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Welcome to the exotic sonic world of Rick Walker's Loop.pooL. A leading figure in the emerging international live looping movement, Rick is a sound designer, electronic music composer, author, percussionist, trapset drummer, multi-instrumentalist and "found sound" artist. Here you will find information on his solo cd's and tour dates, his percussion/drumming activities, and his composition/production career. |
blog| go to latest news | tour diaries | archived news | read Rick's music biography
go to description of Rick's live looping show| Rick's links | press and photos | email Rick
February 2008
The press section has been updated with links to recent articles profiling Rick, and looping, in DRUM! magazine, Guitar Player magazine, and Italian gear magazine Strumenti musicali! Go to www.looppool.info/press.html .
June 2007
I'm really excited to announce that I will be performing at 21 Grand in Oakland, on Friday June 29th, with a really amazing band of live looping instrumentalists: bassist Michael Manring, pedal-steel guitarist Robert Powell, and guitarist Barry Cleveland , doing a set of mostly improvised music, some of which will involve live looping. If you are familiar with these guys, you know that they are extremely innovative and adventurous players, so it should be lots of fun. I'll be playing trapset, exotic percussion and atmospheric loops. This is a one time only show.
We’ll be opening for the Richard Pinhas Trio. Richard is a Paris-based guitarist and electronic musician often compared to Robert Fripp. He’ll be accompanied by drummer Antoine Paganotti (from the pioneering French prog band Magma) and synthesist Jerome Schmidt, and will stage a full-on looping extravaganza.
21 Grand is located at 416 25th Street (@ Broadway) in Oakland. The show starts at 8:30, and admission is on a sliding scale. For more information: 21 Grand
I hope to see you there!
May 2007
The extremely creative MAKER FAIRE (www.makerfaire.com)is this weekend, Saturday and Sunday May 19-20, at the San Mateo Fairgrounds just south of San Francisco (north of the Silicon Valley). Amongst many other things, two live loopers will be part of the musical presentations at this very unusual and stimulating festival.
LOOP.POOL will be performing on the MAIN outdoor stage on Sunday afternoon at 3 p.m., followed immediately by the fabulous a capella "band in a box" looper KID BEYOND at 4:15.
If you haven't seen him, Kid Beyond is a fantastic performer creating an entire dance concert with just his voice as a source for sound. He seamlessly integrates Ableton's LIVE using midi footpedals and a microphone (he never even touches hislaptop in his performances). He's really inspiring and I can't more highly recommend seeing his show.
The MAKER FAIRE is MAKE Magazine's annual festival that showcases unusual and creative inventions. You can think of it as the Burning Man for geek tinkerers or Hot Nerd on Nerd Action!!! I jest, but in reality, this festival is really exciting................from people making groundbreaking inventions in ecological lifestyles to people who invent strange musical devices, I've never seen so much creativity in a small space in my life.
It is an ideal summer festival atmosphere for all ages. I hope you can make it on Saturday and Sunday. If you read this here, please come up and say hello to me after I've cleared my stage for Kid Beyond's performance.
************************************************************2006
Rick was cited in the GUIDE for producing the Most Revolutionary Musical Event in Santa Cruz in 2006.
Here's the article:
from the "Best of 2006" issue of THE GUIDE
(the Santa Cruz Sentinel's Entertainment Magazine)
"MOST REVOLUTIONARY MUSICAL EVENT IN SANTA CRUZ: The Y2K6 International Live Looping Festival. In last week’s column, I highlighted the problems that some local musicians face in competing with national touring acts for club space. That wasn’t to say that there aren’t any local musicians making waves. Rick Walker, founder of the Live Looping Festival, has helped make Santa Cruz the live looping capital of the world. Using modern technology, loopers are able to record and loop any instrument or sound they wish in real time, live on stage. Looping is a worldwide niche scene, and Walker manages to attract to Santa Cruz the best of the bunch each year."
October 2006
Thanks to all who played at, participated in, and contributed to the Y2K6 LoopFest! Archived information and media files from the festival can be found here:
January 2006
Rick is proud to announce that he has signed on a Representing Artist with LOOPERLATIVE.
He is also excited to announce that he has just signed on as a Representing Artist for the COOPERMAN FIFE AND DRUM company as well and will be demonstrating their Kanjira (South Indian), Bodhran (Celtic), Tar (North African) and Riq (Middleeastern) in his multi-instrumental solo shows, featuring percussion, found sound, bass, keyboard and voice.
For more information about Cooperman Drums and the Looperlative, check out Rick's blog.
Rick is proud to say that he has just signed to play
and endorse the McNally Strumsticks
(www.strumstick.com).
The strumstick is a beautiful, simple instrument that is tuned diatonically with three strings and a slender wooden body. The sound of the instrument is somewhere between a mandolin and a Middle-Eastern saz or bouzouki but can also have slightly banjo-esque timbres as well.
Rick first played one at the Winter 2006 NAMM show, when his multi-instrumental solo performances debuting the Looperlative live looping box attracted the attention of the inventor of the Strumstick, Bob McNally.
About the instrument, Rick says, "Coming from a percussion/rhythmic background I was amazed at how quickly and effortlessly I could play this amazingly simple and beautiful instrument. I am also enamored of suspended modal tunings lately, and just like a dulcimer (but far, far more convenient to play) I can get really beautiful third world harmonies and melodies from the instrument, instantly. I have played my standard and large-scaled grand every single day since I got them, and that says a lot if you could see the number of instruments in my living room. It is a looping multi-instrumentalist's dream string instrument, and the fact that anyone can pick one up and make beautiful music instantly is a huge added bonus. I'm so happy I discovered its existence. Nice work, Bob!."
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live looping cd audio | abstract electronica cd audio | "Faux Voix" cd audio | read Rick's music biography
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email Rick | return to the top of the page
A special heartfelt thanks to Chris Roberts who is graciously hosting this site for me on his server. Chris has tithed a lot of energy to several new musical artists' careers and is a wonderful live looping artist in his own right.
thanks to
David Griffiths for the lake applet
and thanks to David Torn for letting Rick
use the name "Loop.pooL"
Rick would also like to thank Daniel Riedel
for the beautiful photograph on the cover
of Transclucent Dayglo Lime Green Plastic.
He can be reached at:
dan@riedelenterprises.com
