Re: What's wrong with loops

[mwsmart@insightbb.com]

Cool article...thanks for that link, Warren. My approach to looping 
has always been to use actual chord progressions, repeated like 
in a normal jazz performance. It can be done quite easily, really, 
but I guess a lot of people just don't do it. Play in some kind of
bass+chords or drums+bass+chords, etc accompaniment and loop it back.

I've been messing with my NeKo for the past couple of weeks and was
strugging to try to figure out how to record loops of my Reaktor 
guitar processing, Reaktor big band horns, B4 organ and Battery drum
machine. A couple of days ago I installed the demo version of Ableton
Live that came with the NeKo. I hadn't ever used that before...WOW! 
What an amazing program. I will be able to use this to run all the
plugins and record the loops on the fly, and everything can be 
controlled from external MIDI control messages. I ordered the real 
thing last night.

In my big band synth there is a sequencer that stores the chord
progression for the song so that the automatic harmonizer will know
how to voice the chords under the lead line you play into it (I use
a wind controller for this). That can easily be synched up in 
Live..I had it partially working last night. Then I can 
record the horns onto an audio track and lay down
more horns on top of it without having to have multiple instances
of Reaktor open. This rocks! What I'm aiming for with the big band
synth is riffing arrangements like the Count Basie tunes from the
late 1930s with Lester Young on tenor:

<http://tinyurl.com/b4dzf>

...with the saxes, trumpets and trombones playing different rhythms.
Looks like I will not only be able to do these, but to make them up
on the spot if I want, following the pre-programmed chord progression.
This is pretty exciting!

Mark Smart
http://www.marksmart.net