Villavicencio, C. (2008) - The Discourse of Free Improvisation. A Rhetorical Perspective On Free Improvised Music (Doctoral Dissertation, PHD Thesis.

The Discourse of Free Improvisation
A Rhetorical Perspective on Free Improvised Music
Cesar Marino Villavicencio
School of Music, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
PhD Thesis
2008
This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with the author and that no quotation from the thesis, nor any information derived therefrom, may be published without the authors prior, written consent.
Th e Disco urs e of F ree Im p ro visati on
Ces ar Villavi cen cio
Truly free, yet in constant obligation: Circumscribed; but not servile Johann Mattheson
Acknowledgements To my wife, Camila, who had to learn quite a bit of my work and for her patience in dealing with some stressful moments. To my little girls, Luiza and Marina, whose lives is truly an inspiration for me. Also, without the care and support of my parents, Vera and Marino, this would not have been possible. To Jonathan Impett. I am extremely grateful to Frits Wils for his great help in developing this thesis. To my brother Jorge Villavicencio, Clarence Barlow, Richard Barrett, Evan Parker, Henk Heuvelmans, Rodrigo Sigal, Fernando Iazzetta, Rogrio Costa, David Borgo, Francisco Colasanto, Carlos Lpez Charles, Aslaug Holgersen, Krista Vincent, Diego Espinosa, Julien Chauvin, Johan van Kreij, Lex van den Broek, Joost Diergaarde, Paul Schenkels, Juan Parra, Veera Devi Khare, Jason Slaughter, Nikolas James, Luke Kestner, Enrique Menezes, Nelson Carneiro, Gustavo Sarzi, Fabricio Pires, Tnia Lanfer, Rafael Ramalhoso, Jos Lenidas, Fbio do trombone, Juan Enrique Bobadilla, Waldemar Aguilar, Marcia de la Luz Ortiz, Ixchel Mendez Salmon, Netzahualcoyotl Rodriges Arcos, Jesmar Garcia lvarez, William Brent, Jason Ponce, Jonathan Piper, Joe Bigham, Shanti Harris, Colter Frazier, Devin Burke, Jonathan Ventura, David Landes, Tim Beutler, Rami Gabriel, James Ilgenfritz, and Charity Chan.
Abstract
How can we talk about free improvised music? Would it be possible to teach free improvisation? It seems that because of the absence of pre-specified rules and prescriptive materials, this practice presents itself as impermeable to analysis. Also, developing guidelines for teaching free improvised music may be considered difficult. This study presents rhetoric as a suitable area for establishing a discourse on free improvisation. Rhetoric is being tested in understanding this music in structural and intentional terms. Using the combination of examining the author's own development as improviser, and the results from seven improvisation projects, this investigation has set out to propose that the social environment in which this music activity is realised is crucial for understanding this practice. The creation of form and content collectively has uncovered ethics as the primary force in establishing the style of free improvised music. Ethics, the driving force in rhetorical theory, helps us to understand this music aesthetically, opening ways for the development of pedagogical approaches. It appears that the realisation of this activity is important for developing individual expressiveness and may be a model for a new music educational system.
PART I CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK .....................................................................9 1 Introduction .......................................................................................................................9 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 2 Modes of Discussion.............................................................................................. 12 Education ................................................................................................................ 14 FIM and Social Dynamics ..................................................................................... 20 Programme of the Study ........................................................................................ 28
Objectives. Why is it Difficult to Analyse Free Improvised Music? ......................... 31 2.1 Instrumental Techniques Free of what? ......................................................... 42
Historical Considerations .............................................................................................. 46 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 Rhetoric as a Concept and Tool: Its Origins and Evolution through the Ages .. 47 Jazz.......................................................................................................................... 55 Late 20th Century Western European Music ........................................................ 60 Considerations in the use of Technology.............................................................. 68
Current Limits of the Discourse in FIM ....................................................................... 76 4.1 Concluding Observations....................................................................................... 83
PART II METHODOLOGY ......................................................................................... 85 5 Framework for the Analysis and Operational Study of Rhetoric Applied to FIM .... 85 5.1 5.2 5.3 The Bond between Developing and Learning ...................................................... 89 Revisiting Rhetorical Figures ................................................................................ 93 Rhetoric in Music. Intention and Structure. ......................................................... 97
5.3.1
Rhetorical Figures and their Analogy in FIM............................................. 106 Figures of Intentional Imitation ........................................................... 107 Figures of Structural Imitation............................................................. 112 Figures of Illustration ........................................................................... 114 Figures of Silence ................................................................................. 124 Figures of Time..................................................................................... 130
5.3.1.1 5.3.1.2 5.3.1.3 5.3.1.4 5.3.1.5 5.4 5.5
The Classical Structure or Dispositio ................................................................. 135 The Virtues of Style: Ethics, Decorum, Kairos and Audience.......................... 142 Vices.............................................................................................................. 153 Stylistic Vices ....................................................................................... 155
5.5.1
5.5.1.1 6
How Rhetoric Addresses the Unspoken in FIM ........................................................ 158
PART III HEURISTIC DISCOVERIES................................................................... 164 7 Individual Experiences ................................................................................................ 164 7.1 The e -recorder ..................................................................................................... 164 Dartington, 2000........................................................................................... 166 The Hague, 2002 .......................................................................................... 178 Belfast, 2006 ................................................................................................. 184
7.1.1 7.1.2 7.1.3 7.2 7.3 8
University of California San Diego (UCSD) (April, 9 11, 2007) .................. 192 Lessons Learned ................................................................................................... 199
Group Laboratories. Prescriptive and Pedagogical Strategies. ................................. 201 8.1.1 The Royal Conservatory, The Hague.......................................................... 201 MODULUS II, THE HAGUE 2004 .................................................... 205
8.1.1.1 8.1.2 8.1.3
Universidade de So Paulo (USP)............................................................... 207 Universidade de So Paulo II (USPII) ........................................................ 210
8.1.4 8.1.5 8.1.6 8.2
University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV).................................................. 211 Centro Mexicano para la Msica y las Artes Sonoras (CMMAs)............. 213 University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB) ........................................ 214
Lessons Learned ................................................................................................... 216
PART IV CONCLUSION............................................................................................ 220 9 10 11 Results and Roads for the Future ................................................................................ 220 Bibliography............................................................................................................... 231 APPENDIX ................................................................................................................ 238 11.1 11.2 11.3 11.4 11.5 11.6 11.7 AUDIO SAMPLES DVDR............................................................................ 238 AUDIO SAMPLES CDR 1 ............................................................................ 238 AUDIO SAMPLES CDR2 ............................................................................. 240 Daniel Landau COR (Composition Organ Recorder) (1998). ..................... 241 Erik Stalenhoef YIDAKI (1998).................................................................... 242 Cesar Villavicencio MODULUS II (2004). .................................................. 243 Aria: Erbarme Dich , Johann Sebastian Bach ................................................... 244
PART I CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
Introduction In the course of my life I have dedicated special attention to aspects of music creation that involve the discovery and presentation of new ideas. Setting up the tools for developing the work presented here revealed connections with another of my activities, namely the development of new understandings of historically informed performance of the music of the 18th century1 or, as identified by Bruce Haynes, Rhetorical music.2 The connections between free improvised music and early practices reside in the need to develop suitable methods for establishing a discourse. To understand how to interpret and perform rhetorical music it is imperative to change the conventions established for the analysis of music written after the 18th century. This also applies to free improvised music in the sense that conventional systems, used for the analysis of written compositions, do not seem to be fully adequate. Whilst for addressing rhetorical music today there is already a consistent body of work that presents better methods for its analysis,3 for free improvised performances there is still a lack of discourse in appropriate terms. The hypothesis of this investigation is that rhetoric affords a suitable discourse for understanding the generative processes and the structures of free improvised music.
The investigation set to comprehend the original environment and to re-create the modus operandi of this music began during the end of the 1940s. The task involves the reconstruction of instruments based on original plans, the study of written sources of that period, re-editing scores from the originals, etc. Haynes explains that the concept of Early music and instruments was set in the early 80s to reveal them as exceptional and exotic. But since its aura of alternative music or, as he puts it, organic music (e.g. as for tomatos), has faded away to the point that in todays CDs you rarely see advertised the use of historical instruments. The use of Early does not refer to anything. He says that, From now on, Ill call it by this new name, Rhetorical music. Haynes (2007) p. 12. We have translations and new editions of books on style written during the baroque period (Mathesson 1739, Geminiani 1751, Muffat 1695, C. Ph. E. Bach 1753, Quantz 1752, etc.) and a consistent body of new studies (Buelow 1980, Donington 1982, Butt 1994, Harnoncourt 1984 and 1995, Tarling 2005, Haynes 2002 and 2007, etc.).
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I view the simultaneous conception and performance of free improvised music as an activity that is inevitably linked to concepts related to arrangement or the preoccupation with structuring the invention. Although this may represent an apparent paradox, musicians and listeners have the tendency to find structures in the music they create and perceive respectively. Rather than taking a polarised perspective of this musical practice considering it the unsystematic result of spontaneity as opposed to methodical musical composition I consider the products of free improvised performances as the outcome of a process in which inherent structural issues are involved. It is also worth noticing that even if it were possible to produce music without structure, it would become an antistructure, which is then again a new structure in itself. In this case, Derek Baileys modus operandi of non-idiomatic performance might be the best example. To create something that does not expose any reminiscence of other styles of music is an achievement in itself, and most certainly Bailey was knowledgeable about styles in order to perform outside their stylistic ranges. Then again, the results of his music reveal a new particular form with a characteristic mode of action. The work here presented accepts the hypothesis that there is an intrinsic search for structure in the performance of free improvised music (FIM). We could think of FIM as a music-compositional activity in which the creators may do whatever they like. The difference between FIM and written music composition is that the compositional activity of the former is influenced by relationships of group performance, and most importantly by the absence of the concept of perpetuation of the work of art. Contrary to written compositions, FIMs products do not entail a preoccupation with becoming works for the future. In this sense there is some similarity with the ideology of compositions from the period of rhetorical music. Lydia Goehr has pointed out how the conventional western concept of work does not apply in pre-classical music. She tells us that It mattered much more that the music satisfied or lived up to the demands of the
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occasion.4 It could be argued that audio recordings of FIM represent a preoccupation with the posterity of the work of art. However, in FIM presentations there are other aspects to observe outside the aural, which are intrinsic and sometimes determinant in the performance. There are unique characteristics in the performances of FIM such as the observation of gestures and the publics potential of altering the course of performance. These elements are only alive during the performances. Consequently, applying the concept of work to FIMs products would not be accurate. In this introduction I shall refer to the various modes of musical dialogue in order to demonstrate the need for developing an appropriate discourse for FIM. Also, I will discuss educational issues with the purpose of addressing necessary changes for approaching FIM pedagogically. Additionally, I consider it pertinent to bring the technical, social, political and psychological aspects rooted in historical issues together, so as to provide a holistic view of this practice. In exposing how social dynamics have influenced FIM during its existence, I then allude to the inherent collaborative qualities of FIM and how this may even change the role of audiences. I describe then how and why rhetoric is an area suitable for addressing FIMs properties and consequently appropriate for establishing a discourse. The analytical process in this investigation has been directed towards drawing notions about purpose, method, ethics and value from both angles: the individual and the collective. The body of work is informed by a self-reflexive examination of my own development as improviser in which the analysis is focused on the changes brought by experience. Also, I examine several FIM projects that I have directed and in some of which I myself have played. Due to its heuristic characteristics, FIM ought to be analysed through an empiric methodology in order to build something of epistemological consistency, keeping in mind, however, that words are a limited medium and that the works of music themselves offer the best exposure of its elements.
Lydia Goehr (1992) p. 180.
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1.1
Modes of Discussion
One of the advantages of using rhetoric in developing analysis in FIM is that it allows us to base it on the observation of the intentional content of the music rather than only on the musical material itself. At this point, it is important to think how music is flexible in adapting itself to the diverse places humans have designated for it in history. In Medieval times, music was part of the Quadrivium,5 together with arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy. The Trivium was constituted by grammar, logic and rhetoric. Boethius in De Institutione Musica presents two aspects of music: one that describes the Pythagorean unity of mathematics and music, and another which illustrates the relationship between music and society.6 On the one hand there was the tendency to view music as having imbibed principles of arithmetic proportionality that were thought to govern the universe and everything in it,7 and on the other hand Boethius thoughts seemed to acknowledge a great inherent power of music in respect of human emotions and integrity,8 in keeping with the Platonic ideals that point to the dangers of musical experience.9 However, as Dewey tells us, Perhaps he [Plato] exaggerated when he said that a change from Doric to the Lydian mode in
Mark (2002) p.25 The term quadrivium was introduced by Boethius in his De Institutione Musica which remained the principal source of information about music as a mathematical subject for over a millennium. Mark (2002) p.25
6 7
Haar, James: Humanism. The Medieval Background. Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed 7/07/2007), http://www.grovemusic.com
8
Boethius, De Institutione Musica . Quoted in Mark (2002) p. 25. That music is related to us by nature, and that it can ennoble or debase our character. Plato, Republic p. 78. Rhythm and harmony permeate the inner part of the soul more than anything else In searching for the ideal kallipolis it seems that musics obscure abstract quality, which hides its true meaning if there be one, may be the most frightening thing of all for Plato. Here is this incoherent and amorphous phenomenon that undoubtedly produces immensely profound effects. When the goal is stasis, how does one respond to such an opaque and uncontrollable menace? In the end, his reaction to music is to drastically limit our experience of it. (Shane Perlowin, Plato and Censorship: A Descriptive Critique of the Limits of Musical Expression in Kallipolis, 2005)
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music would be the sure precursor of civic degeneration.10 Le Coat tells us about Boethiuss distinction between musica mundana, musica instrumentalis, and musica humana. The first he refers to as a practice concerned with the mathematical laws inherent in the concord of sounds and their bond with the harmony of the universe. The second, he says, is dealing with musical instruments, including human voice, by means of which various sounds are produced. The third concentrates on the human soul which unites the incorporeal activity of reason with the body.11 Chadwick writes that Boethius considered instrumental music the lowest of the hierarchy. He continues telling us that To Boethius human music means the blending of incorporeal soul and the physical body and that musica mundana is related to cosmic harmony holding together in consonance and equilibrium the four elements of earth, air, fire and water; or the cycle of the four seasons.12 Chadwick is also of the opinion that Boethiusis writing on musical theory without the least likelihood that he knows much of the practice of the art.13 This seems to suggest that the preoccupation of Boethius studies in music are in line with those of Plato, which were concerned with studying music as an abstract and pure science considering from musics dichotomy between theory and practice just the first in isolation. In the range of modes of talking about music, we can identify an approach with scientific criteria concerned with musical surface, musical gesture, and one focused on the emotional narrative. A mode of analysis based on rhetoric provides a method of inquiry that unites surface, gesture and the emotional qualities of music, yet also provides an idea of structure. Other modes of discussing FIM have perhaps been brought about by changes in music over time and its role in the globalised world of today, which have resulted in an amplification of its area of action. Using music as a medical
10 11 12 13
Dewey (1934) p. 8. Le Coat (1975) p. 16. Chadwick (1981) pp. 81- 82. Idem. p. 87.
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treatment, for example, claims the possibility of helping restless sleepers by recording an individual's brain waves and converting them into unique musical sounds.14 It is most likely that we will discover, through our creative and explorative processes, profitable cross-disciplinary fields.15 1.2 Education
The flexibility of, and permeability between, various areas might point to the need to reformulate things such as the role of art today, the way we create and perceive it and, also, the way we teach it and criticise it. That music education today faces new challenges, brought about by the influence of multidisciplinary approaches and the awareness of music of other peoples, and that there is a tangible need for substantial change, has been tacitly exposed.16 Jorgensen, for example, presents the idea of understanding music as a social as well as an individual experience, bringing in what she calls a dialectical view of music education. She tells us about the idea of a broader observation of music education which considers: musical form and context, transmission and transformation, continuity and interaction, making and receiving, understanding and pleasure, and philosophy and practice.17 These dialectics could eventually help to introduce a broader field of artistic music comprehension and criticism
These musical sounds correlate to brain waves that promote relaxation and trigger activation in your body. The musical sounds are presented to you in the form of two musical files - one relaxing, and one activating. They continue claiming that Playing those files promotes relaxation and activation in your body. From the Brain Music Therapy webpage: http://www.brainmusictreatment.com/. Accessed on 31/10/2007. New collaborative artistic forms such as image and sound, arquitecture and music (installations), theatre and music, are examples of that. Dr. eljko Obrenovi, a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centrum voor Wiskunde en Informatica (CWI) in Amsterdam, for example, developed what he called a Multimodal Human-Computer Interface for Tactical Audio Applications. He tells us that the Experiments have shown that acoustic presentation improves the quality of human-machine interaction and reduces error during guidance tasks. On-line source, http://homepages.cwi.nl/~obrenovi/projects.html#project_03b. Accessed on 31/10.2007. Jorgensen says that because of the rapid advances in technology, global communication has facilitated learning about the political, religious, economic, and social upheavals, that took place in remote parts of the world, almost instantaneously. This, she says, has cultural effects which raise compelling questions for music education internationally questions that have yet to be addressed fully whithin the community of music educators and that offer a rich basis on which to revise the profession. Jorgersen (1997) p. 71.
17 16 15
14
Jorgensen (1997) xiv.
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based on acknowledging the need for a combination of formalistic and functional angles. Other factors that perhaps would help to make judgments on consistency are historical consciousness, and a developed perceptive apparatus that combines the observation of intentionalities parallel to those that could be referred as the materials used in a performance. An imbalance in artistic perception happens because an observation made only through conceptual knowledge isolates the observer from human experience. Dewey affirms, The actual work of art is what the product does with and in experience. He also is of the opinion that The prestige of these products creates conventions that get in the way of fresh insight. 18 Once conventions have set, the audience expects something and ceases to be creative, which compromises the experience with reality. Before proceeding, I should try to explain the relevance of having a discussion on FIM in pedagogical terms. If we think about developing a system for establishing a discourse for FIM it is necessary to observe a set of materials that can be referred to as the product of invention. In composed written music, the discourse can be focused on the interpretation and delivery of pre-established materials set by the score. This is because the content of the score is fixed, and its form involves the interpretation and delivery of it. In FIM, however, the content (res) and form (verba) influence each other in the process of creating the music. The dynamics of delivery actually influence the content, which in turn affects the delivery and so on, creating random interactive sequences. If, in FIM, verba the form that is linked to the delivery determines to a certain extent the arrangement of the invention, and is itself shaped by the collective interactive dynamics of the group, then we may deduce that any attempt to develop a critical analysis in FIM ought to take both angles into consideration. Focusing solely on the musical results or only in the interactive dynamics of a group playing FIM will give an incomplete picture of what it is really happening. Therefore, in order to harvest consistent material from the experimental laboratories that I have conducted for this investigation, it was necessary to devise some pedagogical
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Dewey (1934) p. 3.
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premises so as to gather material produced by a controlled" generative process. However, the challenge in setting up those premises was to harmonise them with the natural freedom and inherent experimental qualities of FIM. Susan Allen tells us, Once a learner understands clearly that an instructor is only an authority by way of experience, the avenues for co-education have been opened. A learner and instructor here may set forth the notion of examining a set of ideas or issues together, while the instructor, rather than delivering truths or platitudes, may guide the student toward avenues for research, thought, process and selfdiscovery.19 Consequently, a possible strategy for the elaboration of a pedagogical framework for FIM may well consider including lines that promote adopting a diversity of angles for individual experimentation. One way to obtain results and arrive at conclusions from experiments with group activities in FIM might be to focus on the form of the sonic outcome through an angle of interactive social dynamics. The content then is created in a group, for which reason it may be useful to examine the results according to the intensities provoked by different degrees of balance in collective artistic creation. The matter of polarising music analysis into investigating form in isolation from content seems to be the core of the problem of music education today.20 FIM embodies a symbiotic relationship between content and form, or, in rhetorical terms: res and verba, respectively. Maybe the challenge in music education today is to devise ways to transcend cultural boundaries in order to approach the task of evaluating not only FIM but non-western music as well. Accepting content and form in a balanced combination by ceasing to rely primarily on the contextualisation of music, and allowing expression to be part of the analysis, might be one step forward into finding a new model for music education in a globalised society. If we think about the expressions that art
From Susan Allens website: http://music.calarts.edu/~susie/teaching_philosophy.html accessed on 28/08/2007. In all institutions where I have studied, the way I was tought to analyse a Mozart symphony, for instance, was solely directed towards revealing the division of phrases, periods, the hamonic skeleton, etc. A limited attention was given to the expressive elements that those pieces may carry to the public.
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generates as an activity that reflects what is happening in our societies through the experiences the artist has with the environment, we could also think that art education should somehow gather the necessary elements to observe art as an experience linked to a perception in reality with reality. Dewey tells us that, A conception of fine art that sets out from its connection with discovered qualities of ordinary experience will be able to indicate the factors and forces that favour the normal development of human activities into matters of artistic values.21 Dewey also affirms, Experience occurs continuously, because the interaction of live creature and environing [sic] is involved in the very process of living. Under conditions of resistance and conflict, aspects and elements of the self and the world that are implicated in this interaction qualify experience with emotions and ideas so that conscious intent emerges.22 Deweys concept of resistance is based on the need of obstacles for transforming what he calls impulsion into expression. Impulsions, he tells us, are the beginnings of complete experience because they proceed from need23 He also explains that for impulsion to be transformed, or rather distilled, into an expression impulsion also meets many things on its outbound course that deflect and oppose it. In the process of converting these obstacles and neutral conditions into favouring agencies, the live creature becomes aware of the intent implicit in its impulsion.24 While impulsion is the movement of the whole organism, impulse, he affirms, is specialized and particular; a part of the mechanism involved in a complete adaptation with the environment.25 The concept of resistance presented by Dewey seems to describe the symbiotic relationship between res and verba when he affirms the artist is controlled in the process of his work by his grasp of the
21 Dewey (1934) p.11. Dewey also says that No matter whether the artists affects to be a stranger or an enemy to the society that surrounds him, he can never succeed to cut himself off from it absolutely. Quoted in Gaultier (1913) p. 159. 22 23 24 25
Dewey (1934) p. 35. Dewey (1934) p. 58. Dewey (1934) p. 59. Dewey (1934) p. 58.
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connection between what he has already done and what he is to do next.26 In this embodiment of the attitude of a receiver by the artist, the experience becomes the relationship between doing and undergoing.27 Dewey tells us that prior experiences induce reflection upon the experience resulting from the impulsion, one that does not know where it is going. This reflection represents a resistance which helps in converting a direct forward action into re-flection; what is turned back upon is the relation of hindering conditions to what the self possesses as working capital in virtue of prior experiences.28 A possible measure for making music education today a more holistic activity, and thus a complete experience, might be to direct the learning process to promote, together with the accumulation of knowledge regarding instrumental technicalities and the mastering of musical styles, strategies that encourage students to explore the historical, social and psychological aspects that influence the realisation of art. Conceivably, this would sponsor depth of thought and resistance to emerge. There are also factors that have conditioned the production and perception of art such as the changes brought by mass production and the revolution in technology. According to Benjamin, That which withers in the age of mechanical reproduction is the aura of the work of art.29 By aura Benjamin refers to the elements that become compromised in a reproduction, isolating the work of art from tradition and the uniqueness of existence. He gives us an example: The poorest provincial staging of Faust is superior to a Faust film in that, ideally, it competes with the first performance at Weimar.30 Based on Benjamins idea we could say that the mere reproduction of the outer elements of an artistic object does not reproduce its aura, because the existence of it might depend on the presence of Deweys concept of resistance. As I have explained,
26 27 28 29 30
Dewey (1934) p. 45. Dewey (1934) p. 44. Dewey (1934) p. 60. Benjamin (1968, p. 221) Ibid.
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resistance is presented by Dewey as a sort of catalyst needed for producing artistic quality. In this sense, quality points towards not measuring effort or time in the production of an object but allowing resistance to exist and creating the ideal balance between rich levels of depth with the more superficial decorative levels. The latter, isolated from the full context, is what the qualitative core of todays commercial production machinery has the tendency to present; a strategy that envisions the future of their enterprises as one that renders the biggest possible audience to their products primarily for monetary interests. In the case of a musician resistance may be represented by his instrumental technical control and by a self-criticism that results from embodying in himself the attitude of the perceiver while he works. 31 The relevance of thinking about concepts such as Deweys resistance and Benjamins aura in FIM resides in the lack of preformulated material. For example, the musical score, or any pre-formulated set of rules, offers resistance to the interpreter. Deciphering pre-set elements for musical interpretation represents a sort of filter which can become the necessary resistance so that both expression and aura may be obtained. The manifestation of resistance in FIM, rather than being an evident element, such as in a score, manifests itself in other ways that seem to be linked to ethical issues related to the collective quality of this practice.32
31 32
Dewey (1934) p. 48.
Under the Chapter Ethics, Decorum and Audience I explain in more detail the relation of ethics and style.
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1.3
FIM and Social Dynamics
Smith and Dean observe that a characteristic of improvised music is that it breaks with principles of tradition and modernistic values of permanence.33 In order to understand this concept, some of the ideas about the meaning of postmodernism ought to be presented. Postmodernism has been described in many ways, but, after the Fifties, it is usually regarded as a social and cultural, rather than purely artistic, phenomenon.34 Gerhard Hoffmann explains that The proliferation of designations may diffuse the contours of postmodernism, but it also indicates the wide spread of the post-situation into all spheres of life.35 He continues telling us something new has occurred, but is finding it difficult to crystallize into a defining entity of its own. Unity is here multiplicity of collage without hierarchy. Pluralism is the catchword, pluralism of viewpoints and definitions.36 We may consider the practice of a creative activity through the concept of permanence as something that is not prearranged to change and therefore incompatible with FIMs idea of creating in a collaborative, plural and flexible environment. Another postmodernist idea comes from Judy Lochhead when she considers the changes in the concepts of time and space as relevant for thinking about music. She tells us that because of the technological developments, the rapidity of world travel, and the accessibility of far away places and long-ago times; knowledge has become situated rather than absolute.37 From this perspective, postmodernist thought is based on non-absolute truth in which the
The improvisor engages with process and change rather than permanence Improvisation is concerned with processes rather than products, it is social rather than solipsistic. Smith & Dean (1997) p. 25.
34 35
33
Smith & Dean (1997) p. 16.
Hoffmann mentions that the period up to the end of the Eighties, has not only been called postmodern, but also, post-social, post-historical, post-ideological, post-utopian, post-political, post-fascist, post-aesthetic, post-development, post-revolutionary, post-colonial, post-industrial, post-cultural, post-metaphysical etc. Hoffmann (2005) p.35.
36 37
Hoffmann (2005) p.35. Lochhead (2002) p. 6.
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creator and receiver form together the meaning. If we consider the new category of musical concept proposed by FIM, it is evident that it harmonises with the postmodern thought which is referred to as a force contrary to modernistic concepts such as purpose, design, hierarchy, finished work, art object. Free improvisation is one contemporary artistic field that presents, apparently, a totally free platform for musical expression. It has roots in jazz and Western European music, and, with the incorporation of electronic technology, has put music closer to the world of sciences once more, surrounded by infinite possibilities for sonic creations. It seems that free improvisation is perceived sometimes as a kind of an outlaw musical movement because its aesthetics become alien for those who adopt a kind of position proper for listening and discerning about concert music or The Classical Canon.38 It may be worth considering that in order to perceive the musical results produced by free improvisation it is necessary to learn a different way of listening, taking into consideration that the performer of FIM is absorbed in a creative activity different from the interpretation of written compositions. The invention in FIM is continually changing in the course of performance because of an intricate system of connections between the players. In this sense, as Smith and Dean affirm, improvisation offers more scope for performers than they might have in composed forms: this permits change in composer/performer/audience relationship. Improvisation also provides a tool for collaboration between several individuals, be they creators, performers or audience/participants.39 Because of the strong collaborative ethical nature of this practice, the interaction between the improvisers is in itself something that might be useful to observe. The listener then is capable of participating by either supporting or dismissing actions taken
The Canonic ideology leads to a number of corollaries that form the basic assumptions of Classically oriented musicians. They include: great respect for composers, represented by the cults of genius and originality, the almost scriptural awe of musical works, an obsession with the original intentions of the composer, the practice of listening to music as ritual, the custom of repeating hearings of a limited number of works. Haynes (2007) p. 6.
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Smith & Dean (1997) p. 4.
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by the musicians, creating a parallel level of appreciation to the perception of sounds. Particularly, it has been a recurrent case while listening to a FIM presentation, to identify with the musical input of one or more performers. In my musical appreciation, any change made by those performers goes automatically through a process of evaluation, which result in either a positive, neutral or negative reaction. Consequently, free improvisation brings a new relationship between the performers and the audience profiling the public as potentially capable of altering the course of musical events. Borgo says that, Improvisation and other highly interactive art forms can foreshorten or even eliminate the distance between artist, audience, and work.40 The concept of giving to audiences an active role also harmonises with the inherent characteristics of rhetorical practice. In fact, rhetoric became obsolete in music when musicians were given a higher status and the performers own importance increased as an object of adulation.41 Maybe because of the separation between the artist and the audience, the objects of art began to acquire value as something separated from ordinary experience. But, as Dewey tells us, The factors that have glorified fine art by setting it upon a far-off pedestal did not arise within the realm of art nor is their influence confined to the arts. He continues saying that For many persons an aura of mingled awe and unreality encompasses the spiritual and the ideal while matter has become by contrast a term of depreciation, something to be explained away or apologized for.42 These factors could lead to some reluctance in accepting FIM as a valid form of artistic expression. This reluctance and the difficulty in understanding FIMs components using any existing critical methodology seem to suggest that this practice is still in its early stages of existence. However, it would be useful not only to consider FIMs new aesthetics and social interactivity but also other factors that are determinant, such as the
40 41 42
Borgo (2005) p. 87. Tarling (2005) p. 40. Dewey (1934) p. 6.
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questioning of social conventions in the aftermath of the Second World War. Borgo tells us that in Europe, the early years of free improvisation were often inspired by a rebellious attitude toward the accepted forms of modern music43 Free improvised musics aesthetics was very much influenced by the post-war counter-movement that embraced pacifist and anti-materialistic values aiming to expose the need for social change and the preoccupation with spiritual integrity. Already before WWII, experiments such as Dada44 and Surrealism pointed towards a direction of reformulating socio-political concepts and adopted an increasing emphasis on art as process. This interest in process was part of a larger reaction against the nineteenth century ideal of the creative process as it was symbolised in the concepts of genius, individuality, permanency and privacy.45 One of the characteristics of the improvisation movement during the sixties was the radical socialism that attracted many improvisers and that many artists then were politically aware and active, which produced an ideology of improvisation based on ideologies derived from the works of Freud, Goodman, Marx and values suggested by Eastern religions (e.g. Zen Buddhism).46 If we look into the depths of free improvisation it becomes apparent that its significance is greater than as a mere platform for musical expression. FIM establishes an emphasis on art as process in which human values and ethics play an important role. It is no surprise then that its inherent collective ethos reflected, for instance, Marxist principles of political equality and co-operation. It is important to note how this movement was significant in the sense that it defied the status quo by opposing censorship, war, inequalities, discrimination, commodification in an object-oriented-market and economic repression. It is not surprising that many musicians dedicated to this practice have expressed strong socio-political views. In his article The AACM in Paris, George
43 44
Borgo (2005) p. 87.
Dada performances at the Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich during the first world war often involved improvisation Smith & Dean (1997) pp. 11-12.
45 46
Smith & Dean (1997) p. 21. Smith & Dean (1997) p. 19.
