Joel Davel On Lightning
manipulating two small batons-he looks like a hyperactive magician casting abracadabra spells into the ether-Davel was as much a dancer as Green, moving with a concentrated focus that made him fascinating to watch. -----Newsday
Who can keep an eye on Green, being lovely, while this intent shaman conjures up music? ----Village Voice
Joel is one the foremost performers on Lightning--an innovative 'high-tech' instrument which he builds with designer Don Buchla. It is a focus of much of his solo repertoire.
It has become easier to create and organize new sounds and musical arrangements for recording, but it is still rare to see new and creative performances which do anymore than playback. Lightning, on the other hand, puts the live control of musical expression back into an intriguing instrument.
Using two independent wands emitting infrared signals, spatial coordinates and gestures are translated into musical controls. Melodic colors are expressed as if he is handling a magician's wands or conducting a virtual orchestra. The next moment, they become like drumsticks playing an invisible percussion instrument.
While the technology is impressive, Joel's plays it with a musicality and a repertoire of highly varied material, unexpected from such an instrument. Performing Lightning requires a certain amount of virtuosity and control, though it's easy to "make it play" in the hands of anyone willing to flail around in the air a little.
More specifically:
Lightning employs two hand-held infrared-emmiting wands to convey spacial movement in 2 independent axis each (4 total axis). Lightning interprets the x ,y location as well as indentifying a button push on the wand. Each wand's gestures can then be programmed to initiate various musical responses. For example, one can control pitch and volume like a Theramin, virtual strikes like air drums, or patterns and tempos like a virtual conductor.It allows the player sophisticated theatrical control over the creation of sounds via MIDI.
Joel also plays a Buchla LightningII as an interative complement to Marimba Lumina.
Joel has been Don Buchla's primary hardware assistant in building LightningII's. He is also the author of over half its current presets. Check out the official LightningII Web Site find out more about it. Joel began using Lightning in 1992 in conjuction with an video and sound exhibit for the Exploratorium. Joel was completing software written on the Commodore Amiga in the HMSL-Forth language to drive both the video and synthesizers from the Lightning MIDI output. The exhibit had an all too brief stay in the museum in 1994.