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Musicians and their Macs

January 2006

 

Guitar Hero
Guitarist-composer Dominic Frasca, who will perform original compositions at this year’s festival for solo 6- and 10-string guitar, confirms and embodies Spelman’s observation. “Almost everybody I see who’s really a serious electronic musician has a Mac,” Frasca says.
Frasca, winner of the First Annual “Guitar Player” Magazine Guitar Hero Competition, started out playing rock before studying classical guitar at several universities, eventually forging a distinctive playing style inspired by the minimalist composers Steve Reich and Philip Glass.
To pursue his new style of playing, Frasca required new kinds of instruments and equipment. “I started experimenting with amplification and setting up my guitars with pickups under each string and carrying around heavy racks of equipment,” he says. “I remember thinking back then that I wish I could just do this in a computer.”
“I basically use Logic as my mixing board.... Don’t need the heavy equipment, don’t miss carrying it around.”
About three years ago, Frasca began using a PowerBook running Logic Pro and a MIDI foot controller to mix his solo guitar show in real time, while performing on specially designed 6- and 10-string electro-acoustic guitars.
“I basically use Logic as my mixing board,” he says. “It lets me open 12 channels, one each for 10 strings and two mics, and stick one string in one channel and another string in the back speaker, a lot of stereophonic or surround stuff. And I run separate plug-in’s for whatever effects I need. Don’t need the heavy equipment, don’t miss carrying it around.”