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Lewis tells us that the AACM (Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians), founded in Chicago in 1965, was producing works that challenged the white-coded American experimental music movement to move beyond ethnic particularism toward the recognition of a multicultural, multiethnic base, with a variety of perspectives, histories, traditions and methods. Lewis also mentions, For many French intellectuals operating in the wake of May 1968, the dissonant sounds of free jazz asserted a radical break with Western social, political and economic hegemony.47 In an interview with Daniel Varela, Frederic Rzewski lets us know that at the Festivale Internazionale di Teatro Universitario there was an event organized by Jean Jacques Lebel in which Musica Elettronica Viva (MEV), the Living Theater and other people took part as well. It was a kind of happening and this was in March 1968People from the establishment and the authorities looked at this place full of people and all smoking good hash and they got a little freaked and decided to close the event taking off the electricity. MEV was playing and suddenly, there was no sound! The lights were off and Jean Jacques decided to go to the streets and take the event directly into the city but the next day, the University was occupied by the students- the action against the artists had an inflammatory effect. The basic idea of the text - remember, that was 1968 - was that we are living in a time of very rapid transitions in which older models guiding behaviour collapsed and were in crisis. So, there's very little time to construct new ones and it's necessary to find new forms for human relationships. Improvised music was a possible music to find these new things48 British composer Cornelius Cardew was also very much involved in politics. He embraced Marxism-Leninism and, as a performer, joined the Peoples Liberation Music (PLM) in 1974. He performed songs with the PLM on anti-fascist demonstrations and for the support of Irish people in
47
George Lewis, The AACM in Paris, Renaissance Noire Magazine. On-line source. http://aacmnewyork.com/text.html. Accessed 21/11/2007. Interview with Frederic Rzewski by Daniel Varela (2003). On-line source: http://www.furious.com/PERFECT/rzewski.html. Accessed 21/11/2007.
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their opposition to British imperialism.49 He wrote in Stockhausen Serves Imperialism: A composition is not an object to be evaluated but a force to influence the consciousness of living people as such it functions morally and politically.50 Presently, the political influence in FIM seems to be less palpable than during the 1960s. It also appears to have succumbed to commodification in the sense that there is quite an array of recordings, films and concert halls that present it. If we think on the subliminal importance of the political stand of improvisation during its early beginnings we could speculate that, at that time, any sort of attempt to engage in deep analysis of the practice in purely musical terms might have provoked aversion. This movement might have gone against some western compositional techniques. The excess of compliance with the scores (e.g. Dodecaphonism and serialism) constricted the interpreters activity. This rational way of creating music might have been associated with analysing music. Because of this, it looks as if establishing a discourse on FIM might have been regarded as losing ground to the rule-management system they were set to go against. Today, there is a lack of criticism in the FIM scene, which seems to reveal that some dogmatization is already happening. This dogmatization implies a silent agreement to avoid acknowledging the possibility of judging FIMs musical results qualitatively. Free improvisation is a practice that lacks any sort of pre-specified rules. However, this does not mean that the concept of free points towards a playwhatever kind of direction. In an interview with Charity Chan, Fred Frith tells us that, When you [improvise] with other people, then all kinds of social aspects come into play, and mostly the qualities that make a good improviser are not dissimilar to the ones that I appreciate in my friends: being a good listener, sensitivity to your social surroundings, being there when youre needed but knowing how to step back too, knowing when to be supportive, when to be
49 50
Cornelius Cardew Memorial Concert booklet. p. 21. Quoted in Cornelius Cardew Memorial Concert booklet. p. 17.
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assertive, when your opinion is valuable, when to just go along with something, when to insist! Patience. Tolerance. Openness.51 This ethos, I would suggest, is very influential in shaping the style of FIM. From a dialectical point of view it is possible to understand the process in which an improviser is involved. Gustavsen tells us that The sounding music is a product of the musician making music is an externalizing of the musician. Next, the sounding music is objective reality the components of music are objective entities. But now, the musician becomes a product of the music his or her being in the music shapes consciousness with form and matter from the musical landscape. Finally, this perception shaping the musician is in itself an active process in selecting, grouping and highlighting (as Gestalt theory and cognitive psychology show us), and thus, the circle is already back to where the musician is creating the music.52 Gustavsen describes this dynamic from an individual perspective so extra considerations should be made when grouping various individual dynamic creative fields. Apparently, if resistance is beneficial for the establishment of expression, then it might also help in obtaining an integrated musical outcome in collective improvisation. How to create resistance in the collective? Bastien and Hostager tell us that, By imposing particular limitations on the range of potential musical and behavioural choices available to performers, these structural conventions also serve as information that reduces individual uncertainty. They continue, Paradoxically, these structures enable collective musical innovation by constraining the range of musical and behavioural choices available to the players.53 Given that FIM has no specific rules as to how musicians should interact between themselves it must be clear that there is an inherent ethics that helps in building the musical discourse collectively. This collective artistic human interactivity is to a great extent unpredictable; this is why the application of existing methods for musical
51 52 53
http://quasar.lib.uoguelph.ca/index.php/csieci/article/view/293/617 accessed on 14/04/2008. Gustavsen (1999) p. 13.
Jazz as a process of organizational innovation by Bastien and Hostager in Organizational Improvisation Kamoche, K., Pina e Cunha, M., Cunha, J. V. (2002). p. 17.
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analysis in FIM is ineffective. Adorno says that a method should legitimate itself by adapting to its object concentrating on the light it sheds on it.54 This idea serves as an objective line in the elaboration of analytical tools for FIM; tools that could be adapted accordingly to both the aesthetics and dynamisms presented by this practice. Free improvisation also affords opportunities for collaborations with sciences in the use of computer technology for sound production and manipulation, and offers a rich field for cognitive psychology focused on analysing subjective creative behaviour. As it is recognized as a cultural phenomenon that has properties of its own as well as a specific audience, theatres where it is presented, producers, recordings, and magazines, FIM has to live today with the paradox of having to coexist with the commercial business and propaganda it so much repudiated during its early beginnings. However, this appears to represent the adaptability of this musical area to the changing environment. It seems that the pressure exerted by the environment continuously tests the flexibility of FIM in adapting, mutating and developing itself into becoming the musical area it represents in the contemporary music scene. To establish a discourse in FIM it is necessary to bring together concepts that are in tune with its inherent flexibility, with the structures result from spontaneity, with the succession of events, and with the use of a myriad of sounds. At the same time, a focus on FIM has to consider the influence of the relationships in collective creation and the importance of behaviour and ethics. So we have a musical practice that can use any sort of sound, any kind of instrument and interpreter, and where composing the music is the result of an intricate system that involves, in no particular order, invention, negotiation, organisation, development, refutation, imitation, complementation, support, discussion, etc. Since rhetoric in its abstraction seems to address many of these concepts, this work is presented as an exploration of the use of rhetoric as a discourse for FIM.
54
Adorno (1978) p. 1.
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1.4
Programme of the Study
The following sections will describe how it is fundamental to acknowledge the existence of a communication process in this practice before attempting to develop any sort of analysis using rhetoric. Part I deals with issues that seem to have influenced in the development of FIM. Also in this part I analyse how this musical practice is transforming the instrumental and perceptive aspects, making considerations with respect to the sui generis collaborative qualities inherent in this way of expressing ourselves through the use of sounds. In Chapter 1, I scrutinize various aspects of understanding music with the objective of presenting new insights that relate to its historical, socio-political and pedagogical contexts. Chapter 2 will explain the conditions that influenced the realisation of this study and the idea of using rhetoric for analysing and teaching FIM. Also, I will draw the differences between composition and improvisation, pointing to the need to address theory and expression simultaneously. Finally, I will present FIMs particular characteristics, discussing both instrumental and technological media. Next, in Chapter 3, I will present a historical overview of areas relevant to this practice, and offer a map of the origins of FIM. These areas have strong ties with socio-political aspects that I believe are relevant in shaping its ethical and aesthetic qualities. In this same chapter, first a historical discussion of rhetoric is presented pointing to the diversity of angles in which it could be used to investigate FIM; this is followed by a general idea of how jazz and late 20th century Western European music influenced FIM. Also in Chapter 3, the use of computer technology in the performance of FIM is discussed, focusing on its implications for the connection between performers and audiences. Chapter 4 explores todays restricted ambits of criticism in FIM. Part II sets out, in a systematic manner, the conceptual and operational framework needed for an understanding and empirical investigation of rhetoric and its application to FIM. Drawing upon old and new literature, Part II offers operational tools which represent an important contribution to this study in themselves, but also lay the basis for the empirical projects presented and 28
analysed in Part III. Chapter 5 presents the elements that consider the potential of using rhetoric in FIM as a discourse its creation, discussion, reflection, analysis and pedagogy. It is followed by a detailed description of musical figures taken from ancient sources and the suggested analogy for the application in FIM. Moreover, the influence of socio-political issues is presented. Next, the classical rhetorical structure of oration is set out and possible ways for its operation in FIM are drawn. Subsequently, FIM is analysed through a prism of ethics and decorum, involving fundamental issues in rhetorical theory and which, consequently, are relevant determinants in the intersubjective dynamics of FIM.55 Also under ethics and decorum are examined the role of audiences and the manifestation of vices. Closing the second part, conclusions are formulated on the manner in which rhetoric could signify a theory that addresses the unspoken in FIM. Part III concentrates on the description, analysis and comparison of several improvisation experiences in which I myself was involved, either as a performer or as a director, during the last six years. This chapter represents the core of the practical work of this investigation in which the efficacy of the rhetorical model is tested. Four approaches are described; first, my experiences with the erecorder56 and with a group of improvisers; second, I analyse a recording in which I make use of an acoustic instrument, a tenor recorder, with a group of improvisers from the University of California, San Diego; third, a more constrained type of FIM in the form of graphic scores that I developed and its analysis; and fourth, an analysis and comparison of five pedagogical projects in which almost all members were, initially, totally unfamiliar with this practice. The experiences with the e-recorder entail a self-critical and reflective approach to my own development as an improviser. In this auto-analysis in different circumstances I distinguish subsequent changes in behaviour and,
The particular challenge of group improvisation is that each performer may have a rather different interpretation of what is going on and where the performance might be going. In other words, intersubjetivity is an inherent property of improvised performances. Borgo (2005) p. 186. The e-recorder (electronic recorder) is an instrument that I developed, which consists of a contrabass recorder that apart from being an acoustic instrument is also a MIDI controller.
56
55
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consequently, in style. Since those transformations were also influenced by the changes in control that developed from having to deal with the acoustic instrument a contrabass recorder and its electronic controller simultaneously, attention is given to the instrumental parameters which might have become significant in characterising my performances, solo and collective. In this aspect, I also describe some differences brought by playing with an acoustic recorder, without any electronic equipment. In Chapter 8, the project that I conducted at the Royal Conservatory, in The Hague, is thoroughly explained. This project represents the genesis of the idea of this study. For this undertaking I presented performers with an elaborated rhetorical path in the form of a graphical score. In this same chapter I concentrate on investigating the efficacy of rhetorical guidance for achieving specific intentionalities in group performance. In this connection, I also scrutinize some prescriptive elements set in the score that appear to be inefficient or too restrictive. Finally, five projects are presented, organized in four institutions for higher music education. The main product resulting from these projects is an idea of how effective pedagogical strategies are for teaching FIM, and how to assess the usefulness of the application of rhetoric in guiding the realisation of the activity. From the recordings that I have made, that consist of more than ten hours of sound material, I have extracted examples that show relevant issues related to the connections between performers, the problems with decorum resulting from individual actions, the achievement of eloquence in the collective, and several musical moments that represent examples of the rhetorical figures that I have revised in Chapter 5.3.1. Finally, in part IV, conclusions are drawn, derived from the application of rhetoric for analysing and teaching FIM. Also, the evolving nature of FIM is addressed and an agenda is presented for future work.
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Objectives. Why is it Difficult to Analyse Free Improvised Music? The idea of finding a rhetorical perspective of FIM came during the experiments I made in building an interactive recorder during my studies at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, The Netherlands. For testing the e-recorders interactive system we used improvisation. Through the course of building the sensors and experimenting with the instrument, the role of improvisation itself changed from being the exploring medium to the explored one. It became clear, by analysing my own behaviour, that in the course of the musical improvisatory process I was elaborating structures and models that were apparently rooted in my past experiences with rhetorical music, such as structural formalisms and principles of repetition, recapitulation, variation, etc. Although this could just indicate that human beings tend to deal with themselves in terms of their formal training, the possibility of having rhetoric embedded in my improvisations57 was a revelation that gave me the first impulse to put together a two thousand five hundred year old discipline rhetoric with another of just a half a century of existence free improvisation. Continuing what became a very exciting path of discovery, I conducted a project with students of the Royal Conservatory for which I wrote a graphic score, entitled Modulus II. The score of Modulus II is composed following the structure of a classical oration exordium, narratio, dispositio, confirmatio, refutatio, peroratio.58 In the score, diverse Figurenlehren59 (music-rhetorical figures) indicate specific intentionalities which in combination with the classical division work as guide for the players. Apart
While playing the e-recorder during the early stages I became aware that, in order to grasp any possible consistency in the music produced by experimenting with the new interface and the sounds it produced, I was making connections between the elements created with rhetorical devices. E.g. going up = anabasis, going down = catabasis. Entrance, narration, proposition, disposition, confirmation, rebuttal, conclusion. See: Rhetorica ad Herennium I. iii. 4 and Quintilian, Institutio VIII. pref. 11. Rhetorical Figurenlehren were extensively used in musical composition and performance during the 17th and 18th centuries with the objective of communicating with clarity the intentions of the music.
59 58
57
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from some dynamics and pitch range, no specific musical materials are suggested in the score. During more than twenty hours of rehearsals the group developed its own dynamism which was influenced by the strategies set in the score of Modulus II and also by the interactive processes of improvising without any preestablished idea. Evaluating the musical results seemed to indicate that the elaboration of guidelines based on rhetoric for teaching improvisation had proved to be effective. However, I had to consider also the fact that for that project I had chosen skilful performers. The immediate doubt was as to how much the success of the project came from the effectiveness of the pedagogical strategies and how much it was the result of the expertise of the performers. That experience gave me the impetus to investigate the potential of rhetoric as a system to discern FIMs contents and dynamics parallel to the elaboration of pedagogical guidelines. Other approaches to preparing FIM have been realised by, for instance, Cecil Taylor and Butch Morris. Cecil Taylor in his work with the Italian Orchestra Instabile, for example, engaged in rehearsals after distributing a score composed of graphics, symbols and words. Regarding the score, Marcello Lorrai asks: What does it all represent? An overall plan of the piece to be rehearsed? Some kind of personal, symbolic and evocative drawing? Its not clear. And he continues: An atmosphere of uncertainty frequently prevailsbut Taylor ignores this and begins to dictate a melody, and Taylor wants the music to develop more slowly[He] is not interested in the performance of a pre-defined product but is interested in a process which gradually grows, which is fed by the feedback of the musicians reactions to his input. 60 Another approach is that of Butch Morris, which is rather different than that of Taylor. It concentrates on the development of a series of hand gestures in a practice he calls Conduction to specify a variety of things. Ed Hazell mentions that the gestures can indicate, to sustain a chord or continuous sound, repeat a motif, or memorize a theme and
Liner notes of the CD: Cecil Taylor & Italian Instabile Orchestra, The owner of the River Bank. Enja Records 2003.
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play it whenever called for. He also informs us that the gestures can also suggest melodic movement or rhythm in a kind of real-time graphic notation.61 Morris tells us that the Conduction vocabulary made it possible for me to alter or initiate rhythm, melody, harmony, form/structure, articulation, phrasing and meter of any given notation. Once the vocabulary had been established, it then became possible to eliminate notation altogether in order to pursue ideas based on collective, interactive confrontations for the process of constructing composition in real time.62 It is interesting to read Krells comments on Conduction No. 31, Angelica. He says that, the structures Morris imposes on the group of European free-improvisers (which includes the wild-and-woolly likes of drummer Han Bennink, guitarist Hans Reichel, and bassist Peter Kowald) seem more like constraints; the music takes wing only when soloists cut loose.63 It is perhaps true that when the will of one leader is applied to a FIM group that the strategies, rather than being the result of collective negotiation and interaction, become the decision of one person. This aspect can make some free improvisers feel constricted. A debatable issue in FIM is how to understand the word free. How free actually is the performer and which are the forces that might constrict or expand this freedom? If we consider that we have created systems that allow us to exercise our sharing capabilities spoken and written language, creation of art, mathematics, etc we can infer that to a certain extent we understand each other. Booth tells us that, we are often successful in exchanging ideas, emotions and purposes, using not only words but a fantastically rich set of symbolic devices, ranging from facial expressions that seem much more resourceful than those
Ed Hazell, Out of the Lab, Butch Morriss bold experiment yields 10 CDs. Review (January 2006) on-line http://72.166.46.24//alt1/archive/music/reviews/01-18-96/BUTCH_MORRIS.html Accessed on 29/11/2007.
62
61
From Butch Morris homepage. Artists Statement. http://www.conduction.us/butchmorris.html Accessed on 27/11/2007.
Ed Hazell, Out of the Lab, Butch Morriss bold experiment yields 10 CDs. Review (January 2006) on-line http://72.166.46.24//alt1/archive/music/reviews/01-18-96/BUTCH_MORRIS.html Accessed on 29/11/2007.
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available to other animals, bodily stances, dancing, music, mathematics, painting, sculpture, stories, rituals, and manipulation of social groups in war and politics.64 Booth also says that we are endowed with the capacity to infer intentions, not just in the linguistic sense of meanings but in the sense of purpose. If, then, the tendency to understand each other is inherent in the intersubjective dynamisms of musicians playing FIM, some kind of limits must exist in order to make the sharing of ideas possible. It has not been an easy task to choose a term for referring to what it is transmitted by the improviser because none of the names seem to give a satisfactory idea of the manifestations of a free improviser at the time of performance. Among the possible candidates were messages, meanings, impulses, and intentionalities. Since I consider FIM from an angle that acknowledges communication as a constant active element, intention is understood as an intrinsic element which is possibly always present in one way or another. Even if we presume that at times there may be no intention, or conscious intention, produced by the creator, it is very likely that intention will be manifest in the receiver. Still, intentions are intuitive states of consciousness65 which characteristically intend to change other peoples minds. Intention, by being intuitive, doesnt present facts but somehow a sort of a combined world of objective and subjective interplay, a mixed deliberation from indications derived by observation and subjective scrutiny. So I have chosen to use intentionality to point towards the objective/subjective expressive energies produced by FIMs communicative dynamisms. Intentionality is seen through the perspective of producing changes in peoples minds from both angles of persuasion; the conscious one and the other that is often referred to as a more heart or gut one.
64 65
Booth (1974) p.113.
Booth says that, We really know only facts, and intentions are not facts but states of mind. We do not know them, even in ourselves: they are intutive states of consciousness. We certainly do not know them in others; rather, we infer them and our inferences have at best a very low level of probability. Or so one tradition says. Ibid. p. 116.
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The hypothesis is that a method based on rhetoric may allow us to understand the intentionalities, structures and dynamics inherent in the communication process of free improvised music. In turn, in the case of an ensemble of FIM, rhetoric could focus on the intentionalities through the angle of ethics of human interactive behaviour in the process of collective creativity. If we also consider the communication process in which intentionalities are involved, rhetoric could also represent a useful field for developing orientation in obtaining a critical observation. FIM presents the paradox of not having a defined style and yet existing as a tacitly agreed musical practice that involves action, production, market, and the presence of an audience and a community of experts. Consequently, we are confronted with the problem of finding a rational model that adapts to a practice defined by not being a style, a practice in which the elements necessary for its performance are dependent on subjective decisions and influenced by collective relationships. Monson declares: Musical theories developed for the explication of scores are not fully appropriate for the elucidation of improvisational music making. She continues, explaining that a meaningful theorizing about jazz improvisation at the level of the ensemble must take the interactive, collaborative context of musical invention as a point of departure. 66 While FIM is an identifiable cultural phenomenon that apparently has no defined style, it has properties of its own that need to be addressed by using a different analytical methodology. Generally, analytical approaches to FIM have been directed mostly to the description of the relationships between improvisers, taking angles of aesthetic analysis derived from the improvisers personal understandings of the so-called free. Other documents that focus on FIM are mostly descriptive, metaphorical, and polemical such as, for example, magazines like Wire Magazine, Avant, Banana Fish, Cadence, Coda, Contact, Downbeat, Gramophone Explorations, THC Improviser, Music Words, Opprobrium, Resonance, etc. Also the many CD
66
Monson (1996) p. 74.
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booklets and available interviews, both in music magazines and in on-line sources, generally contribute with statements that reveal individual concepts about the group dynamics in which the words fall into the description of the groups integration, pointing to specific situations during performance. David Borgo points out: Perhaps what is most often missed. in critical discussion of improvisation music is its functional quality.67 Ingrid Monson writes about the conversational aspect of jazz, affirming: translating musical experience and insight into written or spoken words is one of the most fundamental frustrations of musical scholarship.68 Paul Berliner points out that, despite the difficulties of verbalizing about essentially nonverbal aspects of improvisation, artists favour two metaphorsOne metaphor likens group improvisation to a conversation that players carry on among themselvesThe second likens the experience of improvising to going on a demanding musical journey.69 The point is, if we talk about functional qualities and conversational aspects in music, couldnt we find a manner of coming closer to understanding (a) which functions are at play and (b) what is the content of the conversation? A mode of analysis for FIM has been proposed by David Borgo. It presents a different approach suggesting that, By applying the analytical tools of fractal dimensions to the sonic aspects of recorded musicwe may be able to arrive at a useful measure of the relative degrees of complexity of a given performance.70 However, Borgo acknowledges that the perception of complexity is confined to the visual representation and not to the perceptual complexity.71 His fractal analysis is focused on selected recordings of Evan Parker, Derek Bailey, Peter Brtzmann, The Art Ensemble of Chicago and Sam Rivers Trio. The result of his scientific approach produced graphical representations which provide us with an idea of densities and some notion of sections. The graphics presented by Borgo
67 68 69 70 71
Borgo (2005) p. 34. Monson (1996) p. 74. Berliner (1994) p. 348. Borgo (2005) p. 90. Ibid.
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do not give any insight into the qualities of sound. When he describes, for example, Parker increasing his fluttering with these extreme overtones, eventually cadencing at 7:10,72 it is impossible to obtain this perception from the graphics provided by the fractal analysis. It seems to be problematic to approach a FIM group with the hypothesis that its dynamism resembles one produced by the self-organization of natural phenomena, or the idea of theory of chaos directly applied to music. As Paulo Freire tells us, The normal role of human beings in and with the world is not a passive one. Because they are not limited to the natural (biological) sphere but participate in the creative dimension as well, men can intervene in reality in order to change it.73 Freire writes about the concept of integration. He affirms Integration results from the capacity to adapt oneself to reality plus the critical capacity to make choices and to transform that reality.74 This concept seems to capture with more accuracy the role of the performer when involved in the practice of FIM. Moreover, Locke in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690) explains how science can be divided into three parts: All that can fall within the compass of human understanding, being either, first, the nature of things, as they are in themselves, their relations, and their manner of operation: or, secondly, that which man himself ought to do, as a rational and voluntary agent, for the attainment of any end, especially happiness: or, thirdly, the ways and means whereby the knowledge of both the one and the other of these is attained and communicated; I think science may be divided properly into these three sorts.75 From Lockes words we can come to think that the issue of the rational voluntary agent may point to the idea that it is incomplete to focus on humans actions using Lockes first point in isolation. The knowledge of things as they
72 73 74 75
Borgo (2005) p. 98. Freire (1974) p. 4. Ibid. Locke (1690) p. 634.
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are in their own proper beings, their constitutions, properties and operations76 cannot be taken in isolation in approaching an understanding of a human artistic activity because there are intrinsic criteria of its perceptive qualities that are better focused through the second issue, which points to the skill or right applying our power or actions, for the attainment of things good and useful.77 Making reference to the second point, Locke goes further affirming, The most considerable under this head, is ethics, which is the seeking out those rules, and measures of human actions, which lead to happiness, and the means to practice them.78 The third point is referred by Locke as the doctrine of signs and concentrates in the logical approach for the delivery of ideas. He continues saying that, Those which men have found most convenient, and therefore generally make use of, are articulate sounds.79 Therefore, if we understand a human artistic activity through Lockes philosophy, an approach that focuses on FIM by taking the self-organisation of systems into consideration, and thus disregarding the possibility that the actions produced by the voluntary agent would interfere or even make invalid the occurrence of a natural phenomenon, does not seem to offer a complete view of its dynamics. Although there are theories, such as the one Borgo presents, that show results from approaching art through the scientific angle of chaos theory, like the study that focuses on Pollocks paintings,80 the findings just demonstrate the intriguing ways these systems work and how useful science is in revealing the dynamics of those systems, but by no means do I think that this method of approaching the object of scrutiny would reflect any understanding based on artistic grounds.
76 77 78 79 80
Locke (1690) p. 634. Locke (1690) p. 634-635. Locke (1690) p. 635. Ibid.
Richard P. Taylor (The University of New South Wales, Sydney, Autralia) found in Jackson Pollocks paintings patterns that are fractal. http://phys.unsw.edu.au/phys_about/PHYSICS!/FRACTAL_EXPRESSIONISM/fractal_taylor.ht ml accessed on 4/9/2007.
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Because of FIMs particular and unique characteristics, the approach taken by this research adopts certain considerations in order better to frame it within an analysable field. Before the main objectives are presented it is necessary to expose the understanding of free, in the context of free improvised music, used by this research. The understanding of the concept of free as an adjective, presents a field with a broad spectrum of possible meanings in which contradictory concepts arise as result of the deceptive strategy of freeing the music from something. For this research I derive the concept of free from the verb that conditions the interpreter with regard to his musical past experiences. To become a free improviser, the musician has to, somehow, free himself from possible constraints left by his/her musical education rather than thinking about freeing the music, for it must be clear that music itself hasnt any link with constrictive issues but it is the musician, who learned to play in specific styles, that has to become free from them. Consequently, it seems that one of the qualities that manifests itself naturally in free improvised music is diversity. When the doors for sonic exploration are opened to outside stylistic boundaries with no commitment to precision, it appears to be the case that one common strategy between improvisers is to be diverse. Derek Bailey tells us Diversity is its most consistent characteristic.81 To develop a theory for addressing FIM, we have to deal with form and intentionality at the same time. The use of an analytical method that considers the theory and the expression of music independently wont be useful for approaching a practice such as FIM. A complex collective, dynamic, and interactive field is created by the performers in dealing with the sound structures, which are directly connected to the intentionalities. In the case of written music, or music dependent on a preset concept or style, the focus has a fixed theoretical point of departure to establish the critical theory, which in FIM is absent. However, there is a recognisable sonic result produced by FIM. It seems that the style of FIM is not dependent on the existence of its own musical theory but
81
Bailey (1992) p. 83.
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rather on how the dynamics are shaped between the improvisers during the performance. It is most likely that the equilibrium of these inter-relationships influences the production and delivery of the music. So, if we ought to find a method that would give us a solid ground for developing a theory for analysing FIM, it might be useful to consider understanding the organization of materials by focusing on the complexity presented by the use of unlimited resources and the dynamics of collective relations and behaviour, or ethics. One of the differences between the creative environment in FIM and music composition is that in the first the intentionalities are constantly moving, deeply influenced by subjective forces and by the presence of an audience which can subconsciously influence the course of the performance. However, composed music can also present different intentionalities in reproducing the pre-stipulated elements set in the score. Between the interpreters of western classical European music, for example, the so-called versions of a Beethoven piano sonata differentiate from each other by the surfacing of subjective decisions of the interpreter which are based not only on particular choices in tempo, articulation, and dynamics, but also on the emotional outbursts that come as result of an intricate and subjective dynamic field of intentions. This is an area proper to the discipline of music cognition, outside the scope of the present study. There are dynamics in FIM that are strongly influenced by factors outside music, very subjective and, from a musical perspective, difficult, or even pointless, to analyse. Being a free improviser myself, I am very aware that words are a very limited medium to describe what happens in the process of creating music within free improvisation. Dewey says: Indeed, since words are easily manipulated in mechanical ways, the production of a work of genuine art probably demands more intelligence than does most of the so-called thinking that goes among those who pride themselves on being intellectuals.82 This research will focus on a rhetorical view of the different levels of expression and structural organizations
82
Dewey (1934) p. 46.
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that are particular to the practice of FIM, which at times might come close to areas such as human psychology, cognition, and social sciences. As I mentioned before, I became engaged in an experimental methodology based in improvisation during the development of the e-recorder at the Institute of Sonology in The Hague. This created a psychological awareness of my own behaviour while improvising. At the same time, I was also searching for ways of understanding the intentionality of the musical structures that I was creating during the improvisation sessions. Moreover, finding out that it was possible that rhetoric could represent something useful for FIM took me to conduct a project at the Royal Conservatory, The Hague, and its consistent musical results made me undertake the elaboration of several points that are analysed in this research: 1. How can an analytical methodology based in rhetoric reveal notions about FIMs structure? 2. How can we identify the intentionality of FIM through the use of rhetoric? 3. In a collective level, how do ethics and the (inter) subjective relationships between improvisers influence successful or unsuccessful moments in FIM performances? 4. Individually speaking, how can rhetoric help in providing guidelines for practicing and teaching FIM? 5. What is the role of technology and how influential it is in this practice? This investigation suggests that the rhetorical purposes of docet, moveat, delectat83 (to inform, to persuade, to entertain) and its classical division of inventio, distributio, decoratio (invention, arrangement, ornamentation) embedded in a suitable elocutio, memoria, pronuntiatio (style, memory, delivery)84 and used in a creative environment that has a balanced ethos, pathos
83
Quintilian, Institutio XI. iii. 154. There are three qualities which delivery should possess. It should be conciliatory (conciliet), persuasive (persuadeat), and moving (moveat), and the possession of these three qualities involves charm (delectet) as a further requisite. Rhetorica ad Herennium, I. ii. 3.
84
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and logos (ethics, emotions, logic) offer, potentially, the opportunity of elaborating a methodology for analysing the structures based on understanding the intentionalities involved in free improvised music. This methodology has been applied as a guide for the elaboration of pedagogical lines, which, as I explained earlier, was necessary to conduct the experimental laboratories. It is important to consider the rhetorical components, exposed above, isolated from any historical frame since they are not linked to any specific style in history but rather related to the dynamics of human expression and communication. 2.1 Instrumental Techniques Free of what?
Both free jazz and the European classical avant-garde encouraged the use and development of new, or extended instrumental techniques, new formal ideas, and the use of electronic technology. It is also known that the manifesto of the free improvised movement at its early beginnings presented a strong opposition to certain aspects of modern society. An example of it is Derek Baileys initial idea of avoiding the use of anything that could resemble existing styles. This idea derived, somehow, from the fight against the principle of permanence combined with the impulse of finding a satisfactory contemporary medium for expression. But it must be very clear to us that the validity of music must be judged from what it is and not from what it negates. Baileys music creations inevitably exhibited a defined style characterised by the effort of remaining outside the realm stylistic recognisability. During the early free jazz and the post-war Western European music movements, it was common to search for instrumental possibilities not yet discovered in order to expand the range of sounds. Anne LeBaron tells us: John Coltrane spearheaded the timbral expansions of the saxophone with both controlled and purposely fractured multiphonics. She continues saying that Harmonic complexities in the music of Cecil Taylor evolved from the late 1950s
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into the cluster-studded galaxies of sound he came to generate from the piano.85 We should also think of the particular sax technique developed by Evan Parker. This search for new sound material led to performances where it was possible to try-out new sounds, new rhythms, new structures, and, in general, a novel way of behaving. However, I believe that any radical change should present ideas that provide depth of thought to support more superficial technicalities such as the materials used to make a statement. I am of the opinion that if FIM seeks to be free from the limits particular to composition it ought to present elements of its own such as a new variety of sounds and rhythms, parallel to a different dynamic of performance and thought. Although it is natural that an open-ness to the totality of sounds implies a tendency away from traditional musical structures towards informality,86 it seems to me important that the searching for unexplored sonic possibilities should be considered as an instrumental technical expansion rather than a technical migration. New and traditional techniques should be, consequently, included in the sonic possibilities of improvisers. In 1984 Prvost noted that, we as a community of musicians have taken a long time to counterthe erroneous idea of a non-idiomatic form of improvisation.87 I regard Baileys idea of non-idiomatic improvisation as one approach to FIM which might be useful pedagogically. This idea could help beginners to focus only in the new discoveries by isolating instrumental techniques which are linked, or were linked throughout the learning process of the performer, to stylistic idioms. In this way, a more concentrated manner of developing new sounds becomes available. After a period of experimentation, it may be possible to re-incorporate older known techniques detached from their association with an specific style, to form a new, richer, broader field of sonic possibilities.
