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Re: [microsound] Laptop, etc as Performance device



Taking the basic kernel of laptop performance to be sitting behind a keyboard, and then theorizing about how to make that more interesting as performance (or how it is /already/ interesting as performance) seems to be, to some extent, a dead end. One of the primary qualities of the laptop is that its portable... making it perfectly capable of generating performances nearly anywhere (probably anywhere you can get a pair of speakers, if its a musical performance). Secondly, computers can be an incredibly powerful tool for recording input from their environments, and creating/controlling interesting outputs (outputs of all kinds... sound, video, network data, electrical signals, radio signals, etc etc). There is very little need for a laptop performance to rely on (and try to fit into) the context provided by a traditional concert/show event. A cello is an oddity, it relies heavily on the concert/show performance environment to connect to the audience and to the world... its out of place and alien nearly everywhere else /but/ here. But a laptop is already at home nearly anywhere, and can be adapted to fit itself into a huge variety of situations. Using a laptop artistically, to break from the politics of the laptop as a business tool, is an interesting idea... but why perform this break in a club/concert venue/etc. when it can be performed in an office?

- Scott Carver


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