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Looper's Delight
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On Wed, Jul 27, 2011 at 11:59 PM, Jon Forsyth <jpf211@nyu.edu> wrote: > 1) what aspects of looping do you enjoy the most? > To use the looping gear as an instrument. As opposed to using it as a recorder. > 2) what aspects of looping do you enjoy the least? > The "one man band" concept. > 3) what looping tools (including controllers) do you currently > use/have used in the past? > Currently: Electric instruments, acoustic instruments, one microphone, two MIDI surfaces: The Gordius Little GIant 2 and the Faderfox LV3, a laptop (Macbook Pro) with an audio interface (RME Fireface 400), looper software Mobius, four alternative host applications (depending on the kind of project I'm currently involved with): Logic Pro, Mainstage, Plogue Bidule, Ableton Live. In the past: Same audio source instruments as today, Gibson Echoplex Digital Pro, Electrixpro Repeater, Akai MFC42 analog filterbank, mixer, Lexicon LXP-5 multi effect unit, TC Electronics Fireworx multi effect unit, Behringer FCB 1010 pedagboard MIDI controller, Faderfox LV1, a huge rack. > 4) what are the strengths of these tools? > Current (software based) tools setup provides more power to be creative, is more portable, and easier to back up. The previous (hardware based) tools setup looked better on stage, at least in the dark when all buttons and lids were twinkling. > 5) what are the weaknesses of these tools? > Software based setup needs to be taken care of more, since you have to follow upgrades in components. For example a computer operating system might suddenly be upgraded and you need that upgrade for one task but also have to upgrade a lot of third-party software to work well under the new OS version. The old hardware based rig did not have any way to recall set levels. This meant a gig might sound bad initially before you got all levels right. > 6) do you modify a loop once it's been created? > Yes, that's an important aspect of the art form. > if so, how? Most possible ways that serves a musical purpose. Fore example: changing loop length, transposing pitch/speed, replacing certain parts of the loop's audio with new audio, reversing, re-sampling many loops into one new loop, adding new layers of audio, "peeling off" layers of previously added audio, duplicating a loop while mutilating it. > 7) how much planning do you do for a particular performance? > Almost no planning regarding the actual music I will play. But a lifetime of development regarding needed performance skills; like for example music harmony theory, improvisational techniques, arrangement theory, physical instrument playing skills, sound design experience etc > 8) what form does this planning take? (do you write it down, keep it > in your head, etc) I keep it in my stomach. Although my ambition is to keep it in my heart, but THAT is still a dream. Seriously, I never plan more than will be instantly playable without the need for notes on stage. An octaphonic surround concert may need a lot of planning to set up the rig but then I use that preparation time to find out solutions that will make improvisation simple and fluent on stage. This means quite few but rather powerful options at hand (feet). > 9) at what level of detail do you plan? (melody, harmony, timbres, > dynamics, instrumental techniques, etc.) > I guess "at all levels" would be accurate here. > 10) describe your general approach to loop performance. > Make some music I enjoy and have fun. If performing at a festival I might decide at the very last minute to go with an approach that will go well with (= sounding different) what the artist before me played on the same stage. > 11) what would the ideal looping system look like? describe it in as > much detail as you can (and don't worry about practical concerns). > At least 80 foot switches and three expression pedals. A dozen hand controlled faders and buttons. As for functionality I prefer simple and powerful modules that you can play pretty instantly. I like three such "modules", or "stages". 1) First stage may be a delay unit of freeze-reverb located before the looper in the signal chain. This module should be instantly available to snag a short moment of live sound, even just a note within a fast melody run. I think such a "fast audio snatcher/freezer" shall be controlled by an expression pedal that also mutes passing audio (the system audio input, actually) when catching and freezing a slice of audio. Technically you could view it as a *cross fader* between the normal audio input signal and the audio-freeze-pad thingy. This is useful for acoustic microphone instruments because it prevents audio feedback. There are many musical ways to use such a "freeze pad"; you may snatch a chord and play over it or you may cut parts of the frozen audio into the looper to build something up there. When using a Chapman Stick as the physical audio source instrument I use two parallel input signal paths; each one pre looper and with its own expression pedal and "audio freeze pad module". With that setup I can play two fretboards - one with each hand - and freeze slices from left or right hand as some sort of musical questions-and-answers game. 2) Second stage is the actual looper. I use a looper with five parallel, internally synchronized, channels. For each channel I can create maximum five alternative loops. The fifth channel is used to resample the loops currently playng through channels 1 - 4. The five loops do not have to be of the same length, but they will relate to each other in a synchronized way, meaning any poly rhythmic relation can be set up by manipulating the length of the loops. I never use multiple inputs for my multi channel looper. Instead I manually select the channel who's loop is going to be the target for the next action. The looper has to create a tempo for the session based on the length of the first loop created. A crucial function here (really a must-have) is the user option to set preferred maximal and minimum tempo. With that function on board you may start out a performance with an extremely short first loop (like a half second) or with a very long first loop like several minutes and you will be sure that the tempo sent out to all slaved gear will still be within a range that makes musical sense. 3) Third stage is post looper. I want each looper channel to deliver its own output for processing. On each of the five outputs I like different post-loop effect that both work on the stereo panning and on synchronized processing (LFO following song tempo). Knowing about what post-loop effects you have at hand is important for the instant decisions regarding which one of the five loops you lay down a current musical part in. The ideal looping system described above is what I'm currently using, so I'd say I'm a happy camper :-) I wouldn't want to change anything in the system. Greetings from Sweden Per Boysen www.boysen.se www.perboysen.com www.looproom.com internet music hub