85
Anne LeBaron Reflections of Surrealism in Postmodern Musics. Lochhead & Auer (2002) p. 40. Cardew (1971) xvii. Prvost (1984) p. 11.
86 87
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The concept of free should also be understood as one that gives the interpreters greater and more expandable possibilities in dealing with musical materials away from any constraints that recall standardised or style-based performances. It is within this strategy that I believe practice and preparation should be focussed on, at least in the first stages of learning improvisation. It is worth mentioning, at this point, my personal experience in practicing Berios solo piece for the recorder: Gesti (1966). The first section of this composition follows a graphical score in which the main idea is the disassociation of the performer from his standard instrumental control. I recall devoting many hours of daily practice to be able to play above an ostinato, which should be performed in a regular tempo, an intricate combination of vocal and instrumental sounds, using different fluttertongue techniques, and eight types of dynamics. Embracing and practicing new techniques, such as those proposed by Berio, may signify a strategy to legitimise FIM by making it stand on its own broader technical, creative, and aesthetic development. Furthermore, to bring about a state of mind in which musical spontaneity becomes achievable, it is important to think about the possibility that, in a musical practice permeated with characteristics of a process such as FIM, it is important to deal with the musical elements as they are presented rather than to follow a pre-formulated scheme of strategies. We might conclude that performing FIM is also the time of learning. We should think about the fact that knowledge is accumulative and that it depends on memory. In this investigation, rhetoric is presented as a tool that may help performers associate musical moments with rhetorical principles, helping them to recall those moments. The apparent paradox is that this approach could be associated with a predetermined fixed scheme of action. However, this stratagem allows the performer to retain his/her subjective decision-making when linking musical materials and/or performative strategies to rhetorical terms. Free, in todays context of free improvisation, also refers to a sort of license given to the musician so that his/her playing derives from individual decisions rather than pre-specified rules. I do not understand free as a field in which life is smooth and responsibilities lighter. By the contrary, the improviser 44
inhabits a flexible and open creative field carrying not only the responsibility of exteriorizing ideas through sounds but also of creating and formalizing them before delivering them to the audience. In this sense, improvisation acquires a formal thought proper of the field of composition with the difference that the invention, communication and delivery occur almost simultaneously. This combination of the creation of form and content plus the factor of delivery is in my view a task that cannot be taken without proper responsibility, and it is the reason why I believe that the performer of FIM is involved in a complicated ethical heuristic process for musical artistic creation.
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Historical Considerations I believe that history becomes a crucial factor for those who establish their field of action in the avant-garde.88 I also believe that the breaking of the status quo has to be founded on strong arguments based on historical awareness. Sometimes, it seems to me that the driving force in the avant-garde today is neither the preoccupation of establishing a balanced communication nor the search for expressive methods. I have frequently witnessed music where the concentration is on individual experiments to the detriment of any sort of aesthetic elaboration for the delivery. In FIM there has been a switch in the artistic ethos of improvisation from one that was permeated by socio-political influences, back in the 60s and 70s, to one that is inclined towards a political relativism and extreme technological change.89 It seems as if the questioning of social conventions, the preoccupation with antimaterialistic values, pacifism and the search for spiritual wholeness, which permeated the improvising scene during the sixties, is coexisting today with an improvisation that has become technologically orientated. In my experience, it has been a regular case in preparing for a FIM concert, expending most of the time for rehearsal in setting up hardware and constantly programming software. This is not per se, as might be imagined, a problem since it is natural that improvisers develop accordingly to their specific needs and impetus. I regard as more problematic the fact that performances sometimes reflect a lack of preoccupation with important factors such as communication, general background and a disregard towards control. An example of that was evident in the last Discussion Concert (November 2006) I attended at the Institute of Sonology at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. After every presentation of those discussion concerts, where acousmatic and live-electronic pieces and improvisations are presented, a discussion takes place
88
Here we should understand the concept of avant-garde as one that concentrates in proposing new concepts. Smith (1997) p. 18.
89
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where people have the possibility of asking questions to the composers/improvisers. Most of the answers pointed solely to the description of the technological processes used to compose the pieces, showing sometimes even incapacity of discerning about any aesthetic grounds or discussing on the content, intentionalities or meaning of their compositions. Many would agree with the idea that together with a developed instrumental control, the performer who is knowledgeable in the aspects that surround musical practice history, politics, psychology, social aspects, etc has greater chance of achieving depth of thought which in turn substantiates the music he creates. 3.1 Ages Defined by Aristotle in his book Retorica as the capacity of discovering all ways of persuasion available, rhetoric was introduced in ancient Greece by the sophist Gorgias around the year 428 B.C., taken to Rome and after to Medieval Europe. At that time, rhetoric and music belonged to two different fields of knowledge. Music was considered a science that along with arithmetic, geometry and astronomy formed the Quadrivium. Rhetoric was part of the Trivium that was composed by grammar, dialectic and rhetoric. Both, the Trivium and the Quadrivium were part of the so-called Septem Artes Liberalis. Music was part of logos (logic) and of ethos (ethics) and not of pathos (related to human emotions). For instance, the music made for the church, like plainchant, and later, polyphony, restricted the use of pathos. It encouraged the use of a sacred pathos, because the outburst of human emotions inside the temple of God was seen as frivolous and totally pagan. With the arrival of Humanism in the Renaissance at the end of the fourteenth century, the strong intellectual changes made the connection between music and rhetoric inevitable. The music became more humane and closely related to the communication proper of oratory. It is very important to note that until the end of the fourteenth century instrumentalists worked almost exclusively within an oral tradition and that compositions in the fifteenth century were mainly vocal from 47 Rhetoric as a Concept and Tool: Its Origins and Evolution through the
composers such as Martini, Isaac, Agricola, Josquin and Obrecht.90 However, Timothy McGee raises questions about the importance of rhetoric in the musical composition of that period. He says that, My own attempts to analyse a large quantity of musical compositions from the fourteenth century through the sixteenth centuries has led me to question the nature of that relationship and the extent to which it was consciously applied by composers. He continues telling us that, In spite of the fact that scholars have been able to identify rhetorical structure and detail in specific compositions, I found the number of musical works that exhibit that relationship to be extremely limited, both in their number and in the extent to which the influence can be documented, and the relationship itself was on a very general level, often superficial or even accidental.91 The new texts discovered by Cicero and Quintilian during the early decades of the fifteenth century renewed the interest in the study of rhetoric.92 Tarling tells us that, in music, the main influence of the humanists was to highlight the importance and expression of the text.93 As a result, during this period in history, the science of music gave way for the introduction of the rhetoric of music. Bartel affirms that, The composer sought to emulate the rhetorician...replicating an orderly rhetorical construction.94 Although there were minor variations in the number and presentation of rhetorical structures, Bartel tells us, the composer followed the rhetorical structures of (a) inventio (invention), (b) dispositio (arrangement, organization), (c) decoratio or elocutio (expression), (d) memoria and (e) pronuntiatio (delivery).95 At the same time, the
See Keith Polks essay Instrumentalists and Performance Practices in Dance Music, c. 1500 in McGee (2003). p. 98.
91
90
McGee, Music, Rhetoric, and the Emperors New Clothes. In Music and Medieval Manuscripts: Paleography and Performance, ed. Haines and Rosenfeld (2004). p. 210-211. McGee, Music, Rhetoric, and the Emperors New Clothes. In Music and Medieval Manuscripts: Paleography and Performance, ed. Haines and Rosenfeld (2004). p. 207-208. Tarling (2005) p. 14. Bartel (1997) p.68.
92
93 94 95
However, Bartel affirms that the focus on music as a mathematical area remained prevalent in Lutheran Germany throughout most of the baroque. Bartel (1997) p. 10.
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(b) dispositio was comprehended by (i) exordium (introduction), (ii) narratio (narration), (iii) propositio or divisio (division), (iv) confirmatio (confirmation), (v) confutatio (refutation), (vi) peroratio (conclusion). Bartel says that regarding the (c) decoratio or elocutio, its stylistic expectations are summed up in the four virtutes elocutionis: correct syntax (puritas, latinitas), clarity (perspicuitas), figurative language (ornatus), and suitability of form to content (aptum, decorum).96 Later on, the use of instruments would see itself divorced from its associations with the text and the development of its own music-rhetoric would arise. Bartel explains that, Throughout the Italian Renaissance the speculative science of music gradually lost ground to the more practical craft of musical composition. He also mentions that as a result of this, the musical discipline was divided into two categories: a theoretical and a practical musica theoretica (naturalis, speculativa) and musica practica (artificialis).97 Although Bartel claims that whilst Italian writers tend to adhere to the division into those categories, German Lutheran writers introduced a new one: musica poetica.98 Yet he seems to suggest the lack of importance of musica poetica in Italian music, which is certainly incorrect, since Caccini in 1601 already held that poetry alone is the mistress of music.99 Also Lawson and Stowell say that the association of rhetoric and musicappeared for the first time in connection with early Italian monody (di muovere laffetto dellanimo, as Caccini, among others terms it.)100 This change towards focusing on the text began four centuries ago when a group of musicians and poets in Florence intended to revive Greek drama by speculating that the texts then were sung rather than spoken.101 Harnoncourt is of the opinion that this upheaval was one of the most radical in music history. He
96 97 98 99
Bartel (1997) p. 67. Bartel (1997) p. 18. Ibid. Harnoncourt (1984) p. 22. Lawson and Stowell (Cambridge, 1999). p. 29. Haynes (2007) p. 121.
100 101
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tells us that around 1600 The hallowed order of Western music was called into question by a bizarre circle of influential students of antiquity, or, more aptly, would-be restorers of antiquity.102 They were called the Camerata. Claudio Monteverdis Seconda Prattica originated in the middle of this movement with the intention of projecting the texts with complete clarity and great expressiveness.103 So the music had to be at the service of the text. If we think how much of a shock the presentation of the recitatives of the Seconda Pratica must have been considering the prior polyphonic style from Ockeghem, Clemens non Papa, Desprez, among others it is at least surprising that a movement that aimed for resurrecting old values resulted in the production of a musical aesthetic which most certainly was the avant-garde then. Haynes tells us that the Camerata unintentionally ended up inventing something quite new, like neither the mainstream nor the Classical past it had hoped to emulate. He continues underlining the importance of this movement by affirming: It inspired all the music prior to the Romantic era. We could call it the basis of Baroque music.104 Any piece composed during the baroque period can be analysed rhetorically.105 The compositional methods were developed following the rhetorical objective of docere, delectare and movere (to teach, to delight, to move)106 and the analogies made from the techniques used in ancient oratory allowed composers to choose and organize the material for compositions mainly aiming for the effective communication of a diversity of affections. Bruce Haynes compares the use of rhetoric in the Baroque to the Windows operating system in todays computers. He tells us that rhetoric was their operating
102 103 104 105
Harnoncourt (1984) p. 22. Haynes (2007) p. 122. Ibid.
Haynes in his book The End of Early Music says that Here we are, then, at the beginning of this book, witnessing one small end of Early Music. From now on, Ill call it by this new name, Rhetorical music. Haynes (2007) p. 12. Quintilian, Institutio III. v. 2.
106
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system, the source of their assumptions about what music was and what it was supposed to accomplish.107 It was then that composers started to follow the divisions of rhetorical composition: inventio (invention), dispositio (arrangement), elocutio (style), memoria (memory), and pronuntiatio (delivery).108 In oratory, the principle of invention (inventio in Latin), Dreyfus tells us, denoted not only the subject matter of an oration but also a mechanism for discovering good ideas. An orator had at his disposal an entire array of such tools called the topics of invention and with these topics one devised or invented a fruitful subject for a discourse.109 Since the subject of the communication of affetti was central, the first matter that called the attention of writers was how to communicate them and how much the affections should be enhanced. The latter was a subject matter for several discussions on the application of good-taste by a variety of writers such as Geminiani (A Treatise of Good Taste in the art of Music and Rule for Playing in a true Taste on the Violin, German Flute, Violoncello, and Harpsichord ), Quantz (On Playing the Flute), Mathesson (Der Volkommene Capellmeister), Tosi (Opinioni de cantori antichi e moderni o sieno osservazioni sopra il canto figurato), Couperin (Lart de Toucher le Clavecin), to mention a few. The musical-rhetorical theory of baroque music was then constituted by a re-interpretation of classical sources and also depended on the elaboration and interpretation of affections. The latter left the interpreter with great freedom in taking decisions regarding things such as phrasing, accentuation, dynamics, tempi and ornamentation. We could speculate that because of this great freedom the same piece of music could have presented substantial differences between interpretations by various performers. This flexibility, however, was going to become more restricted in the works of Johann Sebastian Bach, who brought the baroque principle of musical discourse to
107 108 109
Haynes (2007) pp. 166-167. Rhetorica ad Herennium, I. ii. 3. Dreyfus (1996) p. 2.
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perfection.110 Harnoncourt tells us that a friend of Bach, the rhetorician Birnbaum, writes: He is so perfectly aware of the aspects and advantages that a piece of music has in common with the art of rhetoric that one not only hears him with great pleasure when he focuses his conversation on the similarity and agreement that exists between both; but also admires the adroit application of the same in his works.111 We could see Bach as a composer who rather than bringing changes to the current style, his traditional education coming from a extensive family of musicians took him to develop the baroque style to such a perfection that the idea of freedom of creative interpretation became restricted. His intricate use of rhetorical devices plus the mastery of his compositional technique brought Scheibe to manifest the following criticism: This great man would be the object for entire nations, if he possessed more pleasantness and if he did not remove every natural element from his pieces through their bombastic and muddled nature, obscuring their beauty through an over-abundance of artAll ornaments, all little embellishments, and everything that one understands to belong to the method of playing, he expresses with actual notes; this deprives his pieces not only of the beauty of harmony, but also makes the singing quite difficult to listen to.112 Later, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, the role of rhetoric started to change. Judy Tarling affirms that it is because of The rise in status of artists and musicians...during this period resulted in a change from audience-centred to an artist-centred performance. Also she asserts that, the rhetorical style of composition and delivery had undergone a radical change as the audiences attention became focused on the performing artist as an individual creative force (e.g. Paganini, Liszt). As a consequence, the importance of the audience as a target for the artists powers of emotional persuasion was reduced, and the
110 111 112
Harnoncourt (2002) p. 37. Ibid.
Scheibe, Der Critische Musicus, Hamburg, May 14, 1737). Quoted in Harnoncourt (2002) p. 38.
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performers own importance increased as an object for adulation.113 This increasing separation of a basic element such as the natural connection between the artist and his audience rendered rhetoric in music obsolete. Later, rhetoric was partly resurrected in the early twentieth century in the form of studies that made public speaking more effective, establishing communication studies focused on the historical examination of classical and humanist models of persuasion and governance.114 Also the creation of new rhetorical theory was subordinated to the pedagogical goal of creating effective speakers along the lines of fairly classical models represented most fully by Quintilians vir bonus dicendi peritus, the good man speaking well.115 The first half of the twentieth century was a period in which methods for reasoning and speaking were based in scientific thinking and studies grounded in rhetoric were regarded as inferior. However, the second half of the last century presented events such as World War II. This somehow showed that the bloom of technology and scientific thinking had no influence on social dynamics, which ended in the insanity of this terrible human tragedy. Although science had made major advancesit had failed to provide solutions to persistent human problems such as aggression, racism, economic exploitation and class polarization. 116 Benjamin tells us that the destructiveness of war furnishes proof that society has not been mature enough to incorporate technology as its organ, that technology has not been sufficiently developed to cope with the elemental forces of society.
117
Perhaps human values couldnt be investigated solely through a scientific
methodology. There was an increasing tendency to admit that much of the discourse of science was not formulaic, clinical, and syllogistic but, instead,
113 114 115
Tarling (2005) p. 40. Lucaites & Condit & Caudill (1999) p. 7.
Quintilian, Institutio I. Pr. 9. My aim, then, is the education of the perfect orator. The first essential for such an one is that he should be a good man, and consequently we demand of him not merely the possession of exceptional gifts of speech, but all the excellences of character as well. Herrick (1997) p. 195. Benjamin (1968) p. 242.
116 117
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decidedly strategic, argumentative, and rhetorical.118 To discuss human values, new means outside the scientific had to be taken into consideration. Rhetoric was then acknowledged as having an important role in areas such as mathematics, cosmology, psychology, and economics.119 Soon after, the effervescence of the sixties changed the approach to rhetoric. The consequences of the immense developments in technology brought by the invention of several communication media changed the way in which public discourse was exercised. Rhetoric started to be understood as a social phenomenon that had implications for how we think about the relationships between theory, criticism and practice.120 Facilities such as the TV, internet, radio, cinema, and recordings, influence the manner in which art is produced and received. There is an enormous amount of choice by which the demanding consumer of art becomes more and more demanding not solely as a consequence of the great amount of offer but also because of the expectation that the real live events will provide an error-free experience such as the one printed in, for example, a CD or DVD. At the same time the casual consumer who has no solid parameters for quality discernment is immersed in this massive quantity of information and, sometimes, it is the quantity rather than the quality that actually becomes the centre of attention.121 Consequently, defining rhetoric today requires framing it for your purposes since it has acquired a variety of meanings and acts in a diversity of areas. Apart from the penetrating use of rhetoric in commercial propaganda, rhetoric has become studied and applied to a diversity of areas such as politics, sciences, psychology, marketing, architecture, etc. Such a contemporary understanding emerged as an outcome during the conferences
118 119
Herrik (1997) p. 196.
See Burke, K. Rhetoric and Ideology (New York, 1993); Harris, R. A. Landmark Essays on Rhetoric of Science: Case Studies (New Jersey, 1997); Brummett, B. Rhetoric in Popular Culture (California, 2006). Smith (1997) p. 10.
120 121
An example of that is todays pastime of collecting as many gigabytes of music as possible that, with the advent of sound compression systems such as MP3, allows a person to store more music than he or she can actually listen to in a life time.
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organized by the National Developmental Project on Rhetoric (NDPR) in 1970 in the USA. The objective was defined as to outline and amplify a theory of rhetoric suitable to twentieth-century concepts and needs.122 It produced four specific recommendations that are very relevant for the direction of this research: 1. The technology of the twentieth century has created so many new channels and techniques of communication, and the problems confronting contemporary societies are so related to communicative methods and contents that it is imperative that rhetorical studies be broadened to explore communicative procedural practices not traditionally covered. 2. Our recognition of the scope of rhetorical theory and practice should be greatly widened. 3. At the same time, a clarified and expanded concept of reason and rational decision should be worked out. 4. Rhetorical invention should be restored to a position of centrality in theory and practice.123 Accordingly, what it was once defined as the power to observe the persuasiveness of which any particular matter admits124 can today be described as the energy inherent in emotion and thought, transmitted through a system of signs, including language [and music], to others to influence their decisions or actions.125 3.2 Jazz
The advent of free jazz can be traced back to the 1940s when Bebop developed in nightclubs in Harlem, New York. The dynamics of Bebop embodied the principle of body-mind holism. It was a conversational type of music best played in small
122 123 124 125
Lucaites J. L. & Condit C. M. & Caudill (1999) p. 9. Lucaites J. L. & Condit C. M. & Caudill (1999) p. 10. Aristotle (1991) p. 74.
Herrick (1997) p. 5. Quoting George Kennedys introduction to Aristotle on Rhetoric: A Theory of Civic Discourse. (New York, 1991, p. 7)
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ensembles rather than the usual Big Bands of Swing Jazz. Bebop was freeing the musicians not only from the specified notes, melodies and expected behaviour of swing music, but also from the authoritarianism and totalitarianism of the producers and conductors, and the framework established by the music business in general. Swing represented corporate liberalism built on a social-economic arrangement, the culture of abundance and consumption, mass production, and the idea of the American way of life. The music made by the Big Bands was played by large groups of musicians with the objective of providing pure entertainment, including dancing. On the contrary, Bebop was meant for listening and pursued establishing a conversational dynamic in which any innovation in its structure was aiming to enhance the conversation. The analogy of improvising with a conversational process delineates the possibility of an approach to jazz through rhetoric.126 Max Roach explains: After you initiate a solo, one phrase determines what the next is going to be. From the first note that you hear, you are responding to what youve just played: you just said this on your instrument, and now thats a constant. What follows from that? And the next phrase is a constant. What follows from that? And so on and so forth. And finally, lets wrap it so everybody understands that thats what you are doing. Its like language: youre talking, youre speaking, youre responding to yourself. When I play, its like having a conversation with myself.127 This line of thought or, better, way of playing improvisation is a position that the free improviser can adopt. But it must be obvious that in free improvisation today there are manners of presentation that do not embrace any sort of strategy based upon Roachs idea of organization of musical events based on conversation.128 Through their radical music, bebop musicians reaffirmed the value of free individual expression. This individual expression still took place within the
126 127 128
See the analysis of Coltranes composition Alabama in Chapter 5.3, table 1. Berliner (1994) p. 192.
An example of that is the use of the aesthetic musical concept of soundscape, which is a nonconversational way of presenting sounds that follow the changes in the perception of music observed by Schaeffers in his Trait des Objets Musicaux (1966) pp. 222-223.
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confines of a group, but it was a more responsive group, not one enslaved by the predetermined plan of an orchestrator, but a group which had the freedom to react to the individual, moment to moment, as it saw fit. This group did not fear, but actually encouraged, the new and unorthodox. It was a group with an open mind and open ears.129 Each player maintained a spontaneous awareness of voices and worked to integrate mind and body by exploring the domain of prosody: the boundary between ideas and feelings where music becomes rhetoric and words become pure sound. With bebop technical instrumental limitations were also stretched to the extreme. Trumpets were playing higher, saxophones faster, double basses developed an unprecedented dexterity and drummers opened an entirely new world of rhythmic variety. Later on, during the 1960s, free-jazz, avant-garde jazz or the new thing was introduced. The origins of this new jazz are usually considered to be in the music of John Coltrane, Sun Ra, Miles Davis, Cecil Taylor and Ornette Coleman. The avant-garde challenged the listener by allowing the musician to choose his own musical path rather than following the traditional approaches to which jazz musicians had previously adhered. All aspects of the music were at the discretion of the improviser. The music often transcended recognizable pitches and musical shapes, allowing moans, shrieks, and cries to convey the energy and emotional discourse of the individual musician. This revolution in jazz was provoked by the musicians dissatisfaction with the lack of liberty brought by the commercial music business. However, this movement was not always received with enthusiasm. Monson mentions that, The hostility towards free jazz expressed by many advocates of jazz neoclassicism Wynton Marsalis most visibly created in the 1980s and 1990s a climate in which expressions of African-American aesthetic principles that refused to be confined by tonality or
129
Vogel. on-line source: http://www.loyno.edu/history/journal/1991-2/vogel.htm accessed on 13/11/2006.
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traditional formal structures were regularly demonized as incompetent, not black enough, or overinfluenced by a European concept of avant-garde.130 With the creation of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) in Chicago in 1965, many innovative jazz musicians united in their effort of promoting the realisation of concerts, educational activities as well as moral support for its members. George Lewis tells us that the composite output of AACM members has explored a wide range of methodologies, processes, and media, developing new and influential ideas about timbre, sonic identity, collectivity, extended technique, instrumentation, performance practice, intermedia, the relationship of improvisation to composition, form, scores, computer music technologies, invented acoustic instruments, installations, and kinetic sculptures.131 Anthony Braxton, who like Lewis is a member of the AACM, has composed and written many works. About his massive three volume Tri-axium writings he tells us: I tried to build a thinking system, a system of thought that does not tell anybody what to think, but rather it gives people different ways to look at things and then you find your own way. Because I think philosophy should not tell people what to think as we move to the third millennium, but it should help people to find their way and let the people find themselves what they think.132 Graham Lock says that, Braxtons Tri-axium Writings, a massive philosophical/historical/spiritual discourse on black creative music and its relation to world culture, seeks to transform our basic understanding of what creativity is.133 Braxtons catalogue of works reveals a big variety of music compositional materials. He makes use of traditional notes, simple graphic lines, geometrical figures, colours, symbols, numbers, verbal instructions, texts that tell a story, choreographed movements, etc. Leo Smith has
130 131
Monson (2004) pref/xi
The AACM and American Experimentalism. George Lewis (2007). On-line source http://www.nyfa.org/level3.asp?id=549&fid=6&sid=17&print=true Accessed on 30/11/2007. A Conversation with Anthony Braxton. Interview by Volkan Terzioglu and Sabri Erdem (1995). On-line source http://www.restructures.net/links/BraxtonConversation.htm Accessed on 30/11/2007. Lock (1988) p. 37.
132
133
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proposed a system of symbols in his production of graphical scores. Smith lets us that his music considers each performer as a complete unit with each having his or her own center from which each performs independently of any other, and with this respect of autonomy the independent center of the improvisation is continuously changing depending upon the force created by individual centers at any instance from any of the units. The idea is that each improviser creates as an element of the whole, only responding to that which he is creating within himself instead of responding to the total creative energy of the different units. This attitude frees the sound-rhythm elements in an improvisation from being realized through dependent re-action. This is the fundamental principle underlining my music, in that it extends into all the source-areas of music-making.134 Smiths calls his system by Ankhrasmation. Bill Bleutter tells us, In practice, Ankhrasmation uses symbols to sketch out a roadmap for improvisation. A composition including the symbol orange, for example, would require Smith and Mori to have thought deeply about how they could musically reference all aspects of orange - not just the color, but the fruit and its myriad characteristics as well. Then they take those reference points and improvise on them.135 It seems evident that the preoccupation of the musicians of the AACM goes beyond the actual playing of music, extending towards the elaboration of complex concepts of social interactivity, respect for individuality in collaborative actions, mysticism, philosophy and metaphysics. This line of thought reveals similarities with the movement of European free improvisation in that both embrace the idea of expanding instrumental technical aspects and cherish creating music by exploring the creative potential of the people involved in the music making.
134
Leo Smiths webpage: http://music.calarts.edu/~wls/pages/philos.html Accessed on 30/11/2007.
Leo Smiths webpage: http://music.calarts.edu/~wls/pages/interviews_eng_2.html Jazz notes: Creating music thats never the same twice by Bill Bleutter, Boston Globe Correspondent, 2005. Accessed on 28/07/2008.
135
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3.3
Late 20th Century Western European Music
The musical ideas of John Cage influenced the free improvised music movement. Paul Griffiths thinks that in the midst of a musical culture that didnt present the necessary elements for improvisation to develop, composers such as Cage and Partch found themselves bound to improvise, and sometimes let their performers do so too although Cage consistently resisted this, and preferred to have his musicians follow exacting rules if not scores. He continues affirming, Improvisation, as a spontaneous expression of intention, was just what he wanted to avoid.136 Cage was not very enthusiastic about improvisation itself, but was interested rather in a compositional method that embraced chance determination. Johnson thinks that, Cage began to work indeterminate of its performance because to have called his work improvisations would have implied that the performers were not guided by goals and rules.137 Griffiths says, Nevertheless, [Cages] influence may have contributed to the re-emergence of improvisation in composed music during the 1960s.138 Referring to the early graphical scores, Philip Thomas tells us, The 1950s and 1960s are the two decades most generally associated with the proliferation of scores which were almost immediately assigned the description indeterminate.139 Composers from the New York School John Cage, Morton Feldman, Earle Brown and Christian Wolff present a variety of indeterminate compositions where, according to Thomas, the compositional intention and the performance possibilities represent two factors that interact and where the former may inform
136
Griffiths, Paul. Improvisation. Western Art Music. The 20th Century. Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy. Accessed on 12/07/2007, http://www.grovemusic.com Johnson (1989) pp. 207-208. Griffiths, Paul. Improvisation. Western Art Music. The 20th Century. Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy. Accessed on 12/07/2007, http://www.grovemusic.com
137 138
139
Philip Thomas, Determining the Indeterminate, Contemporary Music Review, Volume 26, Number 2 (April 2007), p. 129, <http://ejournals.ebsco.com/direct.asp?ArticleID=46798D161B86955358C2>
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the latter.140 There are, however, other factors that might influence the performance of indeterminate compositions, which are previous interpretations that may have already created some sort of tradition or influential model of performance. Like Cage, Feldman also was concerned about allowing too much freedom to the performers. He says that, after several years of writing graph music I began to discover its most important flaw. I was not only allowing the sounds to be free I was also liberating the performer. I had never thought of the graph as an art of improvisation, but more as a totally abstract sonic adventure.141 During the music festival of Darmstadt in 1958, Cage presented compositions like his Variations and Variations I. Thomas thinks that these compositions were the most indeterminate he had ever written.142 The indeterminacy and the factor of chance started a discrepancy between John Cage and the music scene in Europe. In his lectures at Darmstadt in September 1958 he openly criticised composers such as Boulez and Stockhausen as well as the European audiences. Cages criticism must have exerted some influence inside the circle of European composers. Cage was himself influenced not only by music but also by painting and architecture. In the latter the German Bauhaus movement, founded by Walter Gropius in 1919, made a deep and lasting impression on him.143 Gropius inaugurated an institute with the objective of experimenting with education and architecture, industrial art and handicrafts. Bauhaus, he said, wishes to educate a new type of workerwho simultaneously has the command over techniques as well as form. This line of thinking together with influences from Duchamps predilection for chance operations
140
Philip Thomas, Determining the Indeterminate, Contemporary Music Review, Volume 26, Number 2 (April 2007), p. 130, <http://ejournals.ebsco.com/direct.asp?ArticleID=46798D161B86955358C2> Philip Thomas, Determining the Indeterminate, Contemporary Music Review, Volume 26, Number 2 (April 2007), p. 131, <http://ejournals.ebsco.com/direct.asp?ArticleID=46798D161B86955358C2> Quoting Morton Feldman liner notes to Feldman/Brown, Time Records 58007/S8007 (1963). Philip Thomas, Determining the Indeterminate, Contemporary Music Review, Volume 26, Number 2 (April 2007), p. 34, <http://ejournals.ebsco.com/direct.asp?ArticleID=46798D161B86955358C2> Shultis (2002) p. 22.
141
142
143
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andrefusal to distinguish between life and art144 and the unconventional compositional ideas from Satie, inspired Cage in the elaboration of his Composition as Process and the fundamental composition concern of indeterminacy. In 1957 Pierre Boulez published in La Nouvelle Revue Franaise his article Ala. He presents a deep preoccupation with the matter of chance in music, deploring approaches he judges as irresponsible. He tells us, I like to call this an experiment if experiment is the right word where an individual, who feels no responsibility for his work, but out of confessed weakness and confusion and the desire for temporary relief, simply throws into a puerile mumbojumbo.145 Boulez then proposes a guided chance saying that those constraints are necessary because in total freedom it is impossible to obtain invention. 146 After Darmstadt 1958 we can find a variety of compositions that offer to the interpreter more participation in the compositional process. This meant a big step towards an improvisational behaviour of the interpreter. Pieces like Solo and Spiral of Stockhausen, Bussotis RARA (for solo tenor recorder), Cardews Treatise, for example, present mainly graphical indications in the score giving to the interpreter a great deal of decision taking in structuring the piece as well as in choosing the musical material. Stockhausens Aus den sieben Tagen (1968) represented also the new and unique and a composition in which Stockhausen attempts to find musical answers to such fundamental questions regarding the conditions of a harmonious interplay of spirit and matter, which correspond to his serial process thinking and to the maxims of the experimental production of the sound material by composing temporally ordered pulses (Peters 2003, 226). Aus den sieben Tagen stimulates in the performers a certain attitude, which should overcome self-control and provoke creativity.147 Also a composition by Stockhausen, Solo is a graphical composition based in the interaction between a
144 145
Shultis (2002) p. 28.
