Having played the electric guitar as a rock-obsessed teenager, I re-discovered it 25 years later. In the meantime, I have studied composition and musicology and became heavily involved in electronic and computer music. Working as a composer writing complex musical scores I felt more and more the desire to re-connect to those ecstatic times when I was performing on stage with my electric guitar. But first I developed my own idiosyncratic electronic instrument called
m@ze°2 (1998 ff.) which I am still using for free improvisation and live performances.
In 2007, I was ready for another change when the handling with MIDI controllers, graphic tablets, keyboards, computer mouses and pedals became more and more insufficient. I was seeking for an instantaneous, tactile input device to be included into my live-electronic setup. First I was thinking of a custom-made wooden resonance box equipped with strings, contact microphones and pickups that could be plucked, bowed, beaten and scratched. As such a device had to be constructed first (and I am not really good at tinkering) I suddenly realized that the common electric guitar already fulfilled most of my requirements. So I bought myself a Steinberger electric guitar - the most compressed instrument of its kind - and started to study the almost forgotten playing techniques again.
Fortunately, as the body obviously has a strong memory, I got back very quickly to the status of playing that I had 25 years ago. However, meanwhile my musical mind has completely changed: Not being primarily interested in re-adapting those powerful rock clichés, I tried to develop a fresh view onto the electric guitar. First of all I decided no to use a plectrum anymore and to develop a personal finger-picking technique which incorporates some elements that I used when playing the double bass. Then I discovered the possibilities of an E-Bow which serves as a wonderful substitution for the bow. Later I became familiar with tapping technique and the use a volume pedal in order to shape the envelope of the sound.
With these achievements, I wrote a piece for electric guitar and live-electronics in the beginning 2008 as part of my
Sequitur project.
I was discussing this development with my friend Serge Verstockt, a composer and the musical director of the Belgium ensemble Champ d'Action. To my surprise he revealed that he has gone through a similar process recently. As part of my residency with his ensemble during the season 2008/2009, he commissioned to me a composition - not for chamber music ensemble as expected - but for a group of young electric guitarist named ZWERM.
In this piece - entitled
While my guitars gently whip - I tried explored the sound world of this instrument in a different way: not as a solo instrument with its pretentious attitudes, but as the part of an organism that is constructed of four equal parts which communicate with each other. By this interaction, a complex sound entity should be created that builds up a spaces in which the listeners may immerse in.
Full text with pictures and more: www.essl.at/works/guitars-whip.html