We tackled two major elements during this class:

1. getting to get the class to crit
2. how to end and improvised performance

The Big Crit

the good

Play: there’s a several minute stretch of discussion by Andrea, Owen and Paul after the first improvisation. I don’t need to add anything to this; we’re talking about our work.

But…

the bad

Play: are we happy with that? (Our contract made during our first class was to be frank and critical of our work.)

Andrea says we have room for improvement. Owen asks how we might improve. Andrea suggests through more playing and discussion. …But our discussions pretty much exclusively fixated on our successes, and we’re afraid to discuss, in specifics, our less desirable traits—our flaws, our failures, our near and not-so-near misses. How are we going to achieve ‘high-quality’ performances if we don’t apply the same criteria that we bring to bear on the work of our elders and models?

We also tend to propose ‘solutions’ without fully specifying the problem, without asking what is wrong with what we are doing? what dissatisfies us about our current state / performance?

(This will potentially, and eventually, relate to examining criteria.)

the ugly

Kevin: we could be more pig headed.

Owen: did not like my playing. (Excellent! a proper crit!) “The jazz parts put me off.” But if you didn’t like my playing, what could you do to stop me? (An unasked question: what could you have done to redirect, redefine or subvert my playing?)

My crit: I don’t trust the group (but this is actually my problem, not the group’s fault). What sucked? I agree with Kevin, we performed like sheep. Paul could be more assertive, less polite; Kevin could demonstrate more nerve; Andrea could make strong statements by dropping out. We rarely do endings that go bang…

the art (craft? science? magic?) of ending

ending a

Andrea sees a convergence of agency [sorry, my paraphrase] between performers signaling an ending. But is that what’s really happening if, as we’ve discussed before, this kind of interaction, as observed from a third party, is extremely unreliable sign to navigate by.

Owen desires a more abrupt ending… What do you need to do to get that ending?

ending b

Owen feels a need for signals.

We’ve done a lot of ending in the last few weeks, so we are capable of doing endings. What is the mechanism?

Kevin rephrases this question: how do you signify an ending? (This is an interesting, and telling, way to think about the problem… wonder where this leads to.)

Andrea: stop playing, and wait for the others to stop. Certainly works (this is a pretty good answer).

Kevin talks about leaving your options open for coming back in if the others do not take the exit. However, if I guessed what Kevin was doing, and I sabotaged it, what’s happens then?

Andrea brings up the audience as creator of meaning and possibly somehow the arbitrator of the ending. (But how?)

(The answer to our question is between Kevin and Andrea’s statements.)

If two performers desire different kinds of endings, what happens? What can you do in that situation?

ending c

This one, for me, sounded cool. None of us got quite what we wanted, but the results were interesting. (Something to return to.)

How was that? did it suck? was it better? We’re good at describing what happened, but not so willing to make ‘quality’ assessments.

Andrea talks about an ending being a consensus or compromise. Andrea is on to something here: the last improvisation, for him, felt like “we’re have an ending; oh no, we don’t; oh yes, we have… everyone did their own ending… it was cool in a sense, but it was also… forced. Or not an ending as such. [emphasis mine]” Some of this was desirable (“it was cool in a sense”), but held back by some other notion of an ending (“not an ending as such”). Where does this other notion of an ending come from (this ‘real’ / ‘true’ / ‘authentic’ ending)? And if we don’t push this somewhere (“forced”), if we don’t make it happen, then how does the music happen? (Andrea thinks the music can happen without the group making it happen.)

Me: “You’ve actually articulated the idea [of how endings work]… but we’re stuck on this one word [actually two] which is ‘false ending’… There is no double bar line… but we can end, which I agree is magical, but like magicians… the person doing it knows full well that there’s a sleight of hand.” Are we unwilling to open the hood and examine the engine? Improvisation can appear magical (is magical), but are we afraid to loose this sense of magic by examining the sleight of hand?

other notes

Are we imagining a preordained ending? (If we are, is this a useful concept?)

An unanswered question: Kevin, last week, expressed a possible improvisative tactic as “continue as you mean to go on”. Why? Why would you continue as you mean to go on?

Owen suggests prepared elements several times during this class. I’m resisting this: prepared means (scores, compositions, etc) are useful things to bring to improvised music, but, as stated in the first class, we are not going to be dealing with them (at least during this first term). I want to see what is possible within an open improvisative context before resorting to other means.

