Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: MOTM

I just got back from the Robert Rich show in Philadelphia. It's
almost 2 a.m., after driving back to NYC in the pouring rain. The
show was in many ways incredible, and in some ways not quite what I
expected. If you have the chance, go see him live. It's definitely
worth it.

The music was awesome, and there was a lot of it. He first did about
80 minutes, accompanied by video, then a break, then another whole
segment, maybe not quite as long, accompanied by lasers. The show was
in a church, very old, with wood beams and ceilings, shadows of trees
waving on stained glass windows in the rain. It was almost a bit of
culture shock to have this slew of modern electronics in this fairly
medieval setting, but the wood and the lasers seemed to get along
just fine.

The music was excellent, but there wasn't nearly as much synth
playing as I expected. There were plenty of synthesizers playing, but
not very many being actually played by human hands. Most of what he
played was slide guitar (absolutely incredible, and as a bonus I no
longer have to figure out how he gets some of those great sounds out
of a synthesizer) and an assortment of flutes and recorders. I don't
really know why, but I was somehow expecting him to play everything
live. Some of the highlights of the show for me was when he went at
it with his MOTM modular to make all those great Bestiary sounds. Why
I expected him to play unaccompanied, though, is somewhat of a
mystery to me.

As for technical points of interest, there were many. His setup
included the MOTM modular, Wavestation, DX7, and an Ensoniq ASR-10,
plus an array of other devices including mixers, high-end stomp boxes
and two laptops. One laptop was a PowerBook running what I think was
Logic, but which could certainly have been something else. The other
laptop seemed to be responsible for much of the rhythm, but beyond
that I couldn't say much else as the screen wasn't facing the
audience.

He also had literally a pile of flutes/recorders, probably 10 or 12
of them. In fact, some of them looked suspiciously like PVC pipe with
finger holes drilled and with the type of flexible
rubber/plastic/vinyl end caps you sometimes see on large tubes that
hold architectural drawings. I'm not saying 100% that that's what
they were, but some of them sure looked like it. Not that that's bad
or anything, I just thought it interesting, and would like either
confirmation from someone, or to have someone tell me I'm nuts and
they were exotic flutes from Thailand that date back to some dynasty
or other from 800 years ago and are worth millions. Doesn't matter to
me which way it is, but now I'm a bit curious. In some ways I kind of
like the idea of home-made PVC recorders and flutes. I can imagine
him experimenting with all sorts of diameters, lengths, thicknesses
and hole positions, making flutes that perfectly match any given
song's tuning and intonation. Or I could simply be making the whole
thing up.

Other interesting technique things include wedging keys down on the
Wavestation and DX7 (I didn't notice it on the Ensoniq, but that
doesn't mean he didn't do it there also). I've been known to use
electrical tape to hold down keys with an Oberheim or two, and Keith
Emerson's been known to wedge keys down with knives. While Rich's
method is not really as flashy as Emerson's and not quite as messy as
mine, it certainly worked well and was interesting to watch. I may
never be mentioned in the same paragraph as Robert Rich and Keith
Emerson again, but hey, sometimes great artist think alike! <g>

Anyway, now it's almost 3 a.m. and I can see this easily starting to
slide downhill. Executive summary: if you can, go see Robert Rich
somewhere on his tour.


Seth

This Saturday, Robert Rich, next Saturday, AHNE. That's 600 miles of
synthesizers in one week.