Stocktakings from an Apprenticeship (Oxford, 1991) Alea pp. 26 38, originally published in La Nouvelle Revue Franaise, 59 (1957). Ibid. Kutschke (1999) p. 49.
146 147
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melodic instrument and computer feedback. Solo presents abundant possibilities for organising the musical material and many indications so that the performers can elaborate a version of the composition. Other examples of compositions, which provide a framework for improvisation, are the graphical compositions made for the e-recorder Daniel Landaus COR (Composition Organ Recorder) and Erik Stalenhoefs Yidaki and my own work entitled Modulus II for six players.148 British composer Cornelius Cardew was Stockhausen's pupil and attended the concerts and lectures given by John Cage at Darmstadt in 1958. John Tilbury recalls The radical content of Cages musicmade a deep impression on Cardew and continues saying that, In fact Cardews subsequent application of aleatory was highly idiosyncratic and his admiration for Cage had little to do with Cages compositional techniques; what impressed him was Cages rejection of the commodity fetishism that had invaded musical composition, his liberation of the performer from the constraints of the oppressive notational complexities, and the democracy (at least in theory) in Cages scores. 149 Here it becomes clear that the new aesthetics in music proposed by Cage were firmly based upon revolutionary socio-political ideas. In the following description of Cardews graphic composition Treatise (1963) we can clearly understand his radical change of interest in music. [Treatise is] a continuous weaving and combining of a host of graphic elementsinto a long visual composition, the meaning of which in term of sounds is not specified in any way. Any number of musicians is free to participate in a reading of this scoreand each one is free to interpret it in his own way. I now regard Treatise as a transition between my earlier preoccupation with problems of music notation and my present concerns improvisation and a musical life15th January 1966.150 Cardew joined a group called AMM in 1968. Cardew is of the opinion that Informal sound has a
148 149 150
See appendices. Tilbury (1982) p. 8. Ibid. p. 9.
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power over emotional responses that formal music does not, in that it acts subliminally rather than on a cultural level. This is a possible definition of the area in which AMM is experimental. We are searching for sounds and for the responses that attach to them, rather than thinking them up, preparing them and producing them. The search is conducted in the medium of sound and the musician himself is at the heart of the experiment.151 The maturity in the intersubjective communication process that I witnessed at an AMM concert at the UEA, Norwich152, in the winter of 2005, in which Prvost and Tilbury played, was flawless, constantly clear in intentionalities and transparent in direction and form. The main impression for me was the clarity of this performance. Waters says that, Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the experience for me was its immediate memorability. And he continues: replaying the tape I found myself anticipating the musical development with an eerie accuracy.153 If we look deeper, passing through the layers of the aesthetic of sounds, paying attention to the gestures and interactivity between Prvost and Tilbury, the care with which they treat the music material and the respect and common objective of collective creation become palpable. I believe that this behaviour represents the depth of ethics that they embrace for creating music together. It is with no surprise that Cardew in pointing out to the virtues that a musician can develop specifies Simplicity, Integrity, Selflessness, Forbearance, Identification with nature, and Acceptance of Death.154 These conditions may predispose collaborators to perform ethically, allowing the establishment of decorum to settle.155 Yet, Cardews Tigers Mind presented another form of music composition. This piece is a text that is divided into two stories, the Daypiece and the Nightpiece.
151 152 153 154 155
Cardew (1971) xviii. A CD was issued by Matchless Recordings entitled Norwich (2005). Notes by Simon Waters on the CD Norwich (Matchless Recordings 2005). Cardew (1971) xx. This point will be expanded later under Ethics and Decorum (Chapter 5.5).
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Daypiece The tiger fights the mind that loves the circle that traps the tiger. The circle is perfect and outside time. The wind blows dust in tigers' eyes. Amy reflects, relaxes with her mind, which puts out buds (emulates the tree). Amy jumps through the circle and comforts the tiger. The tiger sleeps in the tree. High wind. Amy climbs the tree, which groans in the wind and succumbs. The tiger burns. Nightpiece The tiger burns and sniffs the wind for news. He storms at the circle; if inside to get out, if outside to get in. Anly sleeps while the tiger hunts. She dreams of the wind, which then comes and wakes her. The tree trips Amy in the dark and in her fall she recognizes her mind. The mind, rocked by the wind tittering in the leaves of the tree, and strangled by the circle, goes on the nod. The circle is trying to teach its secrets to the tree. The tree laughs at the 11lind and at the tiger fighting it.156 In this composition Cardew gives directions to the performers on how to engage in several interactive processes, giving also the possibility of changing the sequential organization of the events. Interpretation of this piece is to be viewed hopefully as a continuous process. Initially the two texts given above should be regarded as limiting (ie, play the given actions in the given order), the Daypiece and Nightpiece being used for performance on alternate occasions. All musicians should memorize the text to be used. Subsequently new actions and situations may be allowed to arise spontaneously, concurrent or interleaved with the given ones; also the succession of events may be altered, more or less at randon1 (eg, a performance of the Daypiece might open with the tiger asleep in the tree, or the mind loving the circle, or Amy's mind putting out buds, etc). After additional experience it may be desirable to devise new texts involving the same six characters-the new texts should then be memorized as before. Finally it may be
Sextet The Tigers Mind. Cornelius Cardew. The Musical Times, Vol. 108, No. 1492. (Jun., 1967), pp. 527-530.
156
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possible to play without a text, simply improvising actions and situations involving the six characters.157 I see this improvisation/composition as one with an intrinsic pedagogical intent. Cardew explains that, initially, only one of the pieces, either the Daypiece or the Nightpiece, can be performed independently. Although he describes quite in detail the role of each character, Cardew mantains that thenotes on the six characters are not limiting or definitive. They are intended primarily to encourage and assist prospective performers in the assumption of their roles.158 Cardews indications go as far as to agree with the performers to assume any of the characters at any moment during the performance without the need of making the other players aware of the change. He says each musician may select his own role and allocate the other five roles without telling the other players.159 Perhaps Cardew intended to make the piece as a concept of work vanish at a certain stage, leaving the performers to interact in the musical creative process, using the elements, strategies and philosophies that they may have collected from Tigers Mind. Jazz, on the other hand, had a big impact in Europe during the 60s. Many jazz players from the USA emigrated to the old continent because they were better paid there than in the USA. In Europe they interacted with the avant-garde improvisers who had been influenced by the contemporary composed music aesthetics. One of the differences from the European improvisers was that they concentrated in the exploration of sound, timbre and texture, and the evolution of novel instrumental techniques. The American movement also influenced musicians such as Brtzmann, Dauner, Schlippenbach, Breuker, New Music Ensemble (US), Nuova Consonanza, Musica Elettronica Viva, AMM, Evan Parker and Derek Bailey.160 Founded in Rome in 1964 by Franco Evangelisti, the
Sextet The Tigers Mind. Cornelius Cardew. The Musical Times, Vol. 108, No. 1492. (Jun., 1967), pp. 527-530. Sextet The Tigers Mind. Cornelius Cardew. The Musical Times, Vol. 108, No. 1492. (Jun., 1967), pp. 527-530.
159 160 158
157
Ibid. Smith and Dean (1997) p.61-62.
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group Nuova Consonanza, for example, aimed to unite composition and interpretation in order to change the separate functions of traditional European musical practice into a simultaneous creative act. This ensemble followed the example of another group called New Music Ensemble, which was founded in 1963 in California, USA. Evangelisti mentions that, The ensemble also receives important stimulus from jazz and from Indian music, both of which though each within an entirely different context of aesthetics and tradition have developed somewhat similar principles collective, improvised composition.161 Also, he tells us that there is a consensus reached between the members of the Nuova Consonanza on the restriction of staying between the bounds of the tempered system as a necessary limitation for achieving a distinctive contemporary style within the traditional system.162 However, when we listen to the music of Nuova Consonanzas LP163 we can immediately identify the constant application and exploration of extended instrumental techniques, seldom encountering anything that resembles a tempered system. This seems to point out to the tendency, or even necessity, free improvisers have in exploring for new sonic possibilities in the open collaborative environment of FIM. It seems that breaking with the strict rules of Western European compositional methods was just one of the factors that conditioned FIM to develop into the important area of musical expression it signifies today. As we have seen, the other important influence was jazz. There is, however, the possibility that great impact came as a consequence of the interpreters experience with FIM. I am of the opinion that the significance of this musical practice must have been brought about by the performers enthusiastic acquaintance with a practice that restored the natural expressive mechanisms of performing. Because it is unlikely that only the revolt against the constraints presented by musical composition would have produced the necessary impetus to
161 162 163
Evangelisti (1969) p.1. Evangelisti (1969) p.1. Improvisationen. Nuova cosonanza. Avant Garde LP Stereo 137007 (1969).
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build something so rich and noble. The advantages and limitations involved in conceiving and structuring the music in this practice has opened a democratic space in which the performers have the possibility to deal consistently with their expressive mechanisms and with those of others. FIM has become a significant contemporary musical practice that I believe has the potential to present models for transforming our educational system into one that gathers a more real, nondogmatic approach of teaching music. FIM shouldnt be seen as opposite to musical composition but acknowledged as a practice that involves different materials and different dynamics in the creation of music. Yet it is necessary to devise new manners for establishing a discourse, since the available methods today do not seem to be suitable for addressing FIM. 3.4 Considerations in the use of Technology Today...it seems that the machine has become an important new instrument in the hands of the improvising musician, granting a great step forward in the evolution of the tradition of improvisation. But they must learn to speak with them. In the ancient rhetoric, the art of elevated discourse, a series of formalized principles and rules were taught as a sort of hyper-language destined to influence the improvised speeches so as to render it convincing and aesthetically pleasurable, regardless of the argument in question.164 Frederick Rzewski Soon after the introduction of tape as a musical medium, in the decade of the 1950s, the first experiments and compositions combining both tape and acoustic instruments began to appear. This was the beginning of live sound processing. Today, the technological possibilities are, needless to say, enormous. Computer technology is constantly becoming faster, more powerful and reliable. Yet, these qualities do not ensure the quality of musical performances that use electronic devices. Quite the opposite, they offer such broad possibilities that the danger of
164
Frederic Rzewskis article Le Poetiche dellImprovisazione (The Poetics of Improvisation). Presented at the Seminario Internationale di Musica Contemporanea in Montepulciano, Italy, 1983. (The translation is mine)
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losing consistency is present as it probably never was before. Added to the sonic universe offered by electronics, there are other factors that condition its use for musical purposes. One crucial issue is the physicality of musical performance which Richard Barrett, in a lecture at the UEA, referred as a central aspect of the way music communicates in live situations." When Smith mentions that Computers can be. tools of improvisation165 we have to think also that, in reality, computers are not instruments exclusively dedicated to the creation of art. This means that a computer machine cannot be regarded as a musical instrument since its role is not solely dedicated to the making of music. One point that I regard as problematic in the issue of the physicality of musical performance in the use of electronics in live performances is the divergence between what we listen and what we see. There is a lack of connection between the sound and gesture. Barrett, in the same lecture, said that this deprives audiences of understanding what is going on between the interpreter and the computer and creates an illusion that once it takes place, we run the risk that the perception of the music by the audience loses its connection with reality. The problematic issue of the separation between sound and gesture is further enhanced by another factor, which is the paradox of having the interpreter in a sort of private situation while performing. I am of the opinion that, for instance, the so-called laptop performer sitting behind a computer screen with all the necessary electronic equipment, gives a biased concert performance. In this situation there is a physical barrier present between the audience and the performer, leaving the performer inside a setting that resembles more the private ambience of an office rather than the atmosphere of a concert stage. I am of the opinion that we shouldnt compromise in trying to adjust to this situation by understanding it as a problem that the audience needs to solve by adopting a different concept of listening, but rather to find manners to restore the vital connection natural of live performances.
165
Smith, Hazel (1997) p. 249.
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When we listen to a violin, for example, we perceive a clear connection between gesture and sound. Computers dont have this connection because it is not a necessity as in the case of the violin. Even if we take another example such as the piano, for instance, the manners in which its mechanics work are not comparable to playing computers. Although the performers actions are somehow hidden from the public, it is clear for someone watching the pianist in action, that there is a complete link between the performers movements and the sound. And why is this connection so important? In addition to the visual issue given by the congruence between gesture and sound there is another crucial factor: that of the impulse and expression. If we consider one more time Deweys aesthetic view of the necessity of resistance to transform an impulsion166 into an expression, we could understand that this resistance may manifest itself by meeting and overcoming the technical difficulties of an instrument. An outward impulse without resistance would simply be a discharge. Dewey says that To discharge is to get rid off, to dismiss; to express is to stay by, to carry forward in development.167 If we consider both concepts, (a) the congruence between gesture and sound, and therefore, (b) the harmony between impulse and expression, applied into making music with computer technology, it might be possible to move towards the direction of making it an experience in reality. I would like to think of music as something that triggers the intellect and the sensorial system at the same time. To achieve that, the physical and mental dynamics, during the creation process, have to be balanced. Dewey explains the opposite: When artistic objects are separated from both conditions of origin and operation in experience, a wall is build around them that renders almost opaque their general significance.168
166
Dewey tells us that impulsions are the beginnings of complete experience because they proceed from need. Dewey (1934) p. 58. Dewey (1934) p. 62. Dewey (1934) p.1.
167 168
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One possible strategy to make electronic music a physical experience is to think of whether we can make the computer into a musical instrument. Approaching a solution to this would be at least an initial model of an instrument that would allow the development of skills and knowledge creating grounds for the manifestation of resistance. I developed the e-recorder taking those issues into consideration. Of course, in the case of the e-recorder, the issue of physicality was already embedded by the fact that the electronic system had to be incorporated into an acoustic instrument. The matter of the connection with gesture had then to be applied to where the sensors ought to be built and what their function would become. I believe that, in the e-recorder, this was carefully developed. However, in the course of developing its system, I came to regard the graphical interface as one of the main obstacles in the communication between the electronic musician and the public. When I was preparing a presentation with the ensemble Kreepa169 at STEIM (Amsterdam 2002) I realised that, although I had taken care of making the electronic controllers of the contrabass recorder organologically coherent, I still relied on having the computer and all the necessary peripheral gear in front of the instrument and me. Having a table with the laptop, the mixer, and the effects processor on top plus all the cables hanging from it, was not only an aesthetic problem; it induced me to look unnecessarily at the screen for most of the time during the performance. At STEIM we found the solution for the problem. I incorporated a small LCD monitor into the recorder in a position that required a bit of effort to glance at in order to get just the necessary information. Having no longer that distractive element put me in a better connection with the audience and, at the same time, feeling the feedback from the public had a significant change in the music I played. What changed was actually the amount of time available so that instead of wasting it in paying unnecessary attention to the graphical interface, it was being used for concentrating better on the reactivity of
169
Kreepa (Hilary Jeffery, John Richards, Paul Dunmall) is an ensemble with which I played regularly from 2000-2003.
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creating music and, as a result, improving the communication process. Evan Parker in an interview in Wire Magazine explains that Tim Hodgkinson mentioned that the improvisation approach of The Electro-Acoustic Ensemble, which was searching for clear soundscapes, couldnt work because the relationship between the signals and the musicians is too slow.170 We may consider the possibility that the time-consuming relationship between the musicians and their computers is responsible for the slow interactivity. Consequently, based on my own experiences, I think that one of the first steps to take is finding ways to be independent of the graphical interface because it signifies a barrier of communication and a very distractive element for the performer. Also, resistance may manifest itself by building some sort of instrumental interface that requires practice in order to gain control. If we think about all those problematic elements in rhetorical terms they signify an obstacle because they collide with the basic principles of eloquence, clarity and decorum since they represent issues that interfere in the process of communication. An issue in some live electronic music today is the way in which strategies are built for the interconnectivity between the interpreters. It must be clear that the use of live-processing, in the combination of acoustic instruments with live electronics for example, presents no assurance that musical depth is going to be achieved. Relying solely on the material interactivity does not bring automatically musical consistency. Conceptually, the combination of those ingredients has to be brought to life giving attention to the musical relationships. The relation between performers goes beyond the question of combining acoustic instruments with electronics, or using live sampling or pre-recorded material. Between the performers, profound levels of interactivity have to exist to create a consistent relationship. In order to achieve that, the preoccupation has to go beyond superficial details such as processing live an instrument for example. There is no guarantee of coherence given by the fact that the sounds were derived live from a single instrument. According to Barrett, this kind of prosaic
170
Wire Magazine (May 2007), p. 36.
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relationship doesnt necessarily lead to anything in terms of the musical structure that emerges. More interesting are the deeper levels of the music, rhythm, gestures, timbral complementarities and so forth. Once the deeper relationships are active, the superficial relations are not essential any longer or they work just as ornaments. Barrett also mentioned that when we listen to a Beethoven violin sonata, for example, we perceive that both instruments, as incommensurable in some ways as the combination of a violoncello and electronics, are brought together not by trying to sound like each other but on the level of counterpoint, harmonic, and structural relationships. According to Barrett, three categories of electronic instruments may be defined by their function: Active Instrument: The performer causes the musical events. Nothing happens unless the performer does something. This is the closest to an instrumental gesture-musical function relationship. Re-active Instrument: The performer is intervening in an ongoing stream of events rather than producing those events. The range of real time processing is restricted to transforming sound coming from an instrument or that stream of events might be built inside the computer program itself. For example DJing, where a large part of the musical structure is already going on and what the performer does is intervene with that stream of events. Passive Instrument: Using the computer to playback sounds having only the possibility of controlling the levels through the mixing table. I would suggest that if we, again, think about Deweys concept of resistance, the performer should consider employing all these possibilities in the electronic instrument in the same order of magnitude of organization and flexibility as a player of an acoustic instrument. Today, it seems that FIM performances which use electronics, rather than concentrating in deep levels of relationships, are recurrently relying in the superficial ones. How do we engage in these deeper connections? However dangerous it is to assess subjective behaviourisms it is necessary to say that 73
performers involved in playing FIM have to keep a level of concentration that allows the perception of the individual inputs as well as the general result. Also, it may be useful to premeditate what is going to happen and use those opportunities to establish a better connection with the co-creators by perceiving, as Barrett mentions, when a bow is going to change or anticipating the taking of breath of a wind player or a singer. Another strategy that has worked in bringing those levels of consistent interactions in the laboratories that I have conducted consists of bringing to the attention of the players the tactic of speculating the tenor of the intention that provoked the musical inputs. Even if the perception does somehow differ from that intended, if any, it generates a much deeper ground of interactivity than the mere reaction to the sonic outer layers. A very important issue brought by the use of computer technology in music is the new concept of time. Lyotard in his book The Inhuman presents a dramatic new perspective about the developments of our society in which he notes that the acceleration in life processes is deeply influenced by fast technological changes. Musical instruments for example, have been transformed throughout history into more complex, efficient and powerful mechanical machines. But, according to Lyotard, when progress is taken into the development of machinery for producing sequential brain processes, rather than just motoric repetitions, we enter a very different world of problems and possibilities. In music for example, the introduction of live sound processing software and hardware offers vast means for the creation of music. Technological developments are making the creation of meta-instruments viable, bringing an apparently unlimited range of sound possibilities. Besides a large variety of sounds, technology also brings a crucial factor into music, which is a new conception of time and space. With the use of technology it is possible to capture events from the past and project them into the present. I think that it is of great importance to take this factor into consideration when applying technological means for the performance of FIM. From a rhetorical perspective, technology brings a new element related to the figure of memoria, or memory. Besides bringing the possibility of repeating events of the past exactly and transforming them accordingly, memoria may help structuring 74
our performances by using the concept of loci (places or backgrounds).171 Setting up those categories might involve bringing together characteristics of a specific time during the performance and storing them up by making analogies between the intentional-structural contexts and the figures of rhetoric.172 Memory is a figure that was absent in music rhetorical treatises of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It is very thrilling to note that it is for the first time that the figure of memoria can be directly used in live music performances.173
171
Herrik (1997) p. 104 calls topoi places and Harry Caplan, in his translation of Rhetorica ad Herennium, refers to them as backgrounds. For further details on the idea of loci see Chapter 5.3.1.5. See Memory under Figures of Time, Chapter 5.3.1.5.
172 173
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Current Limits of the Discourse on FIM Usually critics of presentations of FIM describe the performance in separate parts, focusing on (a) specific sound effects and descriptions of materials sometimes embedded in a discussion about structural issues and their relation with concepts of what is considered improvisation and what can be more related to musical composition, or (b) enter a metaphorical description related mostly to an overall sense of the music. As an example of (a) here is a description of a performance by trumpet player Peter Evans: he sculpted microtonal lines into a smashed-up continuum where breathy wheezing, percussive bumps, high pitched shrieking and cavernous low notes 174 In this account there are some hints about the character of the music but it basically remains a description of the sound materials used during performance without any further discussion on how these sounds were presented or organized. John Bowers tells us about his collaboration with sax player Graham Halliwell: Sometimes I am using long splices from the buffer to hint at an orchestra of saxophones. Othertimes, I am able to use extreme settings to generate highly electronic material...I do not have to wait for him to give me some material to go on. I can create both sustained textural and highly punctuate events, rhythmic and arrhythmic productions.175 Bowers also amuses us with the description of a particular accident in a presentation, where unexpected sounds he took as musical material were coming from a table. I am of the idea that the accidental factor in music, as in driving a car or preparing a meal, results from an unplanned deviation from the activity and we should be careful not to jump into considering it a factor upon which we could legitimise the musical practice. However, we could also think of the unplanned as something that needs to be dealt accordingly in order to incorporate it to the performance, because otherwise the unintentional might
174 175
Clark, Philip. Letting off steam. Wire Magazine 275 (Jan 2007) p. 12. Bowers, John (2002) Chapter 3, Music as Design Documentation.
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compromise the balance of the presentation. Bowers also affirms that it is improvisation as a practically organised form of music making that is the subject of his current work. 176 Indeed he explains thoroughly the strategies taken for various performances, giving details on the instrumental technical aspects and on some of the interactivity present in the presentation. He even claims at one point that he knew which sound he would start with.177 Although I have to recognise the validity of engaging in this kind of improvisation, as there are many others, the angle taken by my investigation focuses in a musical practice in which there is no agreement on which kind of material is going to be used prior to the performance. Another example of the description of materials comes from a review that says: A typical performance may include disparate elements as projecting messages such as Erase memory, scratch disk fulland sending out electrical and mechanical drones. The critic continues saying that the climaxes of their performances are more often than not unpredictable affairs, which is understandable given the improvisational nature of their work.178 The immediate question that comes to mind is: why is it understandable? It seems a recurrent case that very often critics fit into what they hear by finding it comfortable to say that some aspects are understandable solely because of the improvisatory nature of the practice, not daring to come closer to concepts such as why it was good or bad or why it was effective or ineffective. The reluctance of acknowledging that one performance of free improvised music can be better than the other or that someone could improvise better than someone else, either indicates the adoption of an unnatural ethics, one that assumes all expressions have equal qualities, or the absence of a model to approach it in a critical manner. Sometimes I even have the impression that criticism is not easily accepted in general, probably because of the idea of original inviolability of the individual expression in a free art form. But this by no means exempts this kind of music and the performers from having different qualities and expertise. Edwin Prvost
176
Bowers, John (2002) Chapter 1, Improvising. Bowers, John (2002) Chapter 1, Improvising. Enacting Three Swooshes: Siena. Wire Magazine 268 (Jun 2006). Global Ear by Sophia Ignatidou. p. 16.
177
178
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tells us that, Some might argue that the kind of music discussed here has been played since prehistoric time, and needs no explanation. Indeed, I have some sympathy with the view that its innocence is perhaps its best protection. But of course just because we perceive a music as informal does not mean that it has no underlying structure to distinguish it from other ways of making music.179 Because of the lack of discourse on FIM some musicians have declared being unsure of improvisation. In the liner notes of the CD Episteme Anthony Davis writes: I have turned more and more toward precise musical notation to insure that the improviser is consciously and physically tuned in to the overall structure of a piece. On first glance this approach would seem to inhibit the improviser. This is a valid criticism, but I believe that this inhibition is now a real necessity when one perceives that free or open improvisation has become a clich, a musical dead end. Another angle of discourse seems to focus on improvisation as opposite to composition. In his column Improv, Dan Warburton explains: much of the Improv released in 2006 confirmed that there is indeed a distinction to be made between rough and ready improvisation and polished improvised music (or, if you prefer, instant composition) which itself can de subdivided into discrete stylistic subgenres 180 Although this is a step forward into acknowledging the existence of diverse qualities in improvisation, Warburton somehow links those polished improvised musics to something closer to composition rather than to a true free improvisation. At this point, it might be relevant to mention Franco Evangelistis description of one of the first groups dedicated to improvisation, Nuova Consonanza. He wrote: The ensemble also receives important stimulus from jazz and from Indian music, both of whichhave developed somewhat similar principles of collective, improvised composition.181 It is interesting to read that whilst the aim of the Nuova Consonanza was described by Evangelisti
179 180 181
Prvost (1995) p. 2. Dan Warburton, Improv. Wire Magazine 275 (Jan 2007) p. 44. Evangelisti (1969). (The italics are mine)
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as one directed to unite composition and interpretation, he presented the Nuova Consonanza as an improvisation group. There is also criticism that considers the characteristics of group interactivity. However, the tenor of the discussion is seldom composed by a general outline where there is a tacit emphasis on the description of action rather than the intention. Describing a recording by Evan Parkers Electro-Acoustic Ensemble named Turbulent Mirror, Borgo says, [E]ach individual tends to play less than he might otherwise, allowing space for comment and transformation.182 Also, Warburton in his comments about the CD After All, featuring Uwe Orberg in the piano, Georg Wolf in the bass, drummer Jrg Fischer and clarinettist Frank Gratkowski, tells us that in the track Loose All Oberg, Wolf and Fischer tease and fold lines and shapes gently around each other with grace and space to spare.183 When critics adventure into using metaphors, things become more complicated to grasp. An example of (b) is this review of a CD entitled Zafiro by Evan Parker/Barry Guy/ Paul Lytton. It says: music, raw, sophisticated, loud and quiet, often in solo or duo configuration, which nonetheless condenses in the mind into a crystalline form that is as hard and conductive as any sapphire. For all that they play individually it is hard to hear the whole thing as by anything other than a unit, if that overworked word still means anything.184 First, we could pose the question: How can somebody share the reviewers perception by trying to adopt this so-called hard sapphire-like crystalline condensation in the mind? I am of the idea that a review ought to be more focused in the informative aspects based in experience and not in a metaphorical trip. Second, in the same review, we could also ask: What does the unit in the group represent? For it must be clear that unit does not mean anything if the constituent elements of this perception are not properly presented. I would rather say that Zafiro reveals a
182 183 184
Borgo (2005) p. 106. Soundcheck. Wire Magazine 286 (Dec 2007) p. 61. Brian Molton, Jazz & Improv. Wire Magazine 275 (Jan 2007) p. 75.
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conversational process between Evan Parker, Paul Lytton and Barry Guy in which one of the main characteristics is the alertness of the performers and their acute awareness of each other musical materials. They create music which is initially fast and powerful where sharp interactive moments interweave, delivering a vibrant execution of musical spontaneity. The performance is divided mostly into duos and solos. The solo presentations do not only display the complexity of instruments, which have been stretched to the borders of extended techniques, but also display a sense of comfort in delivering well defined musical ideas. One of the most rewarding musical experiences listening to Zafiro comes from those moments that unite Parker, Lytton and Guy, delivering three different musical ideas, giving a reach counterpointistic texture, and, at the same time, having them play short musical interventions based on someone elses musical material. All the kind of inconsistencies I have presented in the discussion of FIM seem to point to a need for rethinking the ways we adopt to talk about it. There might be a difficulty in extracting the elements that compose the aesthetics of FIM, which is why it is natural that among the several approaches for reviewing its performances, there are some that adopt a metaphorical and even some sort of eccentric approach for the discussion. I have seldom witnessed comments that present a clear general view of a presentation of FIM. Since it must be obvious that the aesthetic of the music and the interactive dynamics are connected, we ought to find words that can assess deeper levels on both angles simultaneously. Edwin Prvost, for instance, directs his book entitled No Sound is Innocent to develop ideas about music life and experience185 giving an assessment based on a socio-cultural analysis, a personal description of experiences as an improviser wrapped in AMMs historical context. In his second book, Minute Particulars, Prvost claims that it is a more deliberate attempt to be analytical.186 This book also focuses on the analysis of music as a social activity,
185 186
Prvost (2004) p.1. Ibid.
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taking into account the process of communication and the transmission of information rather than the qualities of communication. Christian Munthe seems to concentrate in his concerns about the lack of aesthetic acceptation of free improvised music when he closes his article What is Free-Improvisation?187 manifesting a wishful thinking that the listener would adopt the viewpoint of the improviser rather than to stick with aesthetic ideals and convictions. Munthe also claims that music experimentation is by no means a necessity in the practice of free-improvisation and that Free improvised music is experimental or innovative only in as much as it is made by persons whose ambitions are to innovate or experiment. He also claims, this way of looking at innovation, traditions, idioms and rules, I believe to be the key to free improvised music. Although Munthes speciality is applied ethics, it strikes me that no word makes reference to the collaborative aspect of improvised music performance and to the dynamics of communication with audiences. His article rather enters, on one side, into solipsism, acknowledging a particular concept as a key to this practice, and, on the other, manifesting a preoccupation with the publics acceptance, which in my view doesnt help in moving towards an answer to the question posed in the title of the article; What is Free-Improvisation? If we consider the possibility of talking about FIM investigating its intrinsic dynamics and analysing its aesthetic results through an observation of the collective creation, it should be possible to develop guidelines for introducing the inexperienced to this practice; in other words, teaching FIM. Crossan and Sorrenti say that improvisation has received minimal attention from management theorists and practitioners. In part, this is due to the assumption that there is no skill or quality to improvisation or at least none that can be taught.188 They continue explaining, [In our research] we include intuiting as one of the
187
Article from the European Free Improvisation Pages. On-line source. http://www.efi.group.shef.ac.uk/. Originally written in Swedish, this text was first published as "Vad r fri improvisation?" in the Swedish magazine for contemporary art-music, Nutida Musik, no. 2, 1992, pp. 12-15. Kamoche, K., Pina e Cunha, M., Cunha, J. V. (2002). Making sense of improvisation by Mary Crossan and Mark Sorrenti. P. 29.
188
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four Is of organizational learning, with the other three being interpreting, integrating and institutionalizing.189 Charles C. Ford observes that Teaching free collective improvisation at Thames Valley University has, similarly, reminded me more of my experience of drama therapy than of any musical rehearsal or performance. I reduce my role from teacher to coordinator. The only thing I teachis respect for music for its own sake, linking this respect to the paramount importance of listening 'as if your life depends on it'.190 Ford, however, enters immediately into a paradox when he manifests that At the beginning of each session I organise warming-up exercisesTuning is probably the best way to open up the sensitivity of the group to its own sound to listen to itself. We have held onto sung and played single notes for over five minutes, listening to the beats that result from slight mis-tunings gradually slow down as the whole group enters absolute unison. He also says, I have used Stockhausen's Stimmung to show students how to extend tuning beyond its customary sense, by applying it to the unification of vocal timbre. 'Tuning' can also be understood temporally, as the sharing of a single pulse. Establishing a fast clapped pulse is easy, but slow it up to less than one per second, and the exercise becomes fascinatingly difficult. The third exercise I use is like a musical Chinese whispers game in which students pass a melodic cell around the group, each trying to reproduce the last version precisely.191 I am of the opinion that if the role of the teacher is restricted to that of a coordinator, teaching free collective improvisation should not impose specific materials or exercises, because it exerts great influence in the natural development of individual expression, suppressing the manifestation and development of natural subjective talents while setting some sort of standardisation. My idea of a restricted coordinative role for a student FIM ensemble is one that encourages a self-affirmation of the style of the ensemble. Especially at the very beginning of a learning process, I think that
189
Kamoche, K., Pina e Cunha, M., Cunha, J. V. (2002). ). Making sense of improvisation by Mary Crossan and Mark Sorrenti. P. 32. Ford (1995) Ibid.
