Safety First

Andrea invents a class dinner as a metaphor as a way to theorize group improvisative performance. I responded that

Your metaphor of group performance as a group meal is an excellent one… but I’m going to suggest one significant difference: in group performance, the ‘meal’ can be altered in real-time depending on the resources available (or the ingredients brought by the group).

Thus, although it makes sense to say that

each of us will bring things that he feels will be enjoyed by everyone else, according to his own experience and taste

Because group performance is dynamic, we’re not stuck with Owen’s starter or Kevin’s main course.

Now, it strikes me that Andrea’s semi-planned (people are given responsibilities, but have leeway within those) potluck is only one available way to organize a group dinner. Another would be a meticulously pre-planned meal (taken, say, from the pages of a book), where all parties were given specific duties that would culminate in that planned extravaganza; yet another would be a blind potluck where everyone brings whatever is at hand. Even in this crude metaphorical sketch, we might find echos of the autocratic, authorial composerly model in the former, and the Cagian denial of agency in the latter.

But if, as Andrea and Kevin have said, we’re trying to find a balance—something in between those would be best—I’m going to posit that we’re aiming for a different kind of organizing principle.

three hungry chefs in a less-than-satisfactory kitchen

Marilyn loves Chicago cuisine (its versions of Italian, Chinese, etc.). On the other hand, Evan is a chocoholic. John likes everything.

They’re all hungry.

They search the kitchen, find utensils, appliances, ingredients.

Evan needs his fix and is relieved to find a small lump of chocolate, and almost empty jar of Nutella. His heart skips a beat, and begins work.

Marilyn rolls a pizza base. She’s not thinking too much about her next move, or what Evan (never mind John) is up to, but is meticulous—whatever it is that will result, this will be a fine, Chicago-style pizza base. She preheats the oven.

Evan puts together a dark(ish) chocolate sauce. He doesn’t know how sweet or savory it is ’cause he is too hungry to check; he is only guided by his nose. He looks over at Marilyn and feels a momentary sense of dread: should I aim for savory?

John, becoming dissatisfied with the kitchen and the course(s) of action by his comrades, decides a little spice will cure any monstrosity that might result. Just make it hot, he thinks. He grabs half the spice rack, runs between his comrades and throws a pinch of this and that into their concoctions: he pops paprika into Marilyn pizza base, and dumps whole peppercorns into Evan sauce.

Before Marilyn has time to respond, Evan (with only a vague notion of what he is doing) has poured the sauce over the pizza base.

Marilyn, by habit, more than anything, sprinkles oregano onto it. She ceremoniously slides the pizza into the oven.

Oh well, looks like we’re having spicy chocolate pizza (with oregano). It is neither Chicago cuisine, nor is it the confectionery that Evan is more used to. John is slightly horrified (but fascinated).

The meal and its making are, however,

1. novel
2. a result of accepting available resources (including people)
3. a result of competing and cooperative gestures (a negotiation in real-time)
4. neither authorial, nor the denial of agency
5. neither pre-planned, nor the result of pure chance
6. a result of individual desires…
7. …yet of accepting what it can be

Now substitute environment, context and instrumentation for the kitchen with its appliances and ingredients, and substitute improvising musicians for hungry amateur chefs.

play

Felt the group played well. Nothing specific to add other than we’re quicker off the mark than week zero.

This is actually the first time I play in the 2008–2009 Safety First class. Like I’ve said elsewhere, I’m a little stuck in this post-Campbell pseudo-bluegrass mode. (Doesn’t help that my right arm ain’t quite there yet.)

discussion

(Note for future: we need to move away from talking generals, and get down to specifics in our discussions. Hopefully, examining Taylor and Oxley’s performance will help that.)

Andrea asks “were we listening?”

where are we

How does the class feel about where we are? Kevin says we are making progress.

Where are we headed? Andrea: “definitely a different place from where we started.”

Where are we?

consensus

Kevin brought up the notion of consensus (as the process that drives, or goal of, improvisation). Our online discussion continued along the following line

Kevin: …It comes from the group’s consensus…. Maybe a better way to put it would be that the music is the group coming to a consensus….

Han: If it’s a matter of consensus, the question in a sense becomes, who (helps to) makes the consensus if not you?

Kevin: The other performers and the audience?

Han: But if the other performers are, say, all waiting for the others to make the consensus, are you not stuck in a loop? Can a consensus be reached if everyone is just waiting for it to happen?

How do you find consensus if we’re all waiting for the other person? If we’re all reactive how are we going to go anywhere?

“shedding habits”

Paul had said in the second class, in response to the question, that he desires to shed habits. If the goal is to shed habits, why not do whatever you want to do (or do anything (at all))?

play: do whatever you want to do

discussion

Good? Bad?

How did that improvisation compare with the very first improvisation of the class? (Play recording of the first improvisation.) Were the performers listening intently in that first improvisation? and if so, was that advantageous in comparison to everyone doing their own thing?

Kevin thinks yes, but qualifies that something in between those would be best.

Where is that?

leaders and followers?

Orthodox (West European) musical ensemble pedagogy’s model is of leader (conductor, composer, etc) and followers (good musicianship is following). Does the world break down into leaders and followers? Can we be something else other than the leader or the pack?

Andrea says yes, it’s about “finding a balance”.

Paul says he finds it very difficult to “shake-off the past”. But how can you get consensus if you don’t bring yourself (including your past) to the table? We each want something, and what we want is part of our trainings, our histories, our traditions.

(Kevin brings up a double call-and-response scheme. This has the idea of contrasts and juxtapositions hidden there, I ignore this (sorry, Kevin), but we’ll probably return to this.)

audience and perception

Andrea says that notions, such as consensus, are subjective. (He brings up the point of audience and reception. I promise we will return to these ideas of subjective and partial in reading and reception.)

play: duo plus the guy doing his own shtick

Andrea and Kevin do a duo, ignore me, I do my own thing.

discussion

Paul didn’t like it. I was overpowering the group (sorry, my bad). He brings up the word ‘unified’ (as a desirable trait), but adds

Paul: I wanted to hear different things.

What do we mean by reacting? In ‘normal’ music, the bass player, say, is in the bass register, the piccolos are stratospheric; the performers are (apparently) not together. If they were in the same space, the music would collapse. Is that what we mean by reacting (to occupy the same space)? Is ‘being together’ or call-and-response all we have; the only possibilities?

Andrea found it hard to discern if he was reacting to me or not (i.e. interaction is subjective). In which case, does it really matter if I respond (if we’re going to hear a ‘response’ regardless of intention)?

Kevin: No.

Han: Then what do you have left?

Kevin: What you’re doing and what the other guy is doing.

play: duo (two soloists)

Paul and I play, trying our best to ignore each other.

discussion

Andrea thought (imagined?) he could hear interaction. Goes on to say that, when he plays with Kevin, he sometimes occupies the same space, other times, creates contrast. Return to that question: does that mean we can do anything we want?

ego

What do you bring to the negotiating table? Personal/collective histories? Prejudices? Egos? (Paul is suspicious of egos?)

other business

Andrea asks about the topology of the group/class (clockwise, Andrea, Owen (me in this case), Kevin and Paul). I reply that we’re trying to keep things simple for the moment. We may have to return to this issue at a later date depending on how much progress we’ve made on other issues.

homework

Consider Cecil Taylor and Tony Oxley’s ‘Stylobate 1′ (from Leaf Palm Hand) and see if we can talk about it in terms of ‘diplomacy’ and in terms of ‘ego’, or tradition, or (personal/collective) histories. Also see if we can reverse engineer what they are doing, and how they are doing what they are doing.