PGT: Pender/Garton/Taylor     Terry Pender: mandolin     Brad Garton: laptop     Gregory Taylor: laptop




        Hey! You can get our CD Temporary_Habitations to have as your very own!

        New on-line release: Wood Lake, on the stasisfield web-label


    In the summer of 2006, Terry and I (this is Brad typing this...) began to test out some new software we had been developing. We were surprised at how immediately musical the results seemed to be. Right about that time our good friend Gregory Taylor was in town, and we invited him to sit down with his laptop and see what might happen (Gregory had been doing extended live/improvised laptop sessions on his own). The results were the pieces listed as mando::summer on my main music web site. (Actually, the seven pieces listed there are all excerpts from one long piece we performed.)

    Since that first fun experiment, we have performed quite bit more, with the guiding credo that what we do should be fun for us, pure and simple. All three of us are too old now to take this too seriously! So we've been having a blast, playing in a variety of different contexts -- lounge band, ambient reception music, concert-hall settings, club performances, etc. What we do is totally improvised except for the various synthesis processes and signal-processing chains we individually build prior to our sessions. At the most, we may set time constraints, especially when we've been asked by an event organizer to meet certain limits. Or sometimes we'll just say "let's do a short one!"

    Because we're probably really boring to watch perform, we often engage Luke Dubois to do amazing live graphics with us. We've also included others as part of our happy line-up, such as Darwin Grosse performing using his custom WII controllers as musical instruments, and Dan Trueman playing his happy hardanger fiddle.

    We've recorded a substantial amount of music, with our get-togethers for performances also doubling as a chance to do additional recording sessions wherever we can set up our gear. Here are links to several web pages with some of our sounds:


    • PGT-roosevelt
    • PGT-madison (WORT radio broadcast)
    • PGT-stetson
    • PGT-NIME07
    • PGT-CCM
    • PGT-columbus
    • PGT-spark08 (performance)
    • PGT-portugal
    • PGT-spark09
    • PGT-portugal2009
    • PGT-IU

    And here are a few links to recordings Terry and I did together on our own (Gregory lives far far away so we don't see him as often!):

    • PG-febfriday
    • PG-IPR
    • PG-CMC-funnite
    • PG-judy
    • PG-SEAMUS08
    • PG-RAP-may17
    • PG-ethno
    • PG-MIDIclass2011
    • PG-ambient-pancakes

    Here's a performance Gregory and I did without Terry, yikes!

    • GT-purdue

    We're also starting to perform (in various combinations) with other terrific players (see the "PGT-portugal2009" link above, for example). Here are a few links, including the 'supergroup' performance in Roosevelt on May 30, 2009:

    • PGTG-lemurplex
    • PGTGTr-roosevelt
    • PGTr-danshouse
    • PGTr-sandyhook
    • PGTGr-expo74 -- "live" recording, and a video

    Just for fun, I played with Todd Reynolds and Miller Puckette. Somehow the 'live improv' work I do fits under "PGT", even with no Terry or Gregory. The spirit (and the software I use!) is there. Here's a link to a very short thing Todd and Miller and I did together:

    • GPuRe-toddsclass