Loop (music)

Musicians play loops by triggering the start of the musical sequence by using a MIDI controller such as an Ableton Push or a Native Instruments MASCHINE.

For his 1963 piece Music for The Gift he devised a hardware looper that he named the Time Lag Accumulator, consisting of two tape recorders linked together, which he used to loop and manipulate trumpet player Chet Baker and his band.

His 1964 composition In C, an early example of what would later be called minimalism, consists of 53 repeated melodic phrases (loops) performed live by an ensemble.

"Poppy Nogood and the Phantom Band", the B-side of his influential 1969 album A Rainbow in Curved Air uses tape loops of his electric organ and soprano saxophone to create electronic music that contains surprises as well as hypnotic repetition.

[citation needed] The first commercial drum loop was created for the song “Stayin’ Alive” for the movie Saturday Night Fever by Albhy Galuten and Karl Richardson.

That same loop was also use – though slowed down quite a bit, for the Streisand recording of “Woman in Love” produced by Albhy Galuten, Karl Richardson and Barry Gibb.

When Jeff Porcaro of the band TOTO came to work with Galuten and Gibb on a Bee Gees record, he was shown the technique of creating drum loops with analog tape.

[12] Today, many musicians use digital hardware and software devices to create and modify loops, often in conjunction with various electronic musical effects.