190 191
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the application of pre-formulated exercises should be avoided in order to let the groups directions gradually set course by itself. Allowing the collective to raise questions might enhance the activity of collective creation of music. In this way the collective discusses the problems that rise from the group, and the proposals for an eventual solution are agreed cooperatively. 4.1 Concluding Observations
We have learned about a variety of issues that have conditioned the rise and shaped the characteristics of FIM. It seems however that this practice is in its early stages of development due to the lack of modes of discussion and criticism that could embrace all relevant aspects involved in this way of making music. Criticism seems to avoid adventuring into details by limiting itself to the communication of ideas with regard to the material used and some individual strategies. However, generally those remarks make neither a connection with how they came to make part of the music nor explain how they might be transformed as the interactive process between the members of the ensemble influences them. I have pointed out to some modes of discourse in FIM that take polarised angles and to the need of developing a mode of discussion that allows us to understand this practice in a holistic manner. I have also presented the hypothesis that rhetoric is an area with potential for developing means for addressing FIM in a manner that accounts its different parts simultaneously. In this first part we have also encountered several views on observing, practicing and teaching FIM. Since one of the original features of FIM is related to how materials are brought into a performance through their history of invention, negotiation, acceptance or dismissal, settlement and change, etc, it is important to find ways to find a method of inquiry that could give us a manner of putting those dynamics into words and consequently testing this information pedagogically. Furthermore, I have explained how some regard FIM as unsuitable to audiences or defend encouraging the production of aesthetics which could possibly be more listener-friendly or aimed for acceptance. Also, I have 83
presented some pedagogical lines which I regard as restricting, e.g. approaching it in a pupil-friendly way. This approach is one in which the role of the teacher remains as in traditional methods, one of imposing specific directions which, as I have discussed, interrupt the natural evolution of the groups personality. I have set out to develop a theory that deals with those issues and, although its form is still in the early developments, it will hopefully retain individual spontaneous decision taking and, at the same time, encourage the expansion of dialogue, discussion and the sharing of common initiatives for creating music collectively.
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PART II METHODOLOGY
Framework for the Analysis and Operational Study of Rhetoric Applied to
FIM In order to be able to analyse the characteristics and dynamics of rhetoric in FIM, both in theory and practice, we might need an abstract-conceptual as well as an operational framework, allowing us in this study to decompose the concepts of rhetoric and FIM sufficiently to understand, examine and, where needed, even measure them in actual reality. In this task we can, as in previous chapters, utilize concepts, typologies and operational categories drawn from old as well as contemporary literature. These tools for research, including a whole range of operational figures, will be presented in this Part II. I would argue that these are useful for their own sake and hence by themselves entail a contribution to this study. Yet they will also help to establish the necessary basis for Part III in which I present and analyse a series of practical projects both individual experiences and group laboratories which test this operational framework in practice, and try to identify pedagogical issues related to teaching the use of rhetoric in FIM. The aim of this study is to explore the potential of rhetoric for structuring and analysing form and intentionality in FIM. Form is understood as the structural organization of musical manifestations into sequences that show different levels of intensity, the inherent transitions between them, and the eventual black holes.192 Intentionalities refer to the discharge of impulses193
192
I use the term black hole to designate those moments in free improvisation where the performer loses the balance required to perform convincingly. Those moments give you the sensation that you are being sucked out of energy, that all your creative power is pouring out as a water out of a bucket full of holes. Tord Gustavsen in an essay (Oslo, 1999, 10) mentions that musicians often get stuck in a dilemma between the urge for expressing something and the necessity of evaluating the music and its effect and there is a paralyzing alienation between the musician as an operator and the music as accessible sound for potential listeners. Dewey calls the first instinctive mechanism of moving outward and forward as impulsion. In order to transform it into thoughtful action, Dewey says, impulsion has to meet many things on its outbound course that offer resistance. In the process of converting these obstaclesinto
193
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through sound, which might provoke a musical experience in the listeners. Three aspects of the experience are taken into account: (a) creation, (b) delivery, and (c) reception. Creation is the invention. Delivery is the manner in which the invention is organized and it is divided into (a) structural and (b) intentional. In the receptive angle, two different influential levels are met: (a) the players and (b) the publics feedback. Both levels work in diverse ways but belong to one intersubjective action-reaction process which helps, even if at times speculatively, in defining the intentionality of the invention. Performers in general have a way of knowing, or rather feeling, the intensity of the reception by the listeners. This perception may happen through perceiving the reception of the listeners by observing their involuntary movements. Not having the feeling that a balanced positive receptive dynamic has settled down might lead the improviser to consider changing the course of action. This factor points to the possibility that the receptive factor in FIM can also be a determinant in the direction the music takes during a performance. Therefore, the audience can potentially influence the path that the music follows. Those who are listening to the music produce involuntary body movements that could be a reflex to impulses that come as a reaction to different states and degrees of reception. The point in this matter is based on the idea that music manifestations allow us the observed individuals to verify the internal manifestations of the observer and create an intersubjective connection in order to enhance the power of communication. This approach is based on Damasios following assumptions: that the processes of the mind are based on brain activity; that the brain is part of a whole organism with which it interacts continuously, and that we, as human beings, in spite of remarkable individual traits that make each of us unique, share similar biological characteristics in terms of structure, organization, and function of our organisms.194 From the angle of oratory, Perelman and Olbrechts-Tylteca call the
favoring agencies, the live creature becomes aware of the intent implicit in its impulsion. Dewey (1934) p. 59.
194
Damasio(1999) p. 85.
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changes made by the rhetor to tailor the presentation according to a particular audience audience adaptation.195 As set out in Chapter 2, this study focuses on the understanding of free, in the context of free-improvisation, as one deriving from its meaning as a verb rather than as an adjective. In other words, linking the freedom to the person improvising rather than to the music itself. In this way, as described in Chapter 1.3, rhetoric can focus on FIM from a social angle, independent of language, standardised style or meaning. Given this, rhetoric is used in this investigation as a discipline to examine the interchange of energies intrinsic in emotion and thought in the practice of FIM. Since rhetoric seems to be suitable for establishing a discourse in the creation, reflection, discussion and analysis of the music produced by free improvisation, this research extends into exploring its potential use into pedagogy. In order to frame rhetoric for those purposes it is useful to change the question of what rhetoric is into one of what rhetoric can be. In this way we have the opportunity to focus on it as a social human activity where to be rhetorical [is] a central and substantial dimension of many facets of the human social experience.196 Between those experiences lies music making. The rhetorical treatises of the baroque consider the adoption of structural and interpretative strategies for delivering a diversity of affections. This concept seems to indicate to the possibility of communicating a considerable range of feelings through music. Kivy says that, It will be desirable to know just what emotions music can possess as perceptual qualities and, if possible, why just those and not others. For it ought to be obvious that music alone cannot possess just any emotive quality at all.197 What Kivy implies is that emotions manifest in the creator and in the receptor but not in the music itself. It might be right then to say that rhetoric represents a good model for establishing a discourse since it takes into the analysis the dynamics of subjective expression following empirical
195 196 197
Perelman and Olbrechts-Tylteca (1970) p. 23-24. Lucaites J. L. & Condit C. M. & Caudill (1999) p. 10. Kivy (1991) p. 35.
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methodology that allows reflecting on the intentional aspects in communication processes Yet, music seems to deal with the presentation of other kinds of aesthetic expressiveness outside the direct communication of affections through music. An example of that is the attempt to examine the idea inherent in a recurrent trope introduced by electronic music; soundscape.198 Soundscape presents the concept of creating a musical image, independent of provoking any specific affection. It can be represented by the musical-rhetorical figure of hypotyposis.199 Both music and rhetoric use this figure to reflect an image rather than to express an affection.200 Furthermore, the analysis of such image can also become more substantial by acknowledging the difference between hypotyposis and homoiosis. Bartel tells us While hypotyposis is an image of an idea, homoiosis recreates the idea itself.201 Now, outside perspectives of the communication of intentionalities and images, rhetoric could also refer to figures of strategical importance such as, for instance, the figure of time called memoria (memory). Memoria doesnt appear as a musical-rhetorical figure in early music since it was already represented by technical formal elements in musical composition in the form of repetitions, fugue, recapitulations and variations. As a consequence, for this investigation, it was necessary to bring a concept of memory from ancient oratory. In FIM, the figure of memory captures the same importance as in oratory given that both practices have strong improvisatory characteristics.202 Memory implies not only the need to be capable of remembering what your input was at different stages during performance, but knowing with detailed accuracy how it was presented so that a reformulation becomes a resulting reaction to what happened before. The Ad Herennium author calls memory the treasury of things
198 199 200 201 202
A sound portrait or a sound environment. For this particular case, soundscape, refer to Hypotyposis. Chapter 5.3.1.3. Bartel (1997) p. 308. Ibid. p. 308-309.
Quintilian, Institutio X. vii. 30. to prepare by careful premeditation and to trust to improvisation in emergency, a practice regularly adopted by Cicero
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invented, thus linking memory with the first canon of rhetoric, the invention. This alludes to the practice of storing up commonplaces or other material arrived at through the topics of invention for use as called for in a given occasion.203 Furthermore, wrapping the musical-rhetorical figures, the representation of images, and the strategic elements, we have ethics. Ethics is an intrinsic part of the decorum, which is the element that allows collaborative dynamics to work. As it will be explained in Chapter 5.5, ethics represents an area of thought and behaviour that signifies a vital catalyst to the interactive social-collective-creative environment of FIM. Therefore, ethics a fundamental element in rhetorical theory becomes influential in defining the sequential organization of musical thought, manifesting itself as an important force in the characterization of FIMs style. If we see this issue from the angle of social relations it is possible to understand how implicit the value of human communication is in sharing the creation and development of the music. 5.1 The Bond between Developing and Learning
In the process of playing FIM the performer is concerned with issues that involve developing the performance. Given that FIM lacks any sort of prescriptive material, it is perhaps right to say that the development of a performance is closely related to a learning process. In this matter we ought to think of the accumulation of knowledge through practice, which although it probably happens in everything we do in FIM has the peculiarity of having the limitations brought by a lack of discourse. How to exchange ideas for developing a performance without language? For it must be clear that the commonly used discourse of social and psychological behaviour is not instrumental or useful in rehearsal or development of this kind of music. For this investigation I wanted to work with musicians who were not acquainted with FIM. For that reason I had to develop a general theory for better understanding the components and dynamics of FIM and use it to develop guidelines for discovering methods for a preparatory training. Teaching FIM might be described as a paradox due to the idea of
203
Silva Rhetoricae, on-line source.
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subjecting the pupil to directions aimed towards making his/her playing free. However, the pedagogical angle taken by this investigation has been shaped so as to allow for the individual expression to retain its freedom. We might enter here into another paradox because it must be obvious that such a pedagogical approach will most definitely exert some influence in some way or another. Then again, we are at all times being influenced by the environment in which we live, and I believe that the line taken by this study rather than trying to impose any specifics, limits itself to suggest strategies for self awareness in the creative social environment of FIM, which I hope would retain the improvisers own will. I am of the idea that when we engage in setting lines for teaching FIM the approach has to take care of leaving the spontaneous creation of the participants undeterred, and I believe that for doing that the most appropriate discipline is rhetoric. Following the principle of expanding the field of materials and expression, which I have defended earlier as one that I think is natural in this practice,204 I see the role of the teacher as one that concentrates solely on encouraging, first, the isolation of known instrumental technicalities and, second, to search for various depths in the interaction with others. The hypotheses is that by trying to isolate the previous learned instrumental technicalities, the interpreter can concentrate better in dealing with the unknown side of his/her instrument, gaining a much faster acquaintance and control of the new elements. I think that having the standard technique present at an early stage represents a distractive component, because it might be taken as a sort of escape from the harshness of playing just with the unknown new instrumental elements. It can also lead to some frustration because I believe that the effort of expressing ourselves through FIM with conventional instrumental technique could be compared to trying to speak a new invented language with known words of our daily idiom. By directing students to isolate any similarity with traditional techniques, and concentrating solely on the organization of musical thoughts with
204
Evangelistis paradox of claiming that the Nuova Consonanza ensemble had agreed on playing inside the tempered system and showing a predominant use of extended instrumental techniques in the result, seems to point that the use of sound exploration comes as a natural behaviour in FIM. Evangelisti (1969).
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the collective, using primarily the sounds produced by the exploration of new sonic instrumental possibilities, all the elements become homogeneous in their novelty. It is like learning a new language in which the vocabulary, phonetics and grammar are equally alien. Borgo writes George [Lewis] mentioned that he often begins the class [of improvisation] in much the same way they used to teach swimming throw them in the deep end and work with what naturally happens.205 Lewis also tells us that, My evaluation procedure with regard to the improvisation exercises attempted to frame quality, not only with regard to the more intangible factor of whether or not I found the audible results to be interesting, but as to the thoroughness of the engagement with the assignment itself.206 Borgo, who teaches improvisation at UCSD (University of California San Diego), also tells us that, Western educational systems have traditionally relied on a strong distinction between knowing and doing, tending to value the former over the latter. He is also of the opinion that knowing is a process co-constituted by the knower, the environment in which the knowing occurs, and the activity in which the learner is participating. In conclusion, he points out that, Learning, from this perspective, is not so much a matter of what one knows, but who one becomes. And education becomes less about the transmission of abstract knowledge and more about helping students to participate in a community of practice.207 Teaching improvisation often raises questions amongst students with regard to the possibility of practicing it, to the existence of a wrong or right way of playing it, and to deep emotional considerations such as the humbleness of the experience and how it helps you to learn about yourself. I believe that knowing, although it may be divorced from the dynamics of passing knowledge in a traditional way of teaching, becomes very important in FIM in the sense that the improviser needs to know himself in order to contribute with the collaborative
205 206 207
Borgo (2005) p. 9. Zorn (2000) p. 102. Borgo (2005) p. 170.
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dynamics of this practice. This self-awareness maybe also become more mature through the dedication and effort made in the pursuit of knowledge practical and theoretical which in turn better equips the individual for engaging in FIM. Also on the West Coast of the USA, Susan Allens approach to teaching FIM is based on encouraging the development of the students self-awareness as individuals in a collective activity. She says that free improvising requires that each and every member of the group use everything that they have ever learned208 pointing out to the idea of expanding sonic and behavioural possibilities. Allen also is of the opinion that participants must listen intently, they must analyze what they are hearing, they must listen to the whole and to the individual, they must be aware of dynamics, timbres, rhythms, intervals, and harmonies - all simultaneously209 and that the teacher must encourage the development of each individual voice within that ensemble, and subsequently proceed to facilitate the group process.210 She sets out many strategies for the development of a consistent interactivity in large ensembles by first making the student aware of possible directions he/she might take in order to build awareness of their already existent musical knowledge, encouraging for exploring new extended instrumental techniques addressing blockages as moments to be confronted rather than feared. Allens system is one that encourages the development of an expanded instrumental technique and at the same time acknowledges the necessity of training group interactivity by the realisation of many exercises in order to achieve her idea of socializing their music making. According to Allen, Students who have participated in the ensemble find that the experience enhances and informs everything they do in the other music they
208
International Consortium for the Advancement of Academic Publication website. Susan Allen: Teaching Large Ensemble Improvisation. http://radicalpedagogy.icaap.org/content/issue4_1/01_Allen.html accessed on 28/08/2007. Ibid. Ibid.
209 210
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play, in relationship, in life.211 Susan Allens group improvisation projects begin by valuing the individual and at the same time inducing the sharing of that individuality. She tells us that, The first time we meet, I ask the students to introduce themselves and tell a bit about whatever they wish to the ensemble this is their first improvisation.212 5.2 Revisiting Rhetorical Figures
For this study I have revised the ancient music rhetorical theory in order to present a compilation of musical-rhetorical figures. Since the objective of being thorough in reformulating all rhetorical devices from the past is too big a task for the present study, this selection was elaborated with the objective of carry out experiences with the groups I have conducted, and for establishing grounds for using rhetoric for assessing FIM performances. Before attempting to suggest a conception for the use of musical-rhetorical figures in FIM, I have considered many descriptions of those figures by a variety of authors. First, the 17th and 18th centurys musical-rhetorical figures present a diversity of descriptions and, sometimes, there are contradictions among the original sources. This represents, in my view, the inherent flexibility of rhetoric in which freedom of interpretation is something that should be cherished, so as to improve the chances of balancing with the innate flexibility of improvised arts. As a consequence, the concepts formulated in this study rather than being defined with a fixed meaning should be regarded as an association that might be subjected to interpretation, to discussion, and perhaps to further development. For each of the figures here presented, a concluding concept, one that will be applied in the analysis of the practical laboratories, is described and set in a table for easy access. Also, since the art of oratory presents dynamics closer to free improvisation than the music compositional methods from the past, some of the analogies suggested by this
211
International Consortium for the Advancement of Academic Publication website. Susan Allen: Teaching Large Ensemble Improvisation. http://radicalpedagogy.icaap.org/content/issue4_1/01_Allen.html accessed on 28/08/2007. Ibid.
212
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investigation were derived from ancient Greco-Roman rhetorical theories as in the example of memoria and issues such as kairos.213 Through the chapters in part III, the practical experiences of this investigation are presented. First, my experiences playing the e-recorder are analysed. Three different recordings from three different periods have been examined. First, I study a recording made at the Meta-Orchestra project at the Summer School in Dartington. This represents my early steps into the practice of FIM. Second, a trio recorded at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, is presented. Last, a solo e-recorder performance is examined, which was recorded at the Sonorities Festival in Belfast. In view of the fact that those three recordings were made in the years 2000, 2002 and 2005 respectively, I have tried to point to the differences that might have been brought by the accumulation of experience. Second, a recording made at the University of California San Diego with David Borgo and the ensemble pfr is analysed. This performance is particular because I have used an acoustic tenor recorder and also because I had never played, rehearsed or even met the performers of this group prior to this recording. Third, the preparation of a guided improvisation with students from the Institute of Sonology and from the classical department of the Royal Conservatory, The Hague, is presented. Fourth, five projects that I conducted at the University of So Paulo (USP), Brazil; the University of Nevada (UNLV), USA; the Mexican Centre for Music and Sonic Arts (CMMAs), Mexico; and University of Santa Barbara (UCSB), USA, are evaluated. The analysis of the laboratories will focus on identifying observed patterns of responses and the factors that shape them. For instance, to what extent the guidance I provided affected the manner in which they improvise. To illustrate that, I have made recordings before, during and after the introduction of the guidelines and compared them to find patterns of responses. I have also profited from the inexperience of those involved in those projects to point to some problems that free improvised performances may exhibit.
213
See Figures of Time, Chapter 5.3.1.5.
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Given that one of the main characteristics of FIM is its collaborative dynamics, I will examine musical examples drawn from the recordings I have made of the experimental projects, this in order to investigate the hypothesis that ethics is very important in determining the sequential organization of musical events. The participants in the laboratories I have conducted at the educational institutions in Brazil, Mexico and the USA, were between 18 and 25 years of age. There was however one exception at the project at UCSB, where one of the participants was over 40 years of age. Apart from two laboratories (Royal Conservatory and one group at the UCSD) all participants had little or no experience in FIM. The great majority were undergraduate male music students. The dexterity level of the participants was from medium to high, with the exception of the project at the CMMAs in Morelia, Mexico, where some participants were dancers playing objects and even a non-instrumentalist playing percussion was present. All projects mixed jazz performers with classical interpreters apart from the one at UNLV, which was constituted only by interpreters of classical music. Curiously, the great majority of instruments in all projects were wind instruments followed by percussion and pianos, guitars, contrabasses, cellos and voice. Computers were present only at the Royal Conservatory and at the UCSD. The only violin present was at the Royal Conservatory, and violas were absent in all laboratories. All projects consisted of three days of training sessions (except the Royal Conservatory, which had 24 hours of rehearsals), each of around three hours of duration with the exception of UCSD where it was constituted by only one session of 2 hours. Concerts were performed at the Royal Conservatory, USP I, UNLV, UCSD and UCSB. The e-recorder performance at the Hypermusic and the Sighting of Sound project was recorded from direct inputs of the live performance of the MetaOchestra project in Dartington, UK, 2000. The recording of the trio with the erecorder was made at Studio Bea1 at the Royal Conservatory, The Netherlands, 2002. The solo e-recorder recording was made at the Sonorities Festival in Belfast, Northern Ireland, in 2005. With the exception of the USP I and UNLV, for which I used a Sony MD recording device, the other projects were recorded 95
using a Tascam HD-P2 Compact Flash Disc stereo recorder and a mono cardioid Rde NT1000 microphone. The experimental projects were generally organised as follows: (i) In order to allow the players to get acquainted with their own possibilities as improvisers, they played sets in duos, without any sort of previous introduction or guideline.214 Next, (ii) the idea of exploring FIM by adopting an expansion strategy of materials was presented. At this point the players were asked to avoid all known instrumental technicalities to allow a more focused exploration of the new sonic possibilities. This was followed by a second improvisation session performed in groups of two and an open discussion. Continuing with the expansion strategy, (iii) the use of a greater variety of rhythms, densities and microtonalisms was recommended, isolating as much as possible diatonism and regular beats. Also at this point, the use of a bigger diversity of silences was suggested. At this time, all members of the ensemble were told to play. Next, (iv) some characteristics already present in some parts of the music played during the previous sets were identified and explained through a rhetorical prism. In that way the rhetorical elements and strategies became clear since rhetoric is directly related to music activities which have been already performed by the group. The introduction to rhetoric was done by identifying the elements played at the very beginning of the sets with rhetorical elements typical of the exordium, or prologue. In this way, the elements used by the performers became identified with musical-rhetorical figures and ethical principles proper of the introduction. For each of the playing sessions the duration of ten to twelve minutes was suggested. Since the natural perception of time without using a watch is something useful for better structuring musical ideas,215 time had to be taken with flexibility so that the spontaneous interweaving of events were not constricted.
214
Two exceptions were made at the USP II and UCSB projects. Those projects began by making everybody play together and dividing the group after in subgroups of two. The use of a device for mesuring time would mean an element of distraction.
215
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5.3
Rhetoric in Music. Intention and Structure.
Certain seventeenth and eighteenth century composers like Bernhard, Burmeister, Mattheson, Kircher, Heinichen, Quantz, and Scheibe, among others, concentrated in theorizing the use of rhetoric in music. These composers wrote extensively about this subject. The baroque composer searched for gaining control in provoking emotions through the use of harmonies, the construction of phrases, the tempo, and with the use of an arsenal of the so-called music-rhetorical figures. The documents left by those composers bring a diversity of analogies made from the figures of rhetoric proper of ancient oratory. For example, Quintilian mentions a strategy for structuring compositions using the figure of gradatio. He mentions: The gradatio, also called climaxrepeats what has already been said and, before proceeding to something else, dwells on that which preceded.216 Making a musical analogy, Scheibe says: The ascension (gradatio) occurs when one progresses by step from a weak passage to stronger ones, thereby gradually increasing the importance and emphasis of the expression of music217 In this description of the figure gradatio, the analogy is quite direct and it is given an affective and a structural quality. Burmeister presents another interpretation: The climax repeats similar notes but on pitches one step apart, as indicated in the following example:218
Figure 1.
216 217 218
Quintilian, Institutio IX. iii. 54. Scheibe (1745) p. 167. Burmeister (1606) p. 63.
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Burmeisters description of climax doesnt fit today common understanding that it indicates an upward movement parallel to an arousal in intensity. His theory includes the possibility of having a downward movement focusing on it as a figure of structure rather than of affection. In a more complex structural case, the figure of metalepsis is described by Quintilian as: The metalepsis or transumptio is the last of the [tropes] involving a change of meaning and signifies a transition from one trope to another. It is the nature of the metalepsis to form a certain intermediate step between a transferred term and that to which the term is transferred, taking on no meaning itself, but only providing a transition. The most common example is the following one: if cano is replaced with canto, and canto with dico, then cano can be replaced with dico, the intermediate step provided by canto.219 This figure is adapted into music by Burmeister. He writes: The metalepsis is a double fuga in which one voice partially introduces the subject of another, namely its second part, into the fuga, which it thereupon completes through repetition of the whole subject. The range of the voices [is] similarly limited through the ambitus of their common modus.220 Portraying a musical representation of an image is described by the figure of hypotyposis (to sketch). Quintilian explains this figure as: a presentation of a thought which is expressed through the oration in such a fashion that it is perceived as though it were seen rather than heard.221 Vogt explains [The composer] ought to understand how to further intensify [the composition] imaginatively through the musical-rhetorical figures of
219 220 221
Quintilian, Institutio VIII. vi. 37,38. Bartel (1997) p. 322. Quintilian, Institutio IX. ii. 40.
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hypotyposis and prosopopeia and, like a painter, place the beautiful or frightful images lifelike before the eyes of the listeners through the music.222 A representation of hypotyposis can be the image of an aura created by the sustained notes played by the strings in J S Bachs St. Matthew Passion when accompanying Jesus recitatives. AUDIO SAMPLE 1 Bach (hypotyposis) Another musical example of the use of figures of rhetoric can be found in the aria Erbarme dich (Have Mercy) from Johann Sebastian Bachs Mathaus Passion (see appendix). The aria comes after Peters denial in which the Evangelist closes the recitative declaring: und weinete bitterlich (and wept bitterly). AUDIO SAMPLE 2 Bach (Aria: Erbarme dich) This passage is one that expresses despair, regret and uncertainty, which are enhanced next in the aria, Erbarme dich, by the use of a diversity of elements. It is important to note Bachs choice for the key of B minor, regarded as melancholic.223 The strings play mostly long notes in a specifically noted piano sempre accompanied by the continuo playing an unremitting pizzicato in a descending line, or catabasis.224 The part of the violin solo is composed by many appoggiature, the figure of exclamatio (the first notes of the violin), saltus duriusculus225 (e.g. bars 3, 5, 6) and the use of anaphorae226 (e.g. end of bar 3 until middle of 5).227
222 223
Bartel (1997) p. 310.
Charpentier refers to B minor as melancholic and lonely while Mattheson thinks of it as bizarre and morose and Rameau finds it of sweet and tender character. Tarling (2004) p. 77. A descending musical passage which expresses negative affections. A dissonant leap. Or repetition, occurs when subsequent phrases begin in like manner.
224 225 226
227
Analysis taken from Luis Otavio Santospaper Msica e Retrica: uma aproximao atravs da anlise do Combatimento di Tancredi e Clorinda de Claudio Monteverdi e da ria Erbarm dich de Johann Sebastian Bach. (So Paulo 2007).
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One possible way to come closer to understanding a musical passage is to reach the field of the inherent intentionalities by isolating it from the qualities that are not present in that field. For example, to find the place inhabited by the active intentionalities, while listening to a presentation of FIM, it is useful to isolate those places which could not be the home of those intentionalities. For instance, at the beginning of the recording of Coltranes Alabama228 it is apparent that joy is not a place which those intentionalities might inhabit. In this way it is possible to continue by further isolating the basic elements of human expressive universals such as love, tenderness, anger, sorrow, etc, until we land on the intentionality that we think predominates. In the case of Alabama it seems to be sorrow. Sorrow, in our specific case, is linked to certain musical structures such as low dynamic levels and short recitative-like interventions upon a low bass, static and rumbling. It may of course be possible to transmit other kinds of affections using the same sonic ingredients and form. This is why the analysis of FIM should also consider that, parallel to a theoretical angle, it is important to focus on the music through the empiric methodology given by perceptive subjective impressions. Once the variety of structures has been identified with their parallel intentionalities we can come to an idea about the macro-structure of the music. In the example of Alabama, there are very clear structural divisions given by the change of musical material. The end of the prologue, for example, is announced by a general pause called in rhetoric aposiopesis. Bartel in his book Musica Poetica affirms that: With Kircher the musical expression of the affections became more closely linked to rhetorical structures and devices. It was Kircher who introduced the rhetorical steps of inventio, dispositio, and elocutio (elaboratio, decoratio) into musical compositional theory, linking them to text expression. 229 There is the one angle that is microstructural, composed by the figures of rhetoric that are related to what to say? The other angle is macrostructural, composed of inventio, dispositio, and
228 229
See Table 1. Bartel (1997) p. 52.
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ornare, pointing to how to say it? and how to organize it? Furthermore, the dispositio itself is divided into exordium, narratio, partitio, confirmatio, refutatio, and peroratio. These parts were taken analogically by some composers of the baroque period in order to structure their compositions. This division was taken also as a model for the structure of the graphical composition Modulus II, which I prepared for the project at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. Again, the aria Erbarme dich from Johann Sebastian Bachs Matthus Passion230 presents the qualities of an exordium (bars1-8) (see appendix), where the elements of the inventio are shown in their instrumental version. The exordium is followed by the narratio (bars 9-22), having the singer describe the facts through the text Erbarme dich, mein Gottt, und meine Zhren willen231 using similar elements of the exordium. Next, the confirmatio (bars 23-26) presents a middle instrumental section where the main theme of the inventio is again presented. Follows the confutatio (bars 27-46), where new text is presented (schaue hier, Herz und Auge weint vor dir bitterlicht)232 with many harmonic modulations and ornamentations (decoratio). Last, the peroratio (bars 1-8) is represented by the da capo that concludes the aria, again, with the initial instrumental introduction (memoria).233 As I said, it seems possible to understand part of the dynamics of FIM by isolating non-relevant intentionalities. However, we have to be aware of the dangers arising primarily from implicitly or explicitly identifying the music with the words describing it; and in the next step in dogmatizing these identifying approaches.234 For that reason, the approach proposed here considers that the interpretation of intentionalities should maintain a flexibility of interpretation to
230 231 232
See score in the appendix. Have Mercy, Lord, on me, regard my bitter weeping. Look at me, heart and eyes both weep to Thee bitterly.
233
Analysis taken from Luis Otavio Santospaper Msica e Retrica: uma aproximao atravs da anlise do Combatimento di Tancredi e Clorinda de Claudio Monteverdi e da ria Erbarm dich de Johann Sebastian Bach. (So Paulo 2007). Gustavsen (1999) p. 1.
234
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allow different perspectives to co-exist. As I will explain later, musical disagreement can be a positive constructive strategy not only when speaking about it but also at the time of playing. When musical disagreements are explored, they might, if decorum is observed, contribute with establishing more resistance and consequently improving the chances for achieving consistency and depth. One way of directing an analytical methodology based on rhetorical guidelines is by concentrating, first, on identifying musical structural and intentional materials. Second, musical materials such as dynamics and activity need to be recognized. Third, understandings of affection and intentionality have to be set out. Fourth, by extracting and linking all those elements from the music it may be possible to reveal possible intentionalities, emergent behaviours, and the structures of the music. Next, I will give an example on the application of this method by analysing Coltranes composition Alabama recorded in Ralph Gleasons Jazz Casual TV program (December 7, 1963)235.
Jazz Casual. Live Music Performances and Interviews. DVD Video. Rhino Home Video (Los Angeles, 2003).
235
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JOHN COLTRANE ALABAMA Jon Coltrane Sax McCoy Tyner piano Jimmy Garrison bass Elvin Jones drums
Time Material Dynamic 1-------7 09:32 Sax: Recitative Piano (Pn): Low continuous rumble Bass: Recitativ Sax: 1 Bss: 2 Piano: 3 Drum: tacet Activity 0------7 3 Proper of Exordium . Anaphorae Musical phrases introverted, like heard from a distance. Sound as someones thoughts rather than voice. Solitude, sorrow. EXORDIUM OR INTRODUCTION Rhetoric Section
10:44
Pause
Aposiopesis
10:45
Tutti: Syncronised rhythm Sax: Melodic Pn: Chords Drum, Bass: Fixed rhythm
Anaphorae, suspiratio
TRANSITION (epilog of introduction)
11:06
Sax: 5,4,3 Pn: 5,4,3 Drum, Bass: 5,4 4 Sax: 2 Bass: 2 Pn: 2 Drum: 4, 3, 2 3
Development of ideas.