Andrea, like last week, brings up the word ‘control’. Do we not have significant amounts of control (25% share/stake in a quartet, 20% in a quintet)? Is there a question of responsibility for our performance? it seems to me that we cannot hold anyone else to account for the music…

homework

Listening to some endings:

Anthony Braxton and Evan Parker, ‘ParkBrax 5’ (from Duo (London) 1993).
Derek Bailey, George Lewis and John Zorn, ‘On Golden Pond’ and ‘The Warning’ (from Yankees).
Marilyn Crispell and Gerry Hemingway, ‘Billy Duck’ and ‘Jump’ (from Duo).

general comments

I did a little too much of a lecture in class (I suspect the desire to play more and talk less is a response to this).

I also somewhat jumped the gun, indicating the exit out of our current dilemma. I wonder if this will turn out to be a mistake: the last thing I want is for the class to regress into a model in which the teacher generates direction. I hope everyone holds on to their responsibilities (and I don’t exercise too much executive control).

Playing wise, for me, this is the class when we hit it, and it really starts to cooking. (I have no real explanation for this, but I’m also interested that no previous Safety First course has hit such a high mark so soon into the course.) It remains to be seen whether we can keep this up, or if the spark, fired by the various revelations (and reevaluations) of this week’s class basically die down. Either way, the next few weeks shall be interesting.

towards a improvisative tactic

Quick summary of the dilemma: avoid both the autocratic command-and-follow model and the Cagian denial of agency. …and can we (and should we) bring our egos, histories, prejudices, etc to the negotiating table?

What do you want to do? Kevin say talk about Taylor and Oxley.

reverse engineering Stylobate 1

Kevin: Oxley just keeps on following Taylor.

Kevin talk us through what Oxley is doing. Here, Oxley picks out this from Taylor; here he picks something else out.

Question: but what about the other moments when Oxley’s playing doesn’t correspond to Taylors?

Andrea says his initial impression was also that Oxley was following Taylor, but then began to hear the reverse as well.

The rhythm sometimes ‘locks-in’, other times it does not.

How is Oxley following Taylor.

Kevin hears a myriad of ways in which Oxley follows Taylor (imitation, accentuation, etc).

Owen hears Taylor as the dominant voice—the leader.

Question: that’s what it sounds like, but is that how it’s constructed. What’s the underlying mechanism? (Note to myself: we should try and separate audience POV and the reverse engineering of performances.)

Kevin: Perhaps Oxley is accompanying Taylor.

Question: What do you mean by accompaniment? (I didn’t ask this in class, but the question, in a sense, is what does it mean to accompany, when idiom, and style (the usual reference points for this kind of break down of roles) is up in the air?)

Kevin: following… trying to compliment.

demonstration of accompanying

Duo: Kevin as Oxley, Owen as Taylor.

Sounded good. Very interesting playing.

Andrea and I had a hard time deciphering who was accompanying who.

what’s the Oxley algorithm?

What generates that complexity [of response]?

Kevin suggests that Oxley takes his cues from Taylor selectively.

Question: Under what conditions does he take his cues?

my take on what’s happening

Taylor is jump-cutting between several contrasting, distinctive ideas/gestures. Oxley also jumps between contrasting ideas/gestures, locking his changes with (what he perceives to be) Taylor’s changes.

They are, in a sense, missing out the aesthetic or idiomatic ‘judgment call’ (“he’s done that, ergo, I’m going this”).

Thus, sometimes the music ‘locks’ and other times he doesn’t.

Talk very briefly about how the performer’s negotiations are partial (e.g. Oxley’s take on when Taylor makes a jump is subjective). May need to return to this idea…

the audience and ‘active listening’

We return to the idea that the audience’s interpretation of the onstage relationships is subjective. Thus, as performers, all we need to do is generate a certain degree of complexity, and the audience hears the rest. In reference to Andrea’s notion of ‘active listening’, I add that audiences are active because they actively create meaning. Performers delegate responsibility to the audience, the audience (partially) creates the relationships onstage.

play: try out the algorithm

Trio: Andrea, Kevin and Owen.

Playing wise, for me, this was a high point of the course thus far. High-energy, interesting and complex; as audience, the relationships and negotiations were just that little bit out of grasp (that’s a good thing).

Andrea liked having a tactic: not worry too much about shaping the music. I say that the shape should sort itself out if you do your part. (There’s my tired soccer game metaphor…)

what does Taylor do?

