What is Guitar Looping?
Guitar Looping is the art of recording your guitar playing in real-time to create and perform short pieces of music. These short pieces of music are called loops because they continuously repeat around on themselves in a loop.
A loop usually consists of numerous guitar parts that build and layer upon each other in a very musical way until a full piece of music is created. Guitar Looping is also live and performance-based, meaning that it is done in one take, in real time.
All this is achieved through the use of a guitar, an amp, and a Looper Pedal.
What is a Looper Pedal?
A Looper Pedal is a simple floor-based recording device that records your guitar playing and loops (plays) it back through your amp, over and over.
Essentially, the looper pedal has three jobs:
1. It records a Primary Loop (a guitar part).
2. It loops (plays) this primary loop back through your amp over and over.
3. It records additional guitar parts (Layers), which it then also plays back over the top of your original recorded part.
What is a Guitar Loop?
A Guitar Loop is simply a short recording captured by your looper pedal which is then played/looped back through your amp, over and over.
A Guitar Loop consists of a Primary Loop and Layers:
The Primary Loop
The primary loop is the very first recording your looper pedal captures in a performance. It’s the most important because it’s the recording that determines the length and time of your loop.
Layers
Layers are simply additional guitar parts recorded over the top of your primary loop. You can create as many layers as you want providing you don’t run out of loop recording time dictated by whichever looper pedal you’re using.
Your first recorded layer is called Layer 1, your second Layer 2, your third Layer 3 and so on.