DISPOSITIO
12:54 13:15
Trio Sax: Recitative Piano: Low rumble Drum: Rumble Bass: Free rhythm
Memoria Recapitulation of beginning.
CONFIRMATIO
14:19
Pause
Aposiopesis
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14:24
The same as in 10:45 Sax: recitative Pn, Drum: Low rumble Bass: 4 5 6 Sax plays the highest notes of the Pn, Drum: 6 piece. Sax: 3, 4 Pathos, Climax, Anabasis
TRANSITION
14:48
PERORATIO
Table 1.
In the table above, the first column shows the time in the recording. The second column gives the materials used by each instrument. The third column gives the dynamic levels of each of the instruments represented from total silence (0) to maximum volume (7). The fourth column represents the activity of the ensemble from no activity (0) to very active (7). In the fifth column, conclusions about the possible rhetorical content are presented based on the materials from the previous columns. Finally, the sixth column illustrates the macrostructures or sections of the piece. Alabama consists of a theme made up of soft, short phrases, with many silences, in which Coltranes playing resemblances a recitative. Those elements seem to suggest that the intentionalities are carrying forward an emotional content opposite to positive, happy or comical ones. As written in the table, I felt an immediate connection with solitude and sorrow. Coincidentally or not, it was only after doing some research on what the conditions that influenced Coltrane in composing this piece were, that I learned that he had composed this number as his musical interpretation of how he felt when he found out that four young black girls were killed by white supremacists in a church bombing in Alabama. However, this music is partly written and the ethics in the group are informed by respect for Coltranes status as a composer and director of the ensemble. Also, the amount of musical material in compositions may be easier to discern than understanding the music produced by an ensemble playing FIM. If we move to the sound aesthetics presented by Evan Parkers particular way of playing the saxophone, for example, in which it is not necessary to have such
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obvious sectional transition points,236 someone could ask: how can rhetoric explain what goes on when Parker plays? When Evan Parker engages in playing with his virtuosic technique, he demonstrates, according to Borgo, the ability to seamlessly keep three or more distinct musical layers in the air at the same time.237 First, we have to think about the ideas that generate such musical manifestation so as to understand that the primary objective of Parker may be achieving multilayers of sound, trying to characterize each of them by giving the impression that they are somehow independent. In this matter I think we could compare it to a fugue, where the structural clarity becomes the primary intention of the playing and not the concatenation of intentionalities or transmission of affections as, for instance, in a melodic line. It is possible then that in a period marked by contrasts such as the baroque, the aim of the prlude & fugue or the fantasie & fugue was to expose both the free and malleable nature of the first and the more exact, almost mathematical, character of the second. It might be useful for understanding FIM to switch our perception according to the intentionalities of the music being played. However, both characteristics can be focussed through a rhetorical angle since they primary objective is one inherent in a communication process. Next, a selection of figures is presented. Most of them will be used in the chapters where the musical results of the laboratories are analysed. However, for proposing the analysis of FIM through a rhetorical approach it is necessary to retain parameters that are open for interpretation so that the flexibility of the method harmonises with the natural freedom of the practice. A rhetorical method for FIM ought to encourage profitable discussions to allow it to develop into a consistent theory. To achieve this objective, both an empirical methodology and time are required, together with the disposition of improvisers to establish a healthy interchange of ideas.
236 237
Smith and Dean (1997) p. 73. Borgo (2005) p. 95.
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5.3.1 Rhetorical Figures and their Analogy in FIM The re-interpretation of rhetorical figures brings us a set of tools which will be used in this study for understanding FIM. The process of generating useful concepts from the rhetorical figures consists of abstracting from various definitions. To address FIM analytically, however, we ought to bear in mind that FIM is a practice that involves heuristic discovery and dialogue in which the products of invention are flexible of interpretation and, consequently, resistant to conceptualization. Nonetheless, the meta-musician borrowing Edwin Prvosts terminology engaged in FIM is sensing, evaluating and acting238 and, at the same time, trying to find ways to put through intentions while immersed in collective musical debate. In order to apply theory objectively, circumstantial conditions have to be taken into consideration so as to avoid the creation of unnecessary standardisation. It seems possible to combine this conceptual flexibility with the process of making analogies between the music and the figures. To illustrate that, I present practical examples such as my composition titled Modulus II, which is a concatenation of rhetorical figures inside a classical rhetorical structure.239 Also, I have used excerpts from the projects that I have conducted as practical examples for most of the figures here presented. In the process of re-visiting the music-rhetorical figures from the 17th and 18th centuries I have encountered many that cannot be applied to the aesthetics of FIM since they have been developed for music that relies upon pre-conceived compositional methods. However, some of the figures and rhetorical concepts here presented are a direct interpretation from ancient Greco-Roman sources. Some of these figures were intrinsic in the compositional theory of rhetorical music.
238 239
Prvost (1995) p. 3. See the score of Modulus II in the appendix and the recording in the DVDR.
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5.3.1.1 Figures of Intentional Imitation

a) Anaphora or Repetitio b) Antithesis or Contrapositum c) Auxesis or Incrementum A repetition of a musical line. A musical expression of opposing affections, harmonies or thematic material. Where the material is enhanced by exaggeration, by making its dynamics and/or articulations stronger or by mocking. d) Emphasis e) Mimesis, Ethophonia or Imitatio Enhancement of a phrase or musical idea. An approximate rather than strict imitation of a subject at different pitches. Table 2.
a) Anaphora or Repetitio: Gottsched says: When numerous passages of an oration begin in like manner. It can give greater emphasis to the passage been repeated. 240 Bartel mentions that, In most cases authors choose only one of the two terms, anaphora or mimesis for their Figurenlehre.241 Bartel also says that Scheibe and Forkel mention that the repetitio is best used when combined with paronomasia, a figure of repetition which alters passages it repeats, supplying additional material for the sake of emphasis. He continues writing that Scheibe considers the repetitio a figure that belongs both to the musical dispositio as much as to the decoratio.242 Burmeister refers to it as an ornament used in the false fugue only, which means that it is repeated in various voices but not in all of them.243
240 241 242 243
Redekunst p. 279. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 186. Bartel (1997) p. 184. Bartel (1997) pp. 185-186. Burmeister (1606) p.185.
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Kircher says that it is often used in vehement affections such as ferocity or scorn, as exemplified in a composition based on the text: To arms! To arms!244 Other music concepts are intimately related to compositions and/or to words in which the text is supported by the music, especially in cases of repetition. In the context of this research, I suggest its use as: Anaphora is the approximate repetition of both the musical material and its intentionalism with the objective of fixing it in the performance. The length can vary from short musical interventions, such as ornaments, to big sections, like a repetition of the exordium.
Table 3.
In the example of Telemanns quartet in e-minor we can listen to a theme repeated in all voices in a false fugue: AUDIO SAMPLE 3 Telemann (anaphora) From the recording I made with the group pfr and David Borgo at UCSD, I used a strong anaphora by repeating a motif coming from one of the laptop performers: AUDIO SAMPLE 4 UCSD (anaphora) For concepts of repetition that enhance the copied passage, I suggest the use of other figures such as auxesis or paranomasia. Also, in FIM we can consider the idea of having an imitation which is linked not to the sonic result but to the speculative interpretation of the intentionalism carried through the sound. See under Mimesis. b) Antithesis, Antitheton or Contrapositum Quintilian writes: Antithesis, which Roman writers call either contrapositum or contentio, may be affected in more than one way. Single words may be contrasted
244
Kircher (Rome, 1650) L.8 p.144.
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with single, as in the passage recently quoted245or the contrast may be between pairs of words, as in nostri ingenii, vestri auxilii est,246 or sentence may be contrasted with sentence, as in dominetur in contiobunis, iacebat in iudiciis.247 Bartel explains that [antithesis] may refer to opposing affections (Kircher, Janovka, Scheibe), harmonies (Walthers antithesis, Spiess), or thematic material (Vogt, Walthers antitheton, Scheibe, Spiess). He continues saying that The aspect of musical opposites receives particular attention in Matthesons discussion of the confutatio. Just as the confutatio serves to refute objections to the principal argument in rhetoric, so too can it be used to resolve opposition to the theme in music, particularly in fugal composition.248 Mattheson tells us, Opposites can be expressed in various ways in music, be it through certain notes which oppose each other, through sudden changes of the key or the rhythm, etc.249 Antithesis, Antitheton or Contrapositum will be focused as means to identify different angles of opposition. Firstly (intentional), to point to contrasting intentionalities. Secondly (structural), to identify contrasting musical material.
Table 4.
AUDIO SAMPLE 5 Modulus II (antithesis) The start of the narratio of Modulus II is composed for the piano, electronics and contrabass. Whilst the first two are mainly in the high register using fast phrases and emphatical gestures the contrabass plays in antithesis by using slow moaning low sounds that seem to drag in tempo.
245
Quintilian, Institutio IX. iii. 62. Vicit pudorem libido, timorem audacia, rationem amentia. (Lust conquered shame, boldness fear, madness reason.) Quintilian, Institutio IX. iii. 82. This is beyond my power; it is your support that is required.
246 247
Quintilian, Institutio IX. ii. 51. Let it prevail in the public assembly, but be silent in the courts of law. Bartel (2007) p. 197. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 199.
248 249
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AUDIO SAMPLE 6 C.Ph.Bach (antithesis) In the example of Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach we have the introduction of the Symphony for strings No. 5 in B minor. It begins in a manner that tricks the listener into believing that the symphony is going to develop into a direction of smooth upper lines accompanied by sequences of repeated notes in the continuo. However, already around the ninth second the violins, via a saltus duriusculus, jump a seventh interval downwards changing the whole intention that I refer as the antithesis. c) Auxesis or Incrementum Quintilian: The incrementum is a most powerful form [of amplification]: insignificant things are made to appear important. 250 Walther (Lexicon): The auxesis occurs when a passage or a melody is repeated twice or three times, while at the same time, however, always rising higher.251 This research will apply auxesis as: Auxesis is a strategy that intensifies the power of the musical passage by imitating it in several ways: for instance, by making it stronger dynamically, or by giving it a caricaturesque character.
Table 5.
d) Emphasis Quintilian refers to emphasis as when some hidden meaning is extracted from some phrase252 while Mathesson mentions that emphasis always falls on an entire word, not according to the sound of it but according to the meaning contained therein; whereas the accent only deals merely with the syllables.253
250 251 252 253
Quintilian, Institutio VIII i.v. 3 f. 8. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p.211 Quintilian, Institutio IX. ii. 64. Mathesson (1739) p. 370.
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So an emphasis is different from just accents put in musical passages. The use of mere accents seems to me categorically more suitable to ornamentation, or for the sake of structural clarity through the accentuation of rhythm. Emphasis in FIM could involve the enhancement of a phrase or musical idea. As a sort of mimesis that increases and strengthens the intentionality.
Table 6.
e) Mimesis, Ethophonia or Imitatio Mimesis is referred to by many (Burmeister, Thuringus, Whalter and Mattheson) as being linked to fugues. However, the imitation is encouraged to present a freer form, for instance at different intervals or reducing the duration of the notes. Vogt254 and Spiess255 express a concept that lies out from concerns on voices or intervals of imitation but rather on the effect provoked. E.g. womens voices imitated by men. Let us not to forget that imitation is the basis for all human learning, a fact that is very present in the musical literature of the seventeenth and eighteenth century. Imitation, rather than being seen as plagiarism, was regarded as an honor to the creator of the original.256 Mimesis in the context of FIM is regarded by this study thus: Mimesis points towards imitating only the intentionalities inherent in the musical inputs of other players rather than copying the musical material produced by them.
Table 7.
254 Bartel (1997) p. 329. Vogt (Conclave p.151) Ethophonia, vel Mimisis. Cum aliquis alterius vocem imitatur, ut mulieris.
Bartel (1997) p. 331. Spiess (Tractatus p.156) Ethophonia, oder Mimisis, Imitatio, Nachahmung, wird alsdann genennet, wann einer des anders Stimm imitirt. v.g. eines Weibs.
256
255
Mathesson (1739) p. 637 [imitation] is quite a good thing so long as no actual musical thievery is accomplished in the process.An example of that are the Vivaldis violin concertos adapted to harpsichords by J. S. Bach.
111
5.3.1.2 Figures of Structural Imitation

a) Anaphora When the repetition of a phrase is always at the beginning of the passage. b) Epistrophe When the repetition of a phrase is always at the end of the passage. c) Symploce It is the combination of both, the anaphora and the epistrophe. d) Epanodos or Regressio Table 8. A repetition that happens backwards.
a) Anaphora Although anaphora has an intentional connotation it can also be used in a structural manner. Many authors refer to it as such: Bartel mentions in his book that Gottsched says that anaphora is: when numerous passages of an oration begin in like manner.257 Mattheson asks what is more common in melodic composition than the anaphora, in which an already introduced melodic fragment is repeated at the beginning of various following phrases, thus establishing a relationship?258 Anaphora, besides its intentional character, can become a structural device by repeating it every time before making a new statement.
Table 9.
257 258
Redekunst p. 279. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 186. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 189.
112
b) Epistrophe Scheibe mentions that [epistrophe] occurs when the ending of one melodic passage is repeated at the end of other passages.259 Walther tells us that the epistrophe is a rhetorical figure in which one or more words are repeated at the end of numerous phrases, elaborations or similar passages.260 Epistrophe is viewed as the repetition of the conclusion of a musical passage at the end of subsequent passages.
Table 10.
c) Symploce or Complexio Walther: The complexio occurs when the beginning of a musical passage is repeated at its end, in imitation of the poets, who frequently begin and end a verse using the same word.261 Burmeister explains that Symploke is the actual or potential juxtaposition of the disparity signs b or + with #, thereby perverting the nature of perfect consonances and complicating the nature of one consonance with the nature of another.262 Symploce or Complexio is understood as a combination of anaphora and epistrophe.
Table 11.
d) Epanodos or Regressio Walther mentions that the epanodusfrom epi and anodos, the returning route, is a word figure that occurs when the words of a sentence are repeated in reverse
259 260 261 262
Scheibe (1745) p. 696. Walther (1732) Ibib. Burmeister (1601) p. 89.
113
order.263 Another view is presented by Susenbrotus (Epitome p.86): The regressio or epanodos occurs when the repetition os a previously stated thought assumes a different meaning through its division into different parts.264 Epanodos or Regressio indicates a repetition, or imitation, in retrograde.
Table 12.
AUDIO SAMPLE 7 AMM Norwich (epanodos or regressio) 5.3.1.3 Figures of Illustration

a) Anabasis or Ascensus An ascending musical passage that carries a parallel intentionalism of exalted affections. b) Bombus c) Catabasis or Descensus Identical notes in rapid succession. A descending musical passage, the opposite of Anabasis, carries lowly or negative affections. d) Climax e) Dubidatio f) Emphasis A gradual increase in sound and pitch. An intentionally ambiguous progression. A musical passage that heightens the meaning of the text through various means. g) Exclamatio or Ecphonesis h) Hypotyposis, Prosopopoeia A musical exclamation. A vivid musical representation of images.
263 264
Walther (1732) Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 259.
114
i) Interrogatio j) Loginqua Distancia
A musical question. When voices become apart of each other by more than an octave.
k) Parenthesis
A musical representation of a parenthesis.
l) Parembole
A voice that complements what already existed before. Table 13.
a) Anabasis or Ascensus Bartel explains that the anabasis is used to musically recreate the effect of an ascending image or thought found in the textFor example, in Bachs setting of the text Et resurrexit (Mass in B minor).265 Walther says, Anabasis, from anabaino, ascendo, I ascend into the heights, is a musical passage by which something ascending into the heights is expressed.266
265 266
Bartel (1997) p. 179. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p.180.
115
Anabasis or Ascensus will be regarded as the concept involved in creating an upward musical movement with the intention of provoking an arousal in the communication of intentionalities. It is, however, not proper to pre-establish the tenor of affections inherent in such a figure, since this will have to be further explored. The question is whether this figure remains only as mean to communicate positive affections.
Table 14.
AUDIO SAMPLE 8 Bach, B-minor Mass, Et resurrexit (anabasis) AUDIO SAMPLE 9 Modulus II (anabasis) b) Bombus Bartel mentions that, The bombus and its grammatical/musical derivatives are considered ornaments or Manieren rather than musical-rhetorical figures. A series of bombi is referred to as bombilans.267 Bombus will indicate the repetition of the same note in a manner that produces some rhythmic regularity.
Table 15.
This excerpt is from the Dartington 2000 recording. The e-recorder repeats a figure of Bombus several times in the low register. AUDIO SAMPLE 10 Dartington 2000 (bombus)
267
Bartel (1997) p. 212.
116
c) Catabasis or Descensus The descending musical passage can communicate a diversity of intentionalities. Kircher and Janovka refer to this figure as a musical passage which expresses affections opposite to those of the anabasis, like servitude, humility, humbleness, or also affections linked to the significance of descending into hell. Walther also says that the catabasis, from katabaino, descendo, is a musical passage through which lowly, insignificant, and disdainful things are presented268 Catabasis or Descensus in FIM would be related to a descending musical passage. However, as in the case of the anabasis, the intentionalities attached to such a structural device remain to be explored in practice. At this point I may say that depending on the sound material (intervals from microtonalism, big harmonic jumps or even noises and the dynamic level in which they are performed) this figure may express affections such as those described by Kircher, Janovka and Walther but also might express other things related to more positive affections.
Table 16.
AUDIO SAMPLE 11 USP05 (catabasis). d) Climax Climax has had different definitions throughout the seventeenth century. It also refers to a stepwise construction, either upwards or downwards. Bartel mentions even the verbal root of climax (klino: to bow, turn away) suggests a downward rather than an upward or intensifying motion.269
268 269
Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 215. Bartel (1997) p. 221.
117
Because this term is very much associated with an increase in the musical passage, closely related to the concept of crescendo, I think it will be confusing to try and taking it out of this concept. Consequently, the notion suggested by this study is: Climax is represented by a gradual increase or rise in sound and pitch, creating a growth in intensity.
Table 17.
e) Dubidatio Bartel tells us that A musical doubting can be used by ambivalence or unclarity in either harmony or rhythm.270 Also Quintilian says that hesitation may lend an impression of truth to our statements, when, for example, we pretend to be at a loss, when to begin or end, or to decide what especially requires to be said or not to be said at all.271 Intending to create this figure musically, Scheibe asserts that however, the dubidatio must not confuse the composers own arrangement or the proper coherence of his music, thereby creating doubt in his own mind; rather he must only meaningfully lead the listeners astray so that, becoming uncertain regarding the order of the music or the notes, they cannot easily guess his intent.272 Dubidatio in FIM can refer to the use of musical devices that have the objective of capturing extra attention from the audience making them to come closer to the music. This figure can also become very helpful in the case of real doubt. If the improviser, for some reason or another, becomes dissatisfied with his/her musical contribution, the real doubt arising from this action can be transformed in a performed doubt so as to transform it into musical material and therefore, isolating the problem that could lead to inconsistency.
Table 18.
270 271 272
Bartel (1997) p. 242. Quintilian, Institutio IX. ii. 19. Quoted in Bartel (2007) pp. 243-244.
118
f) Emphasis Quintilian mentions that emphasis maybe numbered among figures also, when some hidden meaning is extracted from some phrase, as in the following passage from Virgil: Might I have not lived, From the wedlock free, a life without a stain, Happy as beasts are happy?273 The emphasis on the word happy communicates another meaning. In explaining the difference between accent and an emphasis, Mattheson tells us that the mentioned distinctionconsists primarily in the following characteristics. First of all the emphasis always falls on the entire word, not according to the sound of it but according to the meaning contained therein; whereas the accent only deals merely with the syllables, namely with their length, brevity, raising or lowering in punctuation.274 Emphasis for this research points to the accentuation of a whole musical phrase making it stand in front of other material been played.
Table 19.
g) Exclamatio or Ecphonesis Mattheson tells us that there are three types of exclamatio: The first type comprises astonishment, a joyous acclamation, or a rousing command. E.g. Hurrah! Hurrah! Live eternally, flourish eternally Hamburg! The second type of outburst or exclamation comprises all wishes or heartfelt yearnings; all entreaties, appeals, laments; also fright, dread, and terror, etc. The last ones require melodic vehemence, which is best expressed through rapid or fast sounds: though yearnings and the other traits always have grief as their mother. E.g.
273 274
Quintilian, Institutio IX. ii. 64. Mattheson (1739) p. 370.
119
Heaven! Hast thou still compassion for this poor wretch, Oh! Then help me know. The third type of exclamation is a true scream, which often originates from extreme consternation, astonishment, or from frightful horrible events, which often ascend to the hights of desperation. As when Cain is represented as exclaiming: Vengeance, open yourself, to densely smoking hell! Draw me to my thy fire! I deliver onto thee my desparing soul! etc.275 Walther says that: The exclamatio or ecphonesis is a rhetorical figure which signifies an agitated exclamation. This can be realized very appropriately in music through an upwardleaping minor sixth.276 Scheibe explains that the exclamatio is commonly expressed through an ascending passage, using consonances in joyous events or affections and dissonances in sorrowful ones.277 Exclamatio or Ecphonesis will be considered as a musical exclamation. It is more suitable to discuss it from the perspective of delivery rather than through the angle of invention. This figure can comprise other figures, as in many cases.278 For instance, the manner of expressing an auxesis may have to go through the filter of exclamatio before arriving to the audience.
Table 20.
275 276 277 278
Mattheson (1739) pp. 400-401. Quoted in Bartel (2007) p. 268. Ibid. p. 269.
Deliberating what kind of musical-rhetorical figure might be active in a musical passage, for example, can point to a compilation of figures. E.g. An imitation can be in the form of anabasis which at the same time can structurally represent an anaphora, which at turn can also be an auxexis.
120
h) Hypotyposis or Prosopopoeia Quintilian says: With regard to the figure which Cicero (de Or. III. Liii. 202.) calls ocular demonstration, this comes into play when we do not restrict ourselves to mentioning that something was done, but proceed to show how it was done, and do so not merely in broad lines, but in full detail.279 Burmeister writes: Hypotiposis is that ornament whereby the sense of the text is so depicted that the matters contained in the text that are inanimate or lifeless seem to be brought to life.280 Vogt in his Conclave mentions: [The composer] ought to understand how to further intensify [the composition] imaginatively through the musical-rhetorical figures of hypotiposis and prosopopoeia and, like a painter, place the beautiful or frightful images lifelike before the eyes of the listeners through the music.281 Hypotyposis or Prosopopoeia will be considered as a musical-rhetorical figure that portrays a musical image such as, for example, a soundscape.
Table 21.
Example: The sustained notes played by the strings in Bachs Matthus Passion when accompanying Jesus recitatives. AUDIO SAMPLE 1 Bach (hypotyposis) i) Interrogatio Scheibe poses the rhetorical question: After all, who does not recognize the necessity and charm of the question in all musical compositions?282 This figure in music was
279 280 281 282
Quintilian, Institutio IX. ii. 40. Burmeister (1601) p. 175. Quoted in Bartel (2007) p. 311. Quoted in Bartel (2007) p. 312.
121
closely related to the representation of a question by the use of harmonic artifices such as stopping at the dominant chord in an imperfect cadence. Quintilian asks: What is more common than to ask or inquire? For both terms are used indifferently, although the one seems to imply a desire for knowledge, and the other a desire to prove something.283 Mattheson is of the opinion that Many composers are rigid in the idea that the question mark would always have to be expressed in singing through some type of raising of the voice; but one must in no way think such a proposition is infallible. It is true that in everyday speech and pronunciation the voice is always raised more or less with a question; but in melody there are many circumstances which not only permit an exception to this but often require it. Besides, one encounters many figurative questions in verses where there would be no doubt at all as to whether it is this way or that. Yet doubt is the true indicator of a real question. For this reason a composer of melody must rightly distinguish the one from the other and organize his notes accordingly.284 We can see that while Scheibe makes a clear distinction between interrogatio and dubidatio, Mattheson acknowledges the later to be intrinsic to the first. Mattheson also is of the idea that there is no necessity to have a question to raise doubt. Interrogatio in this investigation will point specifically to the rising of musical questions, leaving the intentionalities that provoke doubt through other means to the figure of dubidatio.
Table 22.
j) Loginqua Distancia This rule refers to the distance between two voices and it is found only in Bernhards Tractatus. The voices are not to be placed too far from each other, that is, not more
283 284
Quintilian, Institutio IX. ii. 6. Mattheson (1739) p. 398.
122
than a twelfth apart.285 Bartel also tell us that, With the dawn of basso continuo era, this rule of counterpoint is no longer as relevant or as strictly observed as in the sixteenth century. He is also of the opinion that, Bernhard describes the distantia between the soprano and bass as longinqua (distant, foreign). This latter term not only describes the long interval separating the voices, but also signifies the foreignness or strangeness of the resulting interval.286 Loginqua Distancia is taken by this study as the parallel opposite movements of two voices in the ensemble, resulting in a great distance between them.
Table 23.
k) Parenthesis Quintilian mentions that, The first is called interpositio or interclusio by us, and parenthesis or paremptosis by the Greeks, and consists in the interruption of the continuous flow of our language by the insertion of some remark.287 Mattheson decribes the parenthese saying that, This caesura is an interpolation where certain words which are isolated from the rest through an enclosure ( ) interrupt the course of continuity of performance a little. The thing is not really very musical and in my opinion might just as well not be used in the melodic discipline. However, because it occasionally appears in arias, though more often and more fittingly in recitative, he who may want to proceed correctly with such enveloped words might only consider whether his interpolation disgresses much or little from the principal aim of the text: in as much as the melody must be interrupted a little or a great deal according to the circumstances.288
285 286 287 288
Bernhard, Tractatus p. 41. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 317. Bartel (1997) p. 317. Quintilian, Institutio IX. iii. 23. Mattheson (1739) p. 401.
123
Parenthesis is a sudden isolated musical thought which allows the previous thought to come back before losing its clarity in the delivery.
Table 24.
l) Parembole or Interjectio Quintilian writes, Again, parenthesis, so often employed by orators and historians, and consisting in the insertion of one sentence in the midst of another, may seriously hinder the understanding of a passage, unless the insertion is short.289 Burmeister says that, Parembole occurs when at the beginning of a piece two or more voices carry on the subject of the fugue, and another voice is mingled that proceeds alongside them without contributing anything pertinent to the nature or process of fugue. It merely fills vacant spaces in the consonances while those other voices carry on the fugue.290 Parembole or Interjectio occurs in FIM when musical inputs become, or are deliberately made, complements to the overall. Those complementary musical ideas are made to fit by adopting an also complementary sonic form, either in the choice of sound or rhythm.
Table 25.
5.3.1.4 Figures of Silence There is a diversity of opinions with respect to the division in which silences should be organized. Bartel in his Musica Poetica divides the musical figures of silence into those signifying a breaking off, or rupture of the musical line, and those signifying and ensuing silence. The problem in taking such a division is that figures such as pausa and suspiratio, which have totally different objectives, get into the same category. Whilst pausa is just a rest with no inherent emotional intention, suspiratio is
289 290
Quintilian, Institutio VIII. ii. 15. Burmeister (1606) p. 179.
124
the musical equivalent to a sigh, charged with emotional meaning. Thinking about another kind of division it will be possible to divide the figures of silence into those used collectively and those used individually. But, by doing so, general pauses such as aposiopesis would be in the same category as pausa, having both very different objectives. After collecting information about the variety of silences used in rhetoric I found useful to find a way to divide them into two groups: one that appeals to Pathos (emotion) and others that are not directly aimed to provoke any emotion but just introduce a rest in the music. The following division was elaborated: Figures of silence related to Pathos
a) Abruptio b) Aposiopesis c) Suspiratio An unexpected break in music. A pause in all voices. A rest that illustrates a musical sigh. Table 26.
Figures of silence related to rests

d) Pausa e) Tmesis A pause or rest in music. A fragmentation of a musical sequence by rests. Table 27.
At the same time, silences could be divided into three categories:

f) Homoioteleuton General pauses that follow a cadence, finale silentium: Pausa g) Homoiptoton General pauses in the middle: Aposiopesis
125
h) Homoioarche291
General pause that anticipates the beginning of the music. Table 28.
a) Abruptio Abruptio is strictly an individual interruption. Defined by Virgil as a breaking off in the middle of a speech,292 abruptio was introduced by Kircher who uses this term instead of aposiopesis. This term cannot be found in the works of Cicero or Quintilian for which reason it seems it was invented for its use in music. Kircher explains two cases of the use of abruptio: Stylus recitativus: breaking the notes into smaller values Cadenza: finishing before the bass by placing as last note the fourth of the dominant (which is the tonic) and leaving the bass to play the tonic alone. Bartels definition is a sudden and unexpected break in musical composition. Abruptio in this research will be referred as an unexpected break in an individual musical line which has subcategories such as: suspiratio or stenasmus, tmesis or diacope, parenthesis, anacoluthon, and pausa.
Table 29.
b) Aposiopesis Aposiopesis, or reticentia, refers to a collective interruption. A general pause closely related to pathos. Breaking off suddenly in the middle of speaking, usually to portray being overcome with emotion.293 Burmeister refers to it as that which imposes a general silence upon all voices at a specific given sign, as in Orlandos 5 voice
291
I invented this term to point to the silence before the music begins, which in FIM is of great importance. It seems to be that the setting of decorum and kairos starts at this point by contacts made in the group through silence. Cassells Latin Dictionary (New York 1968) Silva Rhetoricae online source.
292 293
126
Angelus ad Pastores, 5 voice Surgens Iesus, 5 voice Christe patris verbum and the third part of his In principio erat verbum. Bartel says that it is usually encountered in [baroque] compositions whose texts deal with death or eternity. expressing infinity or nothingness. He continues saying that, It can be related to the figure of interrogatio expressing the silence that follows the question. 294Walther and Turingus refer to it as a general silence in all parts and of two kinds, homoioptoton (general pause without cadence) and homoioteleuton (general pause that follows the cadence).295 Aposiopesis will refer to the happening of a general pause in the group.
Table 30.
AUDIO SAMPLE 12 UNLV06 (aposiopesis1) AUDIO SAMPLE 13 UNLV06 (aposiopesis2) c) Suspiratio or Stenasmus Bartel indicates that, [Suspiratio is] a musical expression of a sigh through a rest.296 Also Kircher tells us that, through [suspiratio] we express affections of groaning or sighing with eight or sixteenth rests, which are therefore called suspiria.297 Suspiratio or Stenasmus is regarded as related to the figure of pathos. It introduces silences into a musical line to portray emotional states related to sorrow, anguish, sadness, etc.
Table 31.
294 295 296 297
Bartel (1997) pp. 203-204. Walther (Lexicon), Thuringus (Opusculum p.126). Bartel (1997) p. 393. Quoted in Bartel (1997) pp. 393-394.
127
d) Pausa Kircher thinks that Pausis is the same as silence. The pausa is appropriately used when one person instead of many are allowed to speak. It is suitably applied when someone asks a question or responds to a question, as in the musical dialogues of Viadana.298 Also Janovka, Walther, Thuringus and Printz refer to pausa as a silence.299 Pausa is not related to pathos, the pausa refers to the use of rests that allow breathing, separate phrasing. It is used also to give space to others to perform. It allows the framing of content rather than having content by itself.
Table 32.
e) Tmesis Bartel explains that, Both the musical and the rhetorical tmesis signify a fragmentation, reflecting the literal meaning of the word as a cut or incision.300 Tmesis in FIM will be considered as unrelated to pathos, meaning a cut or incision which divide the music in fragments by placing rests.