Given Oxley’s tactic, talk briefly about what Taylor’s responses might be. Kevin: prolog a ‘section’ if he likes what Oxley’s doing, etc. We really need to return to some of these ideas because they are at the core of real-time tactics and musical negotiations.

egos, histories, etc.

Following on from last week’s discussions, briefly cover the idea that selflessness is often synonymous with musicianship, and how this may be a problematic idea in group improvisation.

Andrea: Oxley is slightly less egotistical.

Yes, but Oxley is keeping his own identity: he is not subsumed into Taylor’s gestures in a straightforward way. Oxley’s moves are his own, and Taylor’s has to deal with the resultant—Taylor’s life is not made easier by Oxley’s choices.

Andrea: in this music, the self is more necessary than in others. You need to bring yourself (material, background, ego) to the group.

(A peripheral issue that I didn’t say: I think Andrea’s right, but with one modifier: in other musical practices, the self is just as important, but we like to pretend it isn’t. In other words, we often value music, and musicality, that is unmarked.)

You can, and I think it would be good to, bring other traditions and idioms to the performance. You can play the Delta blues, but you cannot expect others to necessarily join in.

play

Quartet: Andrea, Han, Kevin and Owen.

We have a cooky, dramatic little ending: ppp flutters from Owen, just when it threatens to die down, I interject, others join in, etc.

what are we doing next week?

Now what? Owen: less talk, more play. Han: play until we come across a problem.

first impressions

Small group (quartet), a significant change to the 9+ class sizes of the past. Four is the magic number in these context (maybe we’ll discuss this in future classes), but for now, all I can say is… we have a band (2 treble instruments, bass and drums). How weird is that?

identity politics

All male class (all white, but, hey, this is Cork). Why is that? What happened to all the female students this year?

background and prior experience

No one in the group comes from a complete no-prior-experience-of-improvisation background. Does this mean the group has a head start, or that we come with baggage we need shed? How much are our habits (and as improvisers and performers we all have tricks we rely upon from time to time) going to be benefits or liabilities in the coming weeks?

introductions and contract

Everyone got to introduce themselves and state what they expect from the course. Whole bunch of issues came up which we’ll be returning to in the coming weeks:

• interaction: stimulus and response, choices, etc.
• freedom
• restrictions and limits
• boundaries (and responsibilities?)
• (personal) expression

Paul brings up the concept of process (his word) and interaction (mine). We’re starting in a good place here.

Owen is looking for freedom—freedom away from stylistic (idiomatic?) limits, and freedom in terms of ‘expression’. How’s that for a list of interesting and problematic terms? Plenty to go on….

first improvisation

First impressions: very polite.

Found the interventions of Kevin dramatic, and as was Owen’s absence. (Learned that Andrea’s listening is based on an almost LCR or surround sound system.)

The group is good at gauging duration (a request for five minute came in just under), so we probably won’t have to spend too many classes dealing with that issue. (We will likely need to deal with the issue of how to start and how to end of course….)

discussion

This, for me, is when the group starts to shine. Andrea brings up ‘choices’, Kevin wonders about the initial impulse that cascades through the group. We’re not quite in a position to articulate a lot of these ideas in a pragmatic fashion yet, but we’re entering interesting areas.

final improvisations

Notice that Andrea and Paul are very much into their instruments, while Kevin and Owen (especially Owen) are very much looking around at the group (visually driven?). So I requested that Kevin and Owen don’t look at the group, and Andrea and Paul to look up from their instruments.

Now that was interesting wasn’t it? what’s the mechanism here? what happene?

Unfortunately ran out of time. (Maybe return to this later…)

other business

Blog / class diary. Class volunteered to be frank about criticisms, etc. (I’m personally a little nervous about this: people often say they want the ugly truth until they get it.) Propose that we start by being civil on the blog, and then see what happens.

Oh, and the blog will be public. (Nothing like living dangerously.) I will, however, refrain from posting certain information up here: actual assessment (grades), attendance records, etc.

for next week

Question: Why improvisation? Of all the myriad of was to construct / perform / do music, why improvise?

How do we proceed?

• Plan A: we do a Karate Kid, paint some fences. I lay out a bunch of exercises…
• Plan B: freeform. Much more exciting, but much riskier. Class generates direction (I only mark the exit points).

Primary thing to note is that the student/instructor relationship (and responsibilities) will be different depending on the model we choose.

Had some discussion on this, and we’ll vote on this next Wednesday.