Kowalsky, Gregg

***From GREGG KOWALSKY: “After my first album for Kranky, I was eager to adapt a new method of composing and performing as a way to distance myself from the digital realm. I felt limited by the unlimited possibilities of digital production, and I had spent the previous 5 years composing with the computer as my main instrument. In an effort to push myself I spent two years experimenting with tape loops, cassette players and recorders, analog synths, sine oscillators, mixer feedback, contact mics and various acoustic sound sources. Through these experiments I developed a series entitled Tape Chants, which is made up of performances and compositions using tapes as the main source material, as well as the mono speakers of various cassette players for the piece’s amplification. All of the cassettes are tuned to each other using the pitch control and halfspeed playback devices located on the Sony TCM 200DV cassette recorder. All of the compositions are constructed with tuned sinewaves as the starting point and the pieces are built using sources such as shruti box, percussion, gongs, etc. During the construction of the studio version of Tape Chants, I was interested in adding rhythmic textures to the once static drone compositions. The recorded version of Tape Chants does not try to replicate the surround sound component of the live performances, but there is a variety of different acoustic spaces located in the source material. Many of the same cassettes that were used in the several editions of the series were used to record this album.” (STREET DATE 6/08/2009)