Table 33.
f) Homoioteleuton Quintilian writes that, The second form occurs when clauses conclude alike, the same syllabes being placed at the end of each; this correspondence in the ending of two or more sentences is called homoeoteleuton.301
298 299 300
Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 364. Bartel (1997) pp. 364-365. Bartel (1997) p. 412.
128
Walther says that, In music the aposiopesis refers to a pausa generalis, or a complete silence in all voices and parts of the composition simultaneously. This can occur in two ways: (1) Through a complete silence indicated by a whole- or halftactus rest in the middle of a composition following a finalis cadence, which is called homoeoteleuton; (2) when a similar silence in the middle of a composition through a whole-, half-, or quarter- tactus rest without a prceding ending or cadence, which is called homoeoptoton.302 Homoioteleuton is a general pause that happens after a musical passage that manifested the intention of coming to an end.
Table 34.
g) Homoioptoton Thuringus asks the question: What is homoioptoton? It occurs when a general pause is simultaneously inserted in all voices of the composition through semibrevis, minima, or seminima rests. The Italians and French frequently use this figure in choruses, galliards, madrigals, passamezze, canzonetti, courants, balletti, Auffzgen, intradas, paduanas, etc., and contemporary composers in dialogues and in questions.303 Homoioptoton is a general pause that occurs in the middle of the musical discourse.
Table 35.
h) Homoioarche This figure describes the silence previous to the execution of the first sounds in a session of FIM. I have come with this new figure to describe the active nature of this
301 302 303
Quintilian, Institutio IX. iii. 77. Quoted in Bartel (1997) pp. 297-298. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 297.
129
silence. The beginning of a session of FIM is where the musicians involved are tuned into perceiving how the first sounds are left to exist, how the initial intentions and negotiations set up, and how the decorum begins to settle. Homoioarche is a new figure that refers to the energies present in the silence prior to the execution of FIM.
Table 36.
5.3.1.5 Figures of Time

a) Kairos To find the appropriate moment for making a musical input. b) Memoria The ability to retain many aspects of a musical input for the sake of latter access. c) Prolepsis Or anticipatio, links the gestural information from the participants to kairos. Table 37.
a) Kairos Kairos is a very complex term with a varied history. Kinneavy tell us that, it was Gorgias who made kairos the cornerstone of his entire epistemology, ethics, aesthetics, and rhetoric.304 McComiskey says that, The extant texts reveal that Gorgias epistemology is relativistic, and his correspondent rhetorical methodology works to seize the opportune moment (kairos) in which certain kinds of language can be used to unite subjective consciousness into a comunal desire for action.305 Also, revealing the intrinsic improvisational character of kairos Erich Charles White writes
304 305
Kinneavy (1986) p. 222. McComiskey (2002) p. 18.
130
that, the persuasive force of a speech does not derive from its correspondence to a pre-existing reality or truth. Truth is relative to the speaker and the immediate context The persuasive force of the truth must be renewed at each occasion and cannot become, therefore, a routine accomplishment.306 Kairos refers to finding the proper moment to contribute with a musical input considering the contingencies of a given place and time so that it helps the group to achieve clarity and eloquence. In this sense, kairos is closely related to the principles of audience and decorum.
Table 38.
b) Memoria Memory is as much tied to the improvisational necessities of a speaker as to the need to memorize a complete speech for delivery. In this sense Memory is related to kairos.307 Talking about jazz, Berliner mentions that the longer and more complex the musical idea artists initially conceive, the greater the powers of musical memory and mental agility required to transform it.308 Quintilian says that, even extempore eloquence, in my opinion, depends on no mental activity so much as memory. For while we are saying one thing, we must be considering something else that we are going to say: consequently since the mind is always looking ahead, it is continually in search on something which is more remote 309 Quintilian also says: For not only what we say and how we say it is of importance, but also the circumstances under which we say it. It is here that the need of arrangement comes in. But it will be impossible to say everything demanded by the
306 307
White (1987) pp. 14-15.
Silva Rhetoricae, on-line source accessed on 19/09/2007 http://humanities.byu.edu/rhetoric/silva.htm Berliner (1994) p. 55. Quintilian, Institutio XI. ii. 3.
308 309
131
subject without the aid of memory.310 And: Some regard memory as being no mere than one of natures gifts; but, like everything else, memory might be improved by cultivation.311 One example of a cultivated use of memory was presented by AMMs concert at the UEA, the recording of which was released as a CD entitled Norwich.312John Tilburys use of memory is one of the elements that, in my opinion, granted the eloquence this presentation delivered. To give an example, the music begins with a careful interchange of minor thirds between Prvost and Tilbury. Next, Prvost, using a very confirming gesture, makes a resolution playing a semitone downwards from a note Tilbury first played (Track one; 1:23 1:24). The semitone was never repeated until later on (Track one; 6:56 7:06) where Tilbury plays it six times, and four times more in mirror fashion epanodos or regressio immediately after (Track one; 7:20 7:26) giving us a sense of structure. AUDIO SAMPLE 7 AMM Norwich (regressio) AUDIO SAMPLE 14 AMM Norwich (memoria) Memory is then also important for structuring the delivery. In Greece there were systems called topoi. Herrik tells us that the topoi probably began as memory devices and evolved into methods for discovering arguments.313 In this regard, Ciceros concept of loci314 which means places or backgrounds in Latin is linked to the organisation and development of an argument. Herrik informs us, Mnemonic (memory) systems involved envisioning physical settings or locations. A rhetor would
310 311 312
Quintilian, Institutio III. iii. 2. Quintilian, Institutio XI. ii. 1.
CD Norwich, AMM at UEA, Eddie Prvost and John Tilbury. Matchless Recordings, Essex 2005. Herrik (1997) p. 104.
313 314
Loci fist appeared in the book Rhetorica ad Herennium. Its author writes: By backgrounds [loci] I mean such scenes as are naturally or artificially set off on a small scaleso that we can grasp and embrace them easily with natural memory for example, a house, an intercolumnar space, a recess, an arch or the like. An image isa portrait of the object we wish to remember. Rhetorica ad Herennium, III. xvi. 29.
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associate arguments in a long oration with locations in, for instance, a familiar public building, putting each argument literally in its place. Recalling the arguments, then might involve a mental walk through the building.315 Loci represent a strategical device that may help improvisers to link particular moments during the performance to categories. Frances Yates says that the commonest, but not the only, type of mnemonic place system used was the architectural type.316 In this aspect, Quintilian describes that it is an assistance to the memory if localities are sharply impressed upon the mindFor when we return to a place after considerable absence, we not merely recognise the place itself, but remember things that we did there, and recall the persons whom we met and even the unuttered thoughts which passed through our minds when we were there before317 We may think about the possibility of using strategies that help us improvisers retain different moments during a performance. However, we have to keep in mind that, even if Quintilians idea of places might become useful as a structuring device, the associations between our memory and those places are to be remembered only through some sort of contextualisation. Marry Carruthers citing Ciceros Partitiones oratoriae writes: [M]emory is in a manner the twin sister of written speech [litteratura] and is completely similar to it [persimilis], [though] in a dissimilar medium. For just as script consists of marks containing letters and of the material on which those marks are imprinted, so the structure of memory, like a wax tablet, employs places [loci] and in these gathers together [collocat] images like letters.318 Although we have to be careful in contextualising musical moments, I consider this strategy one that is in need of further investigation to reveal its potential in helping performers with structuring FIM. Also, in considering memory in the world of today, we need to think about the changes brought by developments in technology, to which I referred earlier in Chapter 3.4.
315 316 317 318
Herrik (1997) p. 104. Yates (1966) p. 3. Quintilian, Institutio XI. ii. 17. Carruthers (1990) p. 18.
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Memoria has to be seen as much more than just memorization of past musical phrases, motives and melodies. Its concept must extend to helping kairos and the settlement of eloquence and clarity, and consequently the establishment of ethical principles such as decorum.
Table 39.
c) Prolepsis or Anticipatio Quintilian tells us: Anticipation forms a genus in itself, and has several different species. One of these is the defence by anticipation, such as Cicero employs against Quintus Caecilius, where he points out that though previously he himself has always appeared for the defence, he is now undertaking a prosecution. Another is a form of confession, such as he introduces in his defence of Rabirius Postumus, where he admits that he himself regards his client as worthy of cesure for lending money to the king. Another takes the form of prediction, as in the phrase, For I will say without any intention of aggravating the charge. Again, there is a form of self-correction, such as, I beg you to pardon me, if I have been carried to far. And most frequent of all, there is preparation, whereby we state fully why we are going to do something or have done it.319 Walther in his Lexicon mentions that, The anticipatione della note or anticipatio notae, occurs when the upper or lower neighbouring note enters earlier than it normally would in the ordinary setting. This figure, also called praeceptio and praesumptio, differs from the accentus duplex only that it is not to be used in leaps, which the accentus duplex may.320 Prolepsis can become useful for anticipating what it is going to happen in a group of FIM by observing the gestures and their connection with producing sound. For instance, observing the bow of a violin approaching its end or anticipating the taking of breath by a singer or a wind instrument player, gives the necessary information for
319 320
Quintilian, Institutio IX. ii. 16-17. Quoted in Bartel (1997) p. 194.
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preparing our playing accordingly. In this sense, this strategy might help in establishing kairos and therefore the groups decorum. Prolepsis or Anticipatio is referred by this investigation as a figure that influences the musical performance based on the observation of gestures from other participants.
Table 40.
5.4
The Classical Structure or Dispositio
Quintilian wrote that the speech consists of five parts, the exordium designed to conciliate the audience, the statement of facts designed to instruct him, the proof which confirms our own propositions, the refutation which overthrows the arguments of our opponents, and the peroration which either refreshes the memory of our hearers or plays upon their emotions.321 The author of the Rhetorica ad Herennium includes an extra part called division which, he says, makes clear what matters are agreed upon and what are contested, and announce[s] what points we intend to take up.322 For this study, the parts of an oration are taken as follows:
a) Exordium Or introduction, is aimed to capture the publics attention. b) Narratio Or the statement of facts, exposes the initial product of the invention. c) Distributio, Divisio or Partitio Or division, developes what was exposed in the narratio.
321 322
Quintilian, Institutio VIII. Pr. 11. Rhetorica ad Herennium. I. ii. 4.
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d) Confirmatio
Or proof, finds in music its parallel by reformulating what has been presented in the narratio.
e) Confutatio or Refutatio
Or refutation, can be represented in music by the performance of musical material of opposite qualities if compared to the confirmatio.
f) Peroratio or Conclusio
Or peroration, points to a musical punch line, which refreshes the memory appealing to the emotions. Table 41.
a) Exordium The exordium is The introduction of a speech, where one announces the subject and purpose of the discourse, and where one usually employs the persuasive appeal of ethos in order to establish credibility with the audience.323 The exordium has the objective of preparing the audience for what is about to come; the narratio. One particular characteristic of the exordium is that it seems to be a natural manner of performance and that rhetoric acts just as a method to transform it into a concept. The great majority of introductions performed by those involved in the laboratories for this investigation demonstrated the dynamics of the exordium before any musician involved became acquainted with the meaning of the rhetorical introduction. Quintilian wrote, Some would have it that rhetoric is a natural gift though they admit that it can be developed by practice. And he continues; Still Lysias is said to have maintained this same view, which is defended on the ground that uneducated persons, barbarians and slaves, when speaking on their own behalf, say something that resembles the
323
Silva Rhetoricae, on-line source accessed on 18/10/2007 http://humanities.byu.edu/rhetoric/silva.htm
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exordium, state the facts of the case, prove, refute and plead for mercy just as an orator does in his peroration. According to Burmeister The exordium is the first period of affection of the piece. It is often adorned by fugue, so that the ears and mind of the listener are rendered attentive to the song, and his good will is won over. 324 Also, making reference to the importance of the elaboration of a good exordium, Quintilian writes that There is no point in the whole speech where confusion of memory or loss of fluency has a worse effect, for a faulty exordium is like a face seamed with scars; and he who runs his ship ashore while leaving port is certainly the least efficient of pilots.325 In this matter Muffat explains, One should refrain from making any noise, and from warming up in too chaotic a manner. If one fills the air and the ears with this sort of thing before the Symphony, the distaste which results will nearly overshadow the pleasure which follows.326 I would like to give two examples. First, the beginning of Bachs Mass in B minor, BWV 232. AUDIO SAMPLE 15 Bach, Kyrie from B minor mass Bach composed short vocal and instrumental statements around the three syllables of the word Kyrie, bringing inconclusive phrases until the cadence resolves with the word eleison. Next, on the recording of the concert that concluded the project that I directed at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, an excerpt of Modulus IIs exordium shows an introduction which was thoroughly rehearsed following the graphical score (see appendix). AUDIO SAMPLE 16 Modulus II (exordium)
324 325 326
Burmeister (1606) p. 203. Quintilian, Institutio IV. i. 61. Muffat (1695) pp. 44-45.
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Listening to it we can identify elements which in general are short with the intention of attracting the public closer to the performance. Also, the avoidance of pathos is evident, since the phrases are played without making the intentionalities evident. The next example is of a performance in Dartington where I performed with the e-recorder with Evan Parker (sax soprano), Hilary Jeffery (trombone and electronics) and Clo Palacio Quintin (flute and electronics). In this example there were no strategies discussed previous to the presentation and none of its members had played together before in any combination. AUDIO SAMPLE 17 - Dartington 2000 (exordium) In this recording, which is thoroughly analysed in Chapter 7.1, we can perceive a short exordium in which the elements are also short and sparse. The players are getting to know each other by sharing the responsibility of elaborating the music collectively. b) Narratio The author of Rhetorica ad Herennium says that, The Narration or Statement of Facts sets forth the events that have occurred or might have occurred.327 He also tells us that The statement of facts should be clearly and plainly delivered, without allurements of style, but with the charm of variety, or it will necessarily fall flat.328 Mattheson mentions that The narratio is so to speak a report, a narration, through which the meaning and character of the herein-contained discourse is pointed out. It occurs with the entrance or beginning of the vocal part or the most significant concerted part, and relates to the exordium, which has preceded, by means of a skilled connection.329
327 328 329
Rhetorica ad Herennium I. iii. 4. Quoted in Tarling (2004). P. 161. Quintilian, Institutio IV. ii. 118. Mattheson (1739) p. 471.
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The presentation of the main theme in a musical composition may be compared to the presentation of facts. In FIM it seems that we could consider the existence of narration after the introduction or exordium, if any, for in some cases the exordium does not exist and the narration becomes the first part. Also I have witnessed groups that prior to playing decide how to begin the session and is very often the case that the reason for this agreement is to avoid the careful getting to know each other by starting directly with some sort of narration. However, since the only accord was on how to begin, sometimes after a few minutes we perceive qualities proper of an introduction coming into the performance and developing towards a second narration. Another issue important to note is that very frequently the transition between the exordium and the narratio is unnoticeable due to the gradual expansion of musical material presented from the first into the second. c) Distributio The author of Rhetorica ad Herennium says that, By means of the Division we make clear what matters are agreed upon and what are contested, and announce what points we intend to take up.330 Mattheson refers to this part as propositio. He tells us: The propositio or the actual discourse contains briefly the content or goal of the musical oration, and is of two sorts: simple or compound, wherein also belongs the varied or embellished propositio in music, of which nothing is mentioned in rhetoric.331 Mattheson next makes a distinction between propositio simplex, propositio variatam and propositionem compositam. The first reveals a difference by means of transposition and although the same theme is kept, it acquires and entirely new strength. The second he calls propositionem variatam Whereupon the melody is continued some measures further in [the same] till the
330 331
Rhetorica ad Herennium. I. ii. 3-iii. 4. Mattheson (1763) p. 471.
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sense of the text again requires an interruption.332 The third, propositionem compositam, is the combination of both the first and the second one. It is often the case in FIM that, because of the musical debate in which the performers are involved, some musical proposals become denied or do not succeed in getting a place in the music. Whilst an excess of musical denials may unbalance the structure, the opposite could help in the achievement of clarity and eloquence. Therefore, the distributio is referred to by this study as a perception of the collective engaged in developing musical material previously exposed and in which the individual roles are collectively building up eloquence. Because of the collaborative tenor of the distributio in FIM, decorum, kairos, and ethics represent important factors. d) Confirmatio The confirmatio, Mattheson says, is an artistic corroboration of the discourse, and in melodies is commonly found in well-conceived repetitions which are used beyond expectations; this again must not be understood to relate to ordinary reprises.333 Proof or confirmation is a figure that is close related to memoria (memory). One tendency I had during the first stages as free-improviser was to bring the concept of recapitulation from my classical formal training into the new music I was performing. This tendency normally manifested itself very strongly towards the end of the pieces. Confirmatio is a structural strategy and is possibly the easiest figure of memory to achieve since the way we play at the very beginning of an improvisation is often kept fresh in our memory. In FIM it is possible that the musical material needs to go through collective confirmation in order to become an intrinsic part of the performance, which makes the confirmatio also an ethical device.
332 333
Mattheson (1763) p. 473. Mattheson (1739) p. 471.
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e) Confutatio Confutatio, or refutation, is a strategical structural figure which its strongest purpose is that of making contrast. In oratory this part is described as one in which one destroys our adversaries arguments.334 Mattheson writes: The confutatio is a dissolution of the exceptions, and may be expressed in melody either through combining, or even through quotation and refutation of foreignappearing ideas: For just such antitheses, if they are well stressed, the hearing is strengthened in its joy, and anything which might run against it in dissonances and syncopations is smoothed and resolved.335 The presentation of opposite musical characteristics can represent a powerful tool for creating structural and intentional variations. However, it is probably right to say that its use should not be excessive or otherwise we would enter the territory of vices, more specifically into Heterogenium, Battologia and/or Bomphiologia.336 f) Peroratio Quintilian tells us, The peroration is the most important part of forensic pleading, and in the main consists of appeals to the emotions.337 Mattheson says, The peroratio is the end or conclusion of our musical oration, which must produce an especially emphatic impression, more so than all other parts. Custom has established that in arias we close with almost the very same passages and sounds with which we have begun: consistent with which then our peroration is replaced by our exordium.338 The end of playing a session of FIM is a common agreement between the performers, which is in general a process subjected to negotiation. However finishing a set of FIM does not always give the characteristics of a peroratio, for
334 335 336 337 338
Rhetorica ad Herennium. I. ii. 3-iii. 4. Mattheson (1739) p. 471. See Chapter 5.5.1.1. Stylistic Vices. Quintilian, Institutio IV. ii. 118. Mattheson (1739) p. 472.
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it sometimes ends in a deconstructive manner fading material and sound into silence. The peroratio in FIM does not belong to any part in particular. It should be seen rather as a moment in the music that expresses strong emotions. 5.5 The Virtues of Style: Ethics, Decorum, Kairos and Audience Above all it is important that he should never, like so many, be led by a desire to win applause Marcus Fabius Quintilian Give and take on an equal basis is vital to the groups existence, the primary condition for its work A lively mind and personal modesty in all those taking part are absolutely vital if a group of composers are to work together successfully. The result is ensemble playing in which no one participant overshadows the others, so that common language can found which is, or becomes, the mode of expression of the group itself. Franco Evangelisti In order to enter a discussion on issues that involve ethics and, as I have previously suggested, understand how FIMs style originates, it might be useful to grasp the factors that have conditioned this practice to employ the materials it uses and the intersubjective behaviour it adopts. It is possible that one of the most important issues that conditioned the advent of this practice was the liberation of the interpreter from the controlling power exerted by music composition. For making a focus on ethics in this practice, I will present some background elements which I believe have influenced FIM. One of the characteristics of changes in art is that it divides people into those who encourage the change and those who are against it. Jazz, for example, was not accepted as a true black folk music because the element of commercialism was seen as so conspicuous and invasive that one might question whether any folk had ever been involved with jazz at all.339 We should not forget that the
339
Kalaidjian (2005) p. 159.
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movement of free jazz in the USA was also strongly criticized by defenders of the black jazz tradition. They saw this new way of expressing through music as one that was permeated by white European avant-garde elements. But it seems that always where prejudice arises so does the power of cooperation and collaboration. Discussing essays by Michael Dessen and Jason Stanyek, Monson tells us that they illustrate that, far from distancing themselves from issues of relationship to African and African-American tradition and history, contemporary African diasporic intercultural collaborations demonstrate how experimental projects can lead to more expansive understanding of the relationships among history, racial oppression, and community building through music.340 There also seems to be the tendency of some people to identify themselves with other cases of abuse of power and discrimination. Daniel Fischlin and Ayay Heble write: [William] Parker, an AfricanAmerican playing in an ensemble integrated across both racial and gender boundaries, envisions the music of The Peach Orchard,341 radically dissonant and improvisatory as it is, as a way of memoralizing the loss of the Navahoin a gesture of solidarity and kindship with that loss.342 That socio-political aspects have had influence upon music is well documented, but how much it has influenced improvised musics remains to be studied. Although it is certain that they influence FIM, the question remains how much effect comes from socio-political factors and how much from the natural dynamics of human collaboration. However, I think it is important to acknowledge that empathy with collaborative ethical values and the sharing of those principles between musicians support, in some way or another, the commitment to establishing ethics as the important element it represents in FIM. The AACM (The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians), for instance, was formed by pianists Muhal Richard Abrams and Jodie Christian,
340 341
Monson (2004) pref/xii.
The liner notes of The Peach Orchard writes that this music draws its inspiration from events that took place on the Navaho land, where the United States Army pushed the Navaho tribe violently out of their homelands. The Navaho lost everything, including their cherished peach orchard. Fischlin and Heble (2004) p.1.
342
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drummer Steve McCall, and trumpeter Phil Cohran in 1965 with the intention of (1) creating a situation where a brand music of their own choice could be produced, and (2) maintaining self-reliance and control over the music.343 Douglas Ewart, who joined the AACM in 1967, tells us that the creation of the AACM was necessary because the climate of that time was one in which musicians, particularly those that were being adventurous, were being shut out, in a sense. And then on top of it there were a number of things afoot in Chicago to really prevent certain kinds of music from taking place because of its unifying aspects. They had laws in Chicago actually that prevented bands from having more than a trio or duo.344 It seems to me obvious that these restrictions encouraged deeper collaboration between artists with the commitment of embracing a motto such as united we stand. On the other side of the Atlantic, the advent of the European free improvisation movement was also conditioned by many conflicts between defenders of traditionalistic views and those with progressive ideals. Also, events such as the rise of fascism and the two world wars created the circumstances for many to strive for the existence of equality, solidarity, and for respecting ethical principles in the pursuit of liberty and justice. Back in 1916, Dada, for example, stood as an artistic expression aimed to provoke manifestations in the public to make them aware of the false morality and all the issues that they thought conditioned the war to happen. Later on, music went through this liberalisation process which produced the most radical sort of improvisation as an aesthetic opposition to a situation seen as suppressed, brought by radical compositional formalisms from Western European music. The New Phonic Art ensemble praised, for instance, for the freedom from the dictatorship of the score and the consequential greater involvement of the interpreter in the musical shaping of the
343
ISIM (International Society for Improvised Music) Newsletter Summer 2007 Vol. 3, No. 2, p. 4. A Word from the Advisory Council, Interview with Douglas Ewart of the AACM, by Karlton Hester. Ibid.
344
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piece.345 Also, pointing to the important changes brought by FIM, Evangelisti observes that, Just as Wagners magical chords brought about a crisis in the tonal system, and as Schoenbergs twelve-tone technique, with the evolution of serial music to which it gave rise, formed the extreme limits of the tempered system and its ultimate syntactic order, so the open form as a logical development of the idea of variation, which here extends to the variation of the form itself brings to fulfilment the system of Western music founded in the tempered scale and its sources of musical creationTrue, the figure of hitherto known as the composer is completely robbed of the myth which has surrounded him.346 Thus, the responsibility for creation shifted from a single human being to one of collective qualities and responsibilities. Evangelisti continues saying that FIM is a free kind of musicmade in the spirit of mutual tolerance, whereby the musical intuition of each individual is entirely responsible for the form the work takes.347 On the other hand, Boulez, in his article Alea, states that compositions which offer the performer with the possibility to deal with the invention, by following a diversity of choices for schematisation, are poisonous and insidious and even refers to them as the new diabolus in musica. He goes on to propose a guided chance justifying the constraints that might be implicit as necessary to guide freedom since instant imagination misfires more often that it fires; and anyway such freedom has less to do with invention in the proper sense than with the practicalities of invention. Boulez also presents the supposition that with his approach to controlled chance he is actually glorifying the performer! and not presenting anything similar to the idea of a robotperformer, but one who is interested and free in his choices.348 What I am trying to imply here is that those conflicts between tradition and change, plus the political and social issues, represent forces that may have helped
345 346 347 348
Evangelisti (1969). Evangelisti (1969). Evangelisti (1969).
Stocktakings from an Apprenticeship (Oxford, 1991) Alea pp.26 38, originally published in La Nouvelle Revue Franaise, 59 (1957).
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to the establishment of ethics as the strong element it represents in the practice of FIM. To establish ones ethos, James May tells us that the speaker must exhibit phronesis (intelligence, good sense), arete (virtue), and eunoia (goodwill).349 Moreover, if we focus on the Greek idea of separating time into chronos (of quantitative nature) and kairos (of qualitative importance), we could think of the second as dependent on ethics. In the case of FIM, kairos is represented by the act of finding the proper moment to make a musical contribution, connecting the practical objective part of the performance with the subjective mechanisms of social relations. At the same time, kairos is related to the principle of decorum which is the ethical attitude that relates behaviour to the situation and the audience, and which searches for the existence of optimal conditions for the realization of the activity and memoria which allows the storing of objective elements for structuring the music but, most importantly, permits the improviser to retain the qualities of social interaction so as to build the performance ethically. At this point it is important to make clear that the existence of good rhetoric and ethics in FIM should not be understood as a force that would produce specific musical aesthetics. Look at the contemporary cultural reactions, revolutions and transformations through the view put forward by Fischlin and Heble. They perceive the world as it has been molded by a restricted, perverse knowing, one shaped by post-Enlightenment, technocratic, and bureaucratic systems of governance, themselves based on exploitation, slavery, militarization, historical amnesia, and restriction of freedoms in the name of order and progress. From this point of view, it is then that expressions permeated with extreme aggressive content can be understood as a logical defensive reaction. Humans, like any other animal, respond sometimes hotheadedly to the feeling of being cornered by menacing, powerful forces, combined with the frustration of feeling powerless to change the situation.
Quoted on Herrik (1997). James M. May, Trials of Character: Eloquence of Ciceronian Ethos (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988), 2.
349
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We could also consider as ethical the interpretation of compositions in accordance with their style. Advice given to interpreters of written music such as make the piece your own, or feel yourself while performing require, in my opinion, a previous knowledge of the circumstances in which the piece was created, and an interpretation of the components of the piece in accordance with a previous understanding of the style. Furthermore, playing a piano piece by Mozart, for example, requires not only the technical command of the instrument, knowledge of the style and clarity of interpretation, but making somehow all that learning work for you in a quasi-subconscious level, that is, making the piece your own. Borgo mentions that [Anthony] Davis finds that jazz players can move from a dependence on articulating the form to using the form, realizing that [the tune structure] is the beginning of something and you have to create something else. They have to do more than just keep time, they have to articulate time. They can make melodic choices that are at least as strong as the melody that was there before.350 Naturally, there can also be various levels of consistency in the interpretation of music depending, among other things, on the fluidity with which this person extemporises using that knowledge, or, in rhetorical terms, on clarity and eloquence. If we now think about it in terms of free improvisation, in the context of the absence of elements like a composer, time of composition and a score, nobody should be capable of recognising anything particular in this spontaneous way of making music. Indeed, it has sometimes been argued that FIM is a practice that lacks a recognisable style.351 However, if the free does not mean that the performer does whatever he pleases,352 then there is the need of some kind of understanding between the performers in order to build something collectively. Consequently, this understanding between one another seems to suggest that ethics is crucial for
350 351 352
Borgo (2005) p. 186. Ford indicates that, free improvisation, in theory at least, knows no style. Ford (1995). Benson (2003) p. 167.
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defining the manners in which improvisers work, and that ethics may be important in shaping FIMs musical characteristics, or style.353 It seems that the uniqueness of the style in FIM is generated by the dynamism created between the res-verba or Logos-lexis354 or, in other words, the relation between content and form. When the content (res) is pre-composed, the role of form or style (verba) is to communicate the content with clarity and eloquence. However, in FIM, the role of verba appears not to be restricted just to the communication of content, but partly influential in shaping the content (res) itself. If we now make a comparison between FIM and the practice of rhetoric in improvised oratory, we could see that whilst in oratory the content is represented by the meaning of words, in improvised music the content is not fixed by a precomposed musical idea. Also, improvising the musical invention does not provide anything as definite, qua meaning, as the context of a word. This indicates that due to the lack of fixed meaning, the interplay between res and verba has a different dynamism in improvised music than in improvised oratory. Content and form in FIM shape the overall musical result by continuously influencing and changing each other. Since content is something negotiable between the members of the group, and also influenced by the manners in which the delivery is been executed by those members, the style of the music is a representation of those ethical interactions. Those interactions correspond to the
353
Ford also observes that Each player listens and contributes to the formation of a collective sound, which is in a constant state of becoming music, and this sound-becoming-music, in turn, shows the way for each player to proceed. Like the manner in which cats' eyes constantly reveal themselves in a car's headlights, this is a provisional style, a way that knows no being, but only becoming. The movement from individual to collective and back to individual music is not really cyclic or processual, but I know no other way to express it. At its most successful this virtual movement is not known as movement at all, for it does not unfold in time. When collective freedom finds its voice in musical improvisation, the relationship between individual and collective becomes a static, though modulating unity. Individual freedom may well be lost, but what is promised is the most extraordinary union of minds in music, a union that dissolves and assumes ethics, pleasure and aesthetic experience into itself. Ford (1995) Aristotle phrased this as the difference between logos (the logical content of a speech) and lexis (the style and delivery of a speech). Roman authors such as Quintilian would make the same distinction by dividing consideration of things or substance, res, from consideration of verbal expression, verba. Silva Rhetoricae, on-line source accessed on 26/08/2007 http://rhetoric.byu.edu/Encompassing%20Terms/Content%20and%20Form.htm
354
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idea of decorum in which the initiatives have to be taken blindly without knowing if they are going to be reciprocated. Now, if we add to this interactivity the fluency achieved by training and experience, perhaps the chances of reciprocity could increase since the musician would have the possibility to know what and where to place his/her musical interventions more effectively following the principle of kairos and, therefore, contributing with the establishment of a consistent res-verba. In other words, the interactive dynamics between content and form are built through kairos following the groups decorum through the intricate ethics of musical debate. Also it is very possible that the decorum may be subjected to change when negotiations are taking place. It may be the case that the presentation of FIMs human interactive dynamics can produce elements that, in time, become familiar to the listeners establishing what we call a style. In FIM, if style depends on res-verba then it depends also on the collective elaboration of the invention and on the collective delivery, which at the same time trigger, as I discussed previously, potential changes influenced by the audiences feedback. However, the world of rhetoric should not be seen as one that through ethics and decorum provides dynamics solely derived from smooth and agreeable behaviours. Maybe we can consider ethics as an intrinsic element in creating music through negotiating diverse understandings. This idea harmonises with a postmodernist idea in which, unlike the modernist view of order and stability, knowledge is dependent on interpretation and the idea of disagreement becomes essential for a meaningful understanding. Fred Frith tells us: I think conflict is very valuable. Its one useful way to progress. ... As long as you proceed with mutual respect, you dont have to have identical opinions, feelings, or ways of doing things. It would be sad if we did.355 Moreover, inside the negotiations inherent in the dynamics of FIM, some of the apparent musical reciprocity could be the result of dynamics derived from the interaction between dominator and dominated. This interplay of power is necessary to permit individuals the chance
355
Interview with Fred Frith by Charity Chan. http://quasar.lib.uoguelph.ca/in ex.php/csieci/article/view/293/617 accessed on 17/04/2008.
