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Re: Articles on Live Looping as Compositional Tool



On Tue, Nov 11, 2008 at 11:04 PM, Byron Howell <howell.byron@gmail.com> 
wrote:
> While not on  looping - this might be useful as it talks about the 
>origins
> of using the term instant composition instead of
> improvisation:http://www.icporchestra.com/


I chose to use the term "instant composition" but for a different
specific reason, having to do with the live looping context. For
starters, you may get a good feel for it by contemplating that any
instant compositional activity may also be called improvisation but
any improvisation can not be called instant composition.

The most simple form of improvisation is to simply react on sound by
making sound, that causes a reaction, that you then react on by making
another sound etc etc. This may cerate interesting music both from the
interplay between human musicians and the interplay between musicians
and looping devices. It's a developing spiral of questions and
answers. It's a bouncing fun game.

Now, besides pure sound, introduce playing bricks as "structure",
"direction", "time span", "density", "harmony" and things alike.
Improvising with those sort of blocks/clusters makes instant
composition possible. As for praxis in a technical context it can be
done as Willem Breuker and Misha Mengelberg does it, by providing some
guidelines to musicians (here even "not giving any directions
what-so-ever" is also understood as "a guideline", although extreme).
It can also be don by utilizing live looping techniques.

When live looping you are not restricted to simply reacting to
immediate sound you hear, react on that and build  complex music from
there. You are also free to react on what doesn't yet exist as sound,
except for in you time expanded mind, and improvise with that. Since
the improviser knows the looping gear as his/her instrument, he/she is
swimming not only inside an immediate pool of sound but also inside a
hothouse that stretches into possible futures as well as back into the
past, making it possible to bring back earlier parts of the
performance. Live looping expands the time line as one of the bricks
the improviser has at hand to dabble with on-the-fly and blurs the
lines between performer, conductor and composer. Isn't this the
essence of "instant composing"?

We experienced a funny example on this during the 2nd Swedish Loop
Tour in may. One particular night was labeled "Instant Composing Music
Show" and there were seven acts performing (plus workshops in the
day). Most of the acts performed along what I called "reacting to
sound etc" above, which still is a sort of tradition for improvised
music here in Sweden. Rick and I were the only ones that "improvised
with structured blocks" and to be honest I didn't think it was such a
big deal right there. But the day after the daily magazine came out
with a review that mentioned exactly that - so I felt a bit more
confident in "instant composing" not only being just another of my
self indulgent fantasies.

The review went like:
"Per Boysen's live looped ambience music with layers over layers of
sax- and flute melodies was a real experience, and it was obvious that
he is utilizing the electronics as his personal expression without
being a slave to the technology. And Rick Walker's spectacular sound
collages were both entertaining and exciting. Also with him you could
tell the strong musicality was drawing from somewhere else than just
the electronics".

So this journalist had obviously felt the longer time bows Rick and I
were improvising with and it appealed to his personal taste.

-- 
Greetings from Sweden

Per Boysen
www.boysen.se (Swedish)
www.looproom.com (international)
www.myspace.com/perboysen
www.stockholm-athens.com