, which seemed to work well with Vincent
(and some of you have seen/heard me apply this), is that I spent about 5
minutes laying down a series of non-meter loops - basically short
phrases, ethereal sounds, experimental motifs, etc - and then overlaid a
meter-based groove over this array of seemingly unrelated loops, pulling
it all together. At that point, he was able to play the dumbek in meter
with the entire piece...except for a few minor glitches where the end of
the metered loop didn't align right with the beginning of the original
loop. I still need to work this out with the EDP! How would I do this?
For instance, if I play a series of loops that have no time signature,
and then start looping a groove with a time signature over this, what is
the best way to get it to start again on the down beat? Should I be
using the multiply with a particular setting? Man, if I could resolve
this, I'd be set for life.

I'm definitely going to be playing with him again.we had a great
chemistry.  

Fortunately, I recorded most of the performance on my Sony minidisk
recorder, so I hope to have some clips to share in a few days. 

Cheers,

********************************* 
Krispen Hartung 
http://www.krispenhartung.com 
info@krispenhartung.com