Synthesist Erik Norlander performs his 20+ min epic prog synth suite, The Dark Water, live at RoSFest 2011 in Gettysburg, PA.
Norlander plays his 22-oscillator “Wall of Doom” Moog modular synthesizer, controlled by and supplemented with Minimoog Voyager and Alesis Andromeda keyboards.
Performed with Freddy DeMarco (g), Mark Matthews (b) and Nick LePar (d).
The video is taken from the 2012 DVD, Erik Norlander – The Galactic Collective: Live in Gettysburg.
I’d have loved this 35 years ago.
Despite being a excellent performance of skill and technology, I have a really hard time taking it seriously. It’s like you see an 80’s movie that, at first seems really good but 10 minutes in you discover that it was made last year and that cool haircut of the main character is just a silly wig.
I expect prog to make a comeback in a few years, as younger students are taking an interest in it. Dubstep will be easy listening by then (if it already isn’t now), and will probably meld nicely with this style. Kudos to Erik for continuing to do what he likes. Obviously he still has a grateful audience, which is all any performer can ask for.