24 Jan

Possibility   by  scott_good

Possibility:

In the beginning, there was a sound...and this sound said "let me be free - i want to play".  But, this sound did not have a language and context except those of its physical property.  But those physical properties have very distinct characters that even without any musical system in place, have easily understood connotations.   One could very convincingly, stand at the front of a stage, and emote through sound alone, very concrete emotional ideas - anger, love, sensuousness, fear, contentment.  And one could relate these ideas to anyone, regardless of their training, nationality or language.  The only restriction is the openness to experience.

Something has drawn the human mind towards making music.  I don't care to discuss this, but simply hope it to be an accepted concept - we are born as musical entities, just as we are born with inherent grammatical skills. The music of a sound, or collection of sounds, is something we can understand from a very young age.  In the maternity ward, when one baby fresh from the womb cries, they all cry.  It is a reply to the musicality of a sound - a music we all understand in our deepest primal self.

For some reason, music improvisation is often viewed as an abstraction - a kind of learned skill.  But we are improvising entities.  As Noam Chomsky so elegantly describes, language is a continuous exercise in creativity. We do not "think" about our words, we just speak.  Ask any group of people, as many as possible, to explain some basic concept, or describe an object, and the chances of two people using the exact same words is very improbable - we are constantly improvising, and no 2 people are the same, especially if we said they had to use at least 20 words. 

In music, I have seen through my children (aged 1 and 3) that it is much the same.  They do not think about making music, but simply react in musical ways.  Musical gesture is immediate.  Pitch inflection,  repetition, and variation can be surprisingly accurate in the mind of a toddler.  But over time, through a kind of criticism and conformity (music is this, not that) we unlearn these natural skills.  The conscious mind overrides the unconscious - subdues it.  The musician is taught that the music on the page is their duty, and since this duty has such lofty heights, we should not waste time with frivolous experiments.  This is not necessarily said, but simply understood through the rigors of training.  It is not possible to practice Mozart or Beethoven enough.  As one small example, I remember hearing a violinist say that it takes at least 15 years of dedicated practice to achieve a "good sound"!  Now that is time pressure.

I believe this is a problem for both composers and performers.  But, as this is a composition site, I will attempt to explain why I believe this is so for composers (although the reasons do relate to each other).

First off, in this age of endless compositional possibility, I am often surprised at how many composers have decided what their music "is".  How is it that one can understand fully know what they are capable of, until they have exhausted all possibilities (an impossibility)?  How can we truly understand our potential?  Perhaps because that unconscious mind has been shut off, or subdued.  All ideas are left to simmer, passing through the various filters influenced by fears - failure, rejection, and their consequent aspirations - success and inclussion.  As we progress through each stage of our development, we see areas to improve upon, and to regress to try something else would be a distraction. In essence, we decided what our music is in order to focus on achieving the best results.

But by the very nature of improvisation, we cannot have such thorough filters - there simply isn't time to allow for it.  (I must note that I'm not really talking about jazz, where improvisation is key to the very structure and organization of the music - what I mean is free improvisation without any specific context except the in the moment).  Improvisation frees the subconscious to explore beyond conscious limitations.  Thus it feeds the creative urge - to continue searching, and not just building. 

A second point is that improvisation can release a wealth of ideas for which the composer can future draw from.  Raw material to be shaped into composition.  I'm sure that all composers improvise to a degree, but I'm suggesting taking it further, and participating in group improvisation, as well as personal work at the piano (or any instrument or singing).  Group improvisation creates situations in which timbre becomes the focus, and there are several exercises that help focus that timbral exploration.   One I have particularly enjoyed is a simple structure:  The improvisation is divided into 1min segments - at the beginning of each segment, each player decides in the instant what they are going to play for that minute.  So, a somewhat random assortment of sounds is started, and it is then the job of the players to subtly alter their choice to find a blend and balance with the others.  A searching for common ground that can yield some very unexpected, yet incredibly interesting juxtapositions. It is also a wonderful arena to explore extended technique in a room filled with people of similar intent.

Which leads me to my last, and perhaps most important aspect of improvisation, and that is the awareness of a larger musical community one can build improvising.  Without the rigorous limitations of the score, any group of people playing any instruments from any genre can get together and make music.  What could be more beautifully symbolic for our shrinking globalized world?  An arena of limitless potential to search and find crossroads between any and all cultures musics. 

In Toronto, there is an organization called "The Woodchoppers Association" that is a collective of around 200+ improvisers of a multitude of backgrounds.  What is so very special about this group is that it's mantra is two-fold:

1- it is not possible to play a wrong note

2- we come together to play with love in our hearts!

Frankly, a dose of this kind of attitude once and awhile helps, well, "keep it real" as they say.  Attitudes that are shunned by our fast paced commercial world where only the cream rises to the top, and crushes it's competitors. It isn't about winning a job or landing a commission.  It is only about living in the moment, and sharing the great gift of music with any and all who want to join.

Scott

 

About the audio excerpt:  A couple of years ago, I co-composed a "show" with a singer/songwriter.  It was a 10 movement work in which each was in some way, a tribute to the novels of Kurt Vonnegut.  Covering a wide range of stylistic influence, the movement included here is a "free improv" section inspired by "The Sirens of Titan".  But, it isn't completely free, as there were a set of instructions:  From the ensemble (17 piece), 4 duos were extracted - and each duo was instructed to try and communicate with each other 'as if you have never held your instrument before'.  Each duo tries to develop a language for which they can speak to each other.  Any other members are allowed to try and join in, once the communication has been established.

 

At the magical 2/3rds point in the piece, all players join in together to recite lines in a variety of languages, but reciting with growing and growing grotesqueness and exaggeration. 

 

These instructions were only provided at the end of the intermission - no practice nor did anyone know what was going to be asked of them.  It would be the 2nd movement after intermission.

 

This was the result on this particular night.  Enjoy!

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