Eric Jensen

In Part 5 of our con­ver­sa­tion Ken Rosser describes each of the pieces from the Shadow Lan­guage Gui­tar Quar­tet debut per­for­mance… Fol­low Me by Paul Lan­sky Amer­i­can Thighs by Bet­sey Biggs Time Enough by Mick Goodrick Par­al­lels by Rob Wan­na­maker and finally… Motor­mouth by Fred Frith Ken describes the musi­cal char­ac­ter of each com­po­si­tion and the unique chal­lenges pre­sented by the per­for­mance techniques.

In this clip Ken Rosser describes how he picked the pro­gram for the Quartet’s debut performance…

In part 3 Ken describes how he came up with the name for the group…

In this 2nd chap­ter of my inter­view with Ken Rosser we dis­cuss the unique require­ments of an elec­tric gui­tar ensem­ble and the strengths each of the other play­ers brings to this group. Shadow Lan­guage Gui­tarists: Ken Lasaine Kevin Tier­nan Andre LaFosse

The Shadow Lan­guage Gui­tar Quar­tet is an elec­tric gui­tar ensem­ble orga­nized by gui­tarist Ken Rosser. This extra­or­di­nary group of musi­cians recently debuted at the Eagle Rock Cen­ter for the Arts in Los Ange­les, per­form­ing pieces by Paul Lan­sky, Bet­sey Biggs, Mick Goodrick, Rob Wan­na­maker, and Fred Frith. Elec­tric gui­tar ensem­bles are some­thing I have always been involved with. The instrument’s icon­o­clas­tic nature makes it a ver­sa­tile tool in the hands of a skilled com­poser and an excep­tional ensem­ble. In this chap­ter Ken dis­cusses his long­stand­ing inter­est in gui­tar cham­ber music and the ori­gins of this group. In the chap­ters that fol­low he dis­cusses the other musi­cians and the reper­toire of their debut gig. In the final chap­ters Ken demon­strates some of the unique tech­niques involved in Rob Wannamaker’s piece and gives us a taste of Mick Goodrick’s music.