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of allowing resistance to emerge, which, as previously explained, could be beneficial for establishing a dynamic variety and depth in the music being presented. Initiatives by the members of a group of FIM solidify their importance after being presented. Some of them might tacitly change the course of performance regardless of the intention of its creator, which is an indication that in FIM the meaning of individual musical inputs can also be defined by the collaborators rather than the person who created them. Also, the various intensities of musical disagreements might have positive and negative effects. While a positive disagreement contributes to necessary resistance, analogous to a sort of positive discussion, and so helps to reach deeper and richer interactive dynamics, a negative input can make the music collapse.356 One example of applied ethics through a rhetorical perspective in music is found in the decorum of the first formal division of the dispositio, called exordium (prologue). The exordium is commanded by principles of ethos (ethics) and logos (logic) avoiding the use of pathos - related to human emotions. The use of the latter would signify trying to build trust by employing artifices directed to move emotions, which because of being a rather manipulative manner creates an invalid trust. Instead, the building of trust should be exercised by appealing to the intellect with the use of logic and, by so doing, complying with the first principle, ethos. In other words, the role of the exordium is to establish trust from the audience by using ethics and logic without appealing to human emotions. The objective is to avoid resorting to using dramatic passionate gadgets in order to gain trust from the audience, considered as being against the principle of honesty proper of decorum. From another perspective, one that is closely related to individual behaviour, Quintilian writes: But these creatures have another weapon in their armoury: they seek to obtain the reputation of speaking with greater vigour than the trained orator by means of their delivery. For they shout on all and every occasionpanting, gesticulating wildly and wagging their heads
356
An example of musical collapse can be listened in the CDR1, track 18 - bomphiologia .
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with all the frenzy of a lunatic.357 The artificiality of delivery is sometimes explored in music in general as a weapon of persuasion. Examples come in great variety, from shaking heads and closing eyes to moving the body demonstrating the greatest ecstasy. Quintilian continues telling us that the educated speaker, just as he knows how to moderate his style, and to impart variety and artistic form to his speech, is an equal adept in the matter of delivery and will suit his action to the tone of each portion of his utterances, while, if he has any one canon for universal observance, it is that he should both posses the reality and present the appearance of self-control.358 Cicero in De Oratore observes, No single kind of oratory suits every cause or audience or speaker or occasion.359 This might point to the need of adapting to the environment at the moment of the activity, and at the same time to the need of ethics for the construction of a consistent discourse in improvisational practices. Talking about the audience, Bailey is of the opinion that improvisations responsiveness to its environment puts the performance in a position to be directly influenced by the audience.360 He also affirms that, Undeniably, the audience for improvisation, good or bad, active or passive, sympathetic or hostile, has power that no other audience has. It can affect the creation of that which is being witnessed. And perhaps because of thatthe audience for improvisation has a degree of intimacy with the music that is not achieved in any other situation.361 On the other hand, it is interesting to observe that although Fords view of FIM proposes a practice that foregrounds an interactionist ethics362 that is, however, not a chaos of individual wills, but a product of
357 358 359
Quintilian, Institutio II. xii. 9. Quintilian, Institutio II. xii. 10.
Cicero, De Oratore 3.55.210: non omni causae nec auditori neque personae neque tempori congruere orationis unum genus.
360 361 362
Bailey (1992) p. 44. Ibid. Ford (1995) pp. 103-112.
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concentrated listening,363 he judges FIM as unsuitable for audiences, therefore closing the doors for discussing the possibility of having artistic appreciation and eventual feedback from the listeners. He insists that whilst this [freeimprovisation] is certainly a musical activity it does not accord with our conception of art as an object intended, at least in part, for another. In this sense, free collective improvisation is unsuitable for audiences, who will find themselves unable to 'tune in' to sounds that only become music through participation. Audiences are likely to feel like eavesdroppers on a conversation in an unknown language. Ford seems to deny that FIM can produce products of artistic value that can be appreciated by listeners in similar aspects to the appreciation of other kinds of music. It may be true that there is a close link between behaviour and material and an intrinsic influence by the audience in the performance of FIM. However, Quintilian also mentions circumstances that entail a disadvantage. He writes that, On the other hand, it will sometimes also happen that an audience whose taste is bad will fail to award the praise which is due to the most admirable utterances.364 I can think of different ways to react to negative audiences. One is to expose more and more clarity with the hope of overcoming obstacles and putting through the intentions, as somehow training the audience. Another one is to increase the levels of intensity taking the risk of entering the territory of vices. Yet another possibility is to ignore the public and retreat to perceive just the group interactivity. Then again, we ought to be careful not to engage in the delivery without compromise, striving solely for a preoccupation to reach an audiences acceptation, for that would be the most unethical of all. Quintilian is of the opinion that, For my own part I would not hesitate to assert that a mediocre speech supported by all the power of delivery would be more impressive than the best speech unaccompanied by such power.365 So, it appears
363 364 365
Ibid. Quintilian, Institutio X. i. 19. Quintilian, Institutio XI. iii. 5.
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that although rhetoric offers a means to achieve acceptance from the audience it can become a temptation to some to achieve recognition without being preoccupied with the elaboration of any consistency in content. I refrain myself from giving examples of products destined solely to achieve public acceptance since they abound today. In this section we have discussed factors that I believe have influenced making ethics a central element in FIM. I have described the historical and sociopolitical aspects and how they might affect this practice. I have also set out comments and descriptions of FIM phrased by early pioneers, revealing how the shift towards a collective way of making music sponsored a confrontation between tradition and change. Furthermore, I have shown how the relationship between content and form (res-verba) in FIM is sui generis, and how a method aimed to discern its dynamics should be flexible. I hope that by having brought out all those elements out into the open it becomes clear that it is possible to develop a rhetorical theory for the analysis of FIM, and through the inherent flexibility of interpretation of such a method to develop deeper grounds for its discussion and practice. 5.5.1 Vices The intention of Musick is not only to please the Ear, but to express Sentiments, strike the Imagination, affect the Mind, and command the Passions. The Art of playing the Violin consists in giving the Instrument a Tone that shall in a manner rival the most perfect Human Voice; and in executing every Piece with Exactness, Propriety, and delicacy of Expression according to the true intention of Musick. But as for imitating the Cock, Cuckoo, Owl, and other birds; or the Drum, French Horn, Tromba-Marina, and the like; and also sudden Shifts of the Hand from one Extremety of the Finger-board to the other, accompanied with Contortions of the Head and Body, and all other such Tricks rather belong to the Professors of Legerdemain and Posture-masters than to the Art of Musick.366 Francesco Geminiani
366
Geminiani (1751) Preface.
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One recurrent issue in jazz is the notion of the clich. Pre-composed patterns which are taken from respectable performers end up, according to Lewis, in the classicization and canonization of the practice. Lewis also points that the recrudescence of earlier forms of jazz improvisation has received wide support from corporate print, electronic and recording media conglomerates, as well as from changes in the curatorial hierarchy at well-heeled high-culture presenting organizations, such as Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall.367 So it seems that parallel to the dogmatization of musical areas, which are above all based on principles of tradition, there is a by-product represented by the repetition of known devices, or clichs, explored by the music business companies. Again, in the example of the student playing spoons at the laboratory at UC Santa Barbara,368 at a certain point during the performance, one that was to become a short epilogue, this specific musical input the spoons was responsible for halting the performance. After analysing this episode I concluded that this intervention corresponded to what, in rhetoric, is called a vice. Analogically, in improvisation a vice can indicate a habit, or a clich. In the particular case of UCSBs student playing the spoons, his input had no connection with anything happening, which in principle shouldnt per se be a problem. The problem was the lack of expressiveness of such a device being used as if it were capable of consistent eloquence. In this case, the action fell onto the use of the so-called macrologia, using more words than are necessary in the attempt to appear eloquent, and bomphiologia, or the exaggeration done in a selfaggrandising manner. Both, macrologia and bomphiologia, are figures of excess and superfluity.369
367 368 369
Zorn (2000) p. 82. CDR1, track 18 - bomphiologia. Silva Rhetoricae, on-line source.
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5.5.1.1 Stylistic Vices

a) Apathy Indifference that results in a lack or inconsistent participation. b) Battologia c) Bomphiologia Vain repetition. Exaggeration done in a selfaggrandising manner. d) Heterogenium Avoid developing ideas further by presenting another idea. e) Homiologia f) Parrhesia Tedious repetition. To play candidly can sometimes represent a vice. g) Soraismus To mix different styles without skill. Table 42.
Next I will give a short description of what those vices represent. Some are illustrated with musical examples from the projects that I have conducted. a) Apathy This condition reveals a lack of interest that sometimes becomes the manifestation of the frustration in finding the necessary channels for creating music. Normally it leads to dullness, impassivity and indifference.
b) Battologia We could think of this vice as one of smaller scale if compared with homiologia. It can refer to a repetition which is disconnected from the principle of kairos and that either happens by repeating our own material or by the imitation of other performers in the group. 155
c) Bomphiologia Is a figure of amplification by which an exhibitionist behaviour is put forward with the sole intention of drawing attention to himself, possibly believing that by adopting this mannerism conquering the audiences acceptance is granted. However, this vice can also be the result of navet which can lead to an excess of experimentation combined with a lack of integration. AUDIO SAMPLE 18 UCSB 2007 (bomphiologia) d) Heterogenium This vice is typical of those who have little experience in FIM. Heterogenium could be the result of the process of continuous abandoning musical ideas for new ones before they have served the performance. This action may come as an indication of the lack of proficiency or experience of the improviser. e) Homiologia It can refer to a constant repetition of the same musical material or to the continuous imitation of someone elses musical input only for the sake of showing interaction. AUDIO SAMPLE 19 Dartington 2000 (homiologia) f) Parrhesia This vice might be illustrated by those who out of lack of courage, excess of modesty, or even shame, refrain themselves to follow eventual places during the performance that require the adoption of risks where the music is outspoken. g) Soraismus To mingle different languages affectedly or without skill.370 I could see, and have witnessed, FIM performances including sometimes quotes of recognisable
370
Silva Rhetoricae, on-line source accessed on 22/04/2008, http://humanities.byu.edu/rhetoric/silva.htm
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styles. However, if this is not done with artistry and tuned with kairos it may be a risk to create an undesirable unbalance. However, we can consider the use of the stylistic vices in a constructive way, whereby deliberately using them we expose their intentional power in order to extend variation or increase expectation. For instance, apathy could be employed to strengthen the desire for a more consistent musical passage or soraismus could be used in a manner that evokes humour, as in the example from the project at the University of Nevada Las Vegas.371
371
CDR1, track 30.
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How Rhetoric Addresses the Unspoken in FIM Descriptions of emotions felt while listening to music are usually apocryphal and misleading. If they are to be used at all, they must be analyzed and considered in the light of a general theory of the relation of musical stimuli to emotional responses. Leonard B. Meyer Approaching FIM by acknowledging the existence of a discourse allows us to focus on it as a human practice that involves a communication process and where its qualities are defined by judging the effect of its message. As we know, the performer of composed music has already the basic structural and sonic elements preset in the score. Consequently, the criticism of a performance of composed music is going to be based upon what could be judged as a successful or unsuccessful reproduction of those elements. When those elements are absent from the performance, a critical perception of the music has to be based on other aspects. This includes, as in composed music, the instrumental dexterity and fluency of discourse or eloquence of the performers. However, those components acquire unique characteristics when they are bound to the dynamics of FIM. It seems that individual eloquence is dependent on the fact that the musical discourse in FIM has to be built cooperatively. The advantage of embracing rhetoric for the development of an analysis of FIM is that it allows us (a) to understand the social characteristics of the group interactivity involved in collective creation and (b) to learn about the intentions put through sounds or at least to speculate about the content of the communication. The first considers the necessity of an individual awareness of the social equilibrium, based on the rhetorical/ethical principle of decorum, so as to build group eloquence. The second acknowledges the possibility of understanding the intentionalities through the use of Figurenlehren. In the performance of FIM, issues like (a) pitch, rhythm and dynamic complementarities, (b) the interactivity of individual inventions and (c) the construction of a collective eloquence, are interconnected, dependent on one another and conducted by an ethical force integrated by positive qualities 158
such as humility, collaboration, good will and positive humour, which represent the basis for FIMs decorum. Borgo is of the opinion that being a good improviser is in important ways the same as being a good citizen - expressing oneself but also allowing others to be heard; working towards a mutually acceptable goal; acknowledging that everything will not always go your own way. In response to my question about eloquence in FIM he referred to it as a quality of interactions rather than playing. If we focus on FIM from this angle, rhetoric becomes a suitable area of knowledge to establish a critical examination because it concentrates on the analysis of materials produced by the spontaneity of FIMs performances through the inherent intensity of those materials, how they are made to interact, and how they are projected to the audience. The sonic outer layers then, signify just a kind of entrance for deliberating on deeper interactive levels. When several intentionalities are created, they intermingle so as to present a collective result. Therefore, we ought to base our judgment not only on the sound material, but also on a key component that is the pedestal of any collaborative creation: ethics. Ethics introduces a parallel observation level to the auditory aspects. It is possible to examine the dynamics at play between the members of a group of improvisation focusing on the action-reaction processes and on the physical movements. Ethics also determines the so-called appropriateness, or kairos, which is the driving force involved in choosing for the right moment to make a musical input. The occasion chosen for saying anything is at least as important a consideration as what is actually said.372 As mentioned before, one of the examples of inconsistent contribution comes from the laboratory I conducted at UC Santa Barbara where, in a session of music improvisation, there was an obvious discomfort felt by the members of the ensemble. This discomfort came
372
Quintilian, Institutio XI. i. 7.
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as result of a musical input made by one of the members of the group who introduced sound material that caused the sudden stop of the performance.373 If we listen to it adopting a rhetorical angle we can point that this interpreters musical input caused the breaking of the fundamental element of decorum and kairos, which is to fit to each other, to the circumstances and occasion. David Borgo mentions that, Dramatistsfrequently argue that humans are too skilled in suppressing action.374 He continues giving Keith Johnstones opinion that, All the improvisation teacher has to do is to reverse this skill and he creates very gifted improvisers. Bad improvisers block action, often with a high degree of skill. Good improvisers develop action. 375 So it seems that the idea of blocking action presented by Keith Johnstone harmonizes with the rhetorical action of breaking with decorum. In FIM, one of the differences from a performance of composed music is that the improviser is liable to change the course of events dramatically by perceiving the music he is creating and the effect of it in the audience and/or in the cocreators. As a consequence, because in the improvised environment there is a need to develop the invention, there may be the tendency to have a greater conscious dynamic than in the performance of composed music, where the invention is set in the score. This makes the musical activity more complex for the performer since there are more elements to consider in the attempt to achieve balance between the conscious and the subconscious aspects of performing. Although the subconscious dynamism can be compared with the one which is involved in the interpretation of compositions, the conscious aspect represents a much more complicated issue for the performer of FIM than for the interpreter of written music, because of the necessity of creating the material, organizing it, and at the same time expressing it objectively. Borgo is of the opinion that the establishing the so-called group-flow can depend on the level of familiarity
373 374 375
CDR1 track 18. Borgo (2005) p. 185. Johnstone (1979) p. 95.
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between the participants, and it requires musicians and actors to resolve aspects of conscious and nonconscious performance in order to achieve a balance appropriate to the moment.376 This issue of listening/reasoning is crucial for the development of new strategies during an improvised performance. However, searching for those strategies should not compromise the balance between both the conscious and the subconscious levels. It seems that to make this balance possible it is necessary to deal effectively with time. The less time the performer spends in perceiving the outside world, the more time is left to engage deeper in the musical activity. So, the immediate strategy points towards finding a way to perceive the world around you in a faster way or in a manner that does not compromise the depth of subconscious expressive activity. Quintilian insists that, Further attention of the mind must be directed not to some one thing, but simultaneously to a number of things in continuous sequence. The result will be the same as when we cast our eyes along some straight road and see at once all that is on and near it, obtaining a view not merely of its end, but of the whole way there.377 In this respect, I believe that rhetoric can help in saving time at the moment of sonic perception by allowing the improviser to make use of a preparatory training of connecting the observations to intentionalities, or even sequences of them, in order to use time more effectively and therefore increasing the chances of being eloquent. This may be the natural way it works in many fluent skilled improvisers anyway. However, if we take this matter and acknowledge it as part of the improvisers expressive apparatus, and one that could be developed by training, we might come to perceive the light shed by it and consider it as a possible method for better understanding FIMs intrinsic components. If rhetoric is perceived as a flexible system for discussing human communicative dynamics by acknowledging that language and music are systems that exist in order to serve a particular purpose in human communication and
376 377
Borgo (2005) p. 184. Quintilian, Institutio X. vii. 16.
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interactivity, it would be possible to see it as inextricable from social and political contexts. Rhetoric and Society rests on the assumption that rhetoric is both an important intellectual discipline and a necessary cultural practice that is profoundly implicated in a large array of other disciplines and practices, from politics to literature to religion.378 Haynes affirms: rhetoric is remarkably adaptable. It can be applied over a spectrum from writing style to dance. In music it has several facets. Since it serves as a framework of form (with sections like dispositio, pronuntiatio, etc.), it is useful in establishing and analyzing structure, both large-scale (like whole pieces) and small-scale (like figures). He continues, explaining: rhetoric also acts as a kind of hermeneutics or narrative, providing handles for understanding musics meaning, in ways parallel to discursive thought, stories, and descriptions of emotional states. And it provides performers with a rationale for making emotional contact with their listeners. 379 Both the notion of creativity and the practice of oratory are primarily considered individual activities. However, when we engage in the analysis of a practice such as FIM, we ought to consider a new set of dynamisms caused by its inherent social collaborative aspects. As has been shown, the creative product in FIM depends on the collective. Borgo tells us that, During collective improvisation, in both theater and music, [ideas] also become externalized into a group process. When one performer introduces an idea, the other performers may or may not decide to shift the performance in order to incorporate this new idea.380 The elements that I have discussed seem to point out that in order to develop a satisfactory theory for analysing FIM it is necessary to incorporate aspects parallel to music analysis, such as the intersubjective conflicts and harmonies brought by decisions taken by the participants, and the various possible changes induced by collaborators and the audience. As we saw previously, there are social aspects inherent in the rhetorical components of
378 379 380
Kenneth (1994), foreword by Wayne A. Rebhorn, p. 1. Haynes (2007) p. 166. Borgo (2005) p. 184.
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invention, arrangement, expression, memory, and delivery. However, how could we convert a discipline originally intended as an individual practice into one with the intrinsic collaborative creative dynamics such as FIM? To justify the use of rhetoric in a collective activity we have to consider, firstly, a focus on the contemporary concept of rhetoric which asks the question of what rhetoric can be, instead of what rhetoric is secondly, a recognition that the negotiations between the group of FIM are embedded in ethical issues such as decorum and kairos and, thirdly, an acknowledgement that the ethical issues used for establishing trust and an effective communication are intrinsic to rhetorical studies. Also, I find it important to consider the dissimilarity between oratory and music in terms of meaning and the achievement of clarity. For example, if we think about simultaneous preachings by orators, the result would be nothing more than confusion where none of the spoken parts would be understood. In the case of music, even if communication is made through several simultaneous layers of sound in a sort of counterpoint it can be possible to perceive each of the layers. In summary, I believe that rhetorical thinking is of great use for the processes of creation in which the performers of FIM are involved. The idea is to consciously develop a manner of playing that moves audiences through mastering the art of musical declamation, the achievement of eloquence and clarity, and through the guardians of truth and honesty represented by ethics and decorum. Rhetoric is presented by this investigation as a theoretical, creative and pedagogical device for investigating the instrumental and the performative aspects of FIM.
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PART III HEURISTIC DISCOVERIES
Individual Experiences 7.1 The e -recorder
The early steps in electronic composition in The Netherlands were taken in the early nineteen fifties. The first electronic studio was the Philips Physics Laboratory in Eindhoven where Dick Raaijmakers (born 1930), a piano teacher who graduated from the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, started to work at the department of radio and television (1954). Two years later he became an assistant at the new electronic music studio in the acoustics department. At the end of 1960, collaboration between the Philips Lab and the University of Utrecht led to the creation of the first university Studio of Electronic Music, STEM. After leaving STEM in 1962 Raaijmakers and the electronic music composer Jan Boerman opened a private studio in The Hague. Finally, in 1966 STEM became the Institute of Sonology at the Royal Conservatory that has become one of the most important centres of electroacoustic music in Western Europe. Michael Barker, who studied with both Raaijmakers and Boerman in the period from 1982 to 1987, became my teacher in 1994 and my mentor a year later, when I asked for guidance in the development of an interactive recorder. He had already made several attempts in putting electronic devices on recorders. The one that attracted my attention was a square contrabass instrument made by Paetzold (Germany) that he modified in cooperation with STEIM (Studio for Electro Instrumental Music). The size of the instrument and its flat surfaces offered the possibilities for the installation of electronic components. Soon I acquired my own Paetzold contrabass and, with the guidance of Barker, started to apply ideas of my own. Barker referred to these new developments as extensions
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of the recorder in which any transformation should take care not to destroy the original possibilities of expression that the instrument offers.381 The idea of a contrabass recorder with an electronic system was born in 1986, when Michael Barker developed an instrument in collaboration with the Studio for Electro-Instrumental Music (STEIM) in Amsterdam. Due to the rapid changes in technology, the instrument I have now is very different from the one Barker created. The instrument consists of a Paetzold contrabass recorder with 30 sensors installed on it. It uses a condenser microphone LCM 70 SD Systems (Amsterdam) placed in front of the window of the instrument. The way I play consists of recording musical events live and using them to create a parallel sound environment to the acoustic instrumental sound of the recorder. With sliders and the instrument's potentiometer, activated by torsion movement, I can select and scratch through the buffer respectively. The interactive system was programmed using the software MAX/MSP by my friend and colleague Johan van Kreij. It is called PIPO. PIPO started as a composition by him and used subsequently, by me, as a platform to improvise. Later, van Kreij made some upgrades that expanded the possibilities but, in reality, I kept playing with the same patch for three years and acquired better control on the interface. On the other hand, I started to feel limited because of my imagining possible improvements that could enrich the variety of sound transformation and enhance the control of the sound output itself. Then, in 2004, van Kreij programmed the upgrade called PIPOTAN. One very important improvement that came with PIPOTAN was that it provided a graphical representation of the sound been recorded in the computers buffer. Because of that feature I installed a LCD monitor on the recorder. This device shows a copy of the computers screen so that it is possible to watch the graphic of the sounds recorded in the buffer in the instrument itself. With the possibility of seeing those graphics it became easier to know where the recorded material was located, which made the interaction, and use of the electronics, more predictable and easier to organise.
381
Anti Qua Musica (1989), Barker The Midified Blockflute p. 14.
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In order to develop a coherent system for the e-recorder, I found it very effective to use improvisation. In my experience as a performer, this instrument represents the most intricate I have ever played. Obtaining a balanced musical result combining both acoustic and electronic sources is indeed a very difficult thing to achieve. However, practice has undoubtedly helped me in taming some wild sides of it allowing at the same time unexpected sonic explorations to occur. 7.1.1 Dartington, 2000 The first recording I made with the e-recorder was in the year 2000 at a project called The Meta-Orchestra Hypermusic and the Sighting of Sound that took place during the Dartington International Summer School, Devon, England, with the support of the EC Connect programme. One of the presentations included a free improvised set were I had the opportunity to play with Clo Palacio-Quintin (flute and electronics), Hilary Jeffery (trombone and electronics) and special guest Evan Parker (soprano sax). The set had the duration of 7:41 minutes. In general, my impression of this performance was that the whole group had the tendency to retreat when threatened by possible danger, which made at times the sections very small in duration. The fact that none of us had played together before might have also influenced in engaging in careful exploration. However, I am convinced that the presence of Evan Parker conditioned the order of events in one way or another. Parker almost constantly used musical material already present in the performance, rather than coming from scratch with an idea of his own. This revealed his acute sense for integrating the group and a sense of decorum based upon respect for the opinion of others. I still keep the memories of my behaviour during this performance. My first intuition was to avoid playing right at the beginning, instead waiting for something to happen. I did not have to wait very long for Evan Parker started playing a combination of sounds coming from the keys of the sax and short notes followed immediately by Quintin, on the flute, playing a diversity of trills and, at
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the same time, live-processing them with STEIMs LiSa.382 The introductory material was composed by those trills, the sound of the keys of the flute and sax. Next, Jefferys subtle sinewave was taken by Evan Parker as source for developing a melody using the trills exposed at the beginning. However, I feel that this performance was mostly polarised into two duets because of the constant strict imitation of the sax musical inputs by the flute. The result at many points shows the flute interfering rather than collaborating with the sax, leaving little chance for clarity and eloquence to be achieved, and a difficulty for the trombone and the e-recorder to interact with them. This is a problem that Borgo recognises as typical of inexperienced improvisers. He mentions that Anthony Davis is of the opinion that, In order to listen, you dont necessary follow, you respond. You try to construct something that coexists or works well with something else not necessarily this tail-wagging-the-dog thing where you just follow someone. Borgo also mentions that, for Davis, listening is knowing what someone is doing and using it in a constructive way, as opposed to mimicry, just trying to demonstrate that you are quote-unquote listening. 383
382
LiSa (Live Sampling) is a software developed by STEIM (Studio for Electro-Instrumental Music) in Amsterdam. Borgo (2005) p. 187.
383
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DARTINGTON 2000 AUDIO SAMPLE B Dartington 2000 Evan Parker Sax soprano Cesar Villavicencio e-recorder Hilary Jeffery Trombone and electronics Clo Palacio Quintin Flute and electronics
Time Material Dynamic 1---------7 00:00 Silence 0 Activity 0-----7 Homoioarche EXORDIUM Rhetoric Section
00:01
Trb LE: Sinewave Sax: keys, short notes playing around G.
Trb: 1 Sax: 2 Flute: 2 LE: 2 4-5
Proper of Exordium. Short aloof phrases.
00:13
Flute: trills, LE. Sax: keys, short notes
Sax: 2 Flute: 2, LE: 2
00:15
Trb: LE Sine wave
Aposiopesis
00:17
Flute: trills, LE.
4-5
00:18
Sax: Phrase with trills from Trbs sinewave.
Sax: 2 3 2 Flute: 2 3 LE: 2 3
454
Mimesis, Anaphora
INVENTIO I NARRATIO I
168
00:30
Sax: Variation on phrase.
Sax: 4 Fl & LE: 3
34
Anaphora
DISPOSITIO I
00:40
Sax Fl & LE.
Sax: 3 Fl & LE: 3 4
Memoria (Revisiting exordium)
00:44
e-rec: long low note. Trb: mid range
e-rec: 1 4
Parembole
00:45
Fl: Follows e-rec.
Anaphora
00:49
Sax: Variation on phrase. Continuation of Flutes idea. Sax: Tempted to follow long note.
Sax: 4
Auxesis
00:55
Sax: 4 5
Anaphora
00:57
e-rec: ends long note upwards. Trb: LE only Trb: 2 Sax: 3 4
Interrogatio
Parenthesis 4 Emphasis, Pallilogia
00:59 01:09
Sax: transposed up. Fl: Imitating sax
Battologia e-rec: 1 5 4
01:06
e-rec: long low note.
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01:10
Sax: follows long note going up Trb: follows long note going up
Sax Trb: 3 6
Anaphora, Emphasis, Auxesis Exclamatio
CLIMAX I
01:13
Fl: follows long note + variation downwards in diminuendo e-rec: ends in upwards intervals imitating Sax/Trb
Fl: 3 6 3
Anaphora
Catabasis Anabasis, Mimesis
01:17
Sax: Picks up from Fl
Sax: 3 6 3
01:18
Trb: one note Sax: phrase goes up
Trb: 5 3 Sax: 3 2
Exclamatio Anabasis
01:22
Sax & e-rec
Sax: 4 2 e-rec: 2- 4
Loginqua Distantia Antithesis Anaphora Anaphora
Fl & LE: repeat variation. Trb. & LE: presents new elements (two staccato notes) Live sampled from Sax. 01:24 Silence
Fl & LE: 3 5
Pausa, Aposiopesis
TRANSITION
170
01:26
Sax picks back elements from Trb. & LE develops into new phrase. Fl & LE: repeat variation.
Sax: 3
Mimesis
INVENTIO II NARRATIO II
01:27
Fl: 3
Catabasis
01:29
Sax: Develops phrase further. e-rec: Long low note again.
Sax: 3 4
DISPOSITIO II
01:31
Memoria
01:32
Fl & LE: follow sax.
Battologia
01:33
Talk between e-rec and Trb. Attacks.
Trb: 6
Anaphora
01:3401:40
Trb: Long note with vibrato
Trb: 4 6
45
Anaphora, Variatio Decoratio, Exclamatio Memoria, Parembole
01:35
e-rec: Low attack reacting to Trb. Fl & LE: follow sax. e-rec: Phrase with both materials: Fl. & Sax, and Trb.
e-rec: 5
Anaphora, Exclamatio
01:3801:41
Fl: 3 4
Battologia (Fl.)
e-rec: 3 5
Mimesis, Anaphora, Variatio
171
01:42
Trb: Long note
Trb: 3
Parembole,
01:47
Fl & LE: follow sax.
Battologia (Fl.)
01:5001:53
Sax solo, Silence
42
024
Abruptio
01:5401:55
Silence
Aposiopesis
01:5602:14
Polarised into two subgroups; sax/fl & erec/trb. e-rec: long medium note.
Sax: 5
Battologia (Fl.)
e-rec: 4
02:15
Sax & e-rec, Trb & sax.
Accentus, Anaphora, Mimesis, Palilogia,
02:17
Trb: new idea
Trb: 3
inventio
TRANSITION (Negotiation)
02:1902:23
Fl & LE: Sounds in repetitive downward movement.
Antithesis
172
02:24 02:28
Fl & LE: introduces strong material using LE making the other instruments to stop playing.
Fl & LE: 456
45
Bomphiologia, Catabasis
32
02:29
Trb: melodic line not taken by anybody. The hope seems to restore what began in 02:17. e-rec: Just LE from Trb in high pitches. Sax: New input
Trb: 4
02:30
e-rec: 5
Anaphorae, Variatio
02:33
Sax: 5 2
Sax: 5 3
Inventio
INVENTIO III
02:37 02:50
Fl & LE: Sounds in repetitive mode and diminuendo. Sax: Follows Fl. Creating a carpet of sound. e-rec: Trill & development & Conclusion.
Fl & LE: 2 3
Memoria
02:39
Sax: 3 4
Anaphora
02:40
e-rec: 3 5 2
4 53
Anabasis, Catabasis, Accentus
173
02:50 03:12
Sax high pitches. e-rec: high pitches Trb & LE: Following FL and sax & whistleling high. Fl & LE: single notes
Sax: 4 e-rec: 3 4 5 Trb: 3 Fl: 3 4
Mimesis, Anaphora, Auxesis (Trb)
03:03
Fl & LE: water sound samples.
FL & LE: 4
03:04 03:18
Trb: high pitches going up and down.
Trb: 3
03:0904:17
Fl. Following sax with few interventions of e-recorder and Trb. Sax & Trb: long note.
45 3 45
4 3 424 5
Inventio (sax), Battologia, macrologia (Fl), Parembole (e-rec, Trb) Memoria, Emphasis (sax,Trb) CLIMAX II
04:18
46
04:2004:59
Trio: Sax,Trb,erec. Trb & LE: embochure samples. Fl & LE: water sound samples. Fl: long notes and some imitation of sax.
4543 56
34
Emphasis, Antithesis, Catabasis, (Trb) Exclamatio, Anabasis, Antithesis (e-rec) Emphasis, Antithesis, Catabasis, Decoratio, Anabasis (sax) Hypotiposis (LE) Battologia Bomphiologia
INVENTIO IV
245
2 346 e-rec: 7 6
05:00
e-rec: hard LE intervention
174
05:01
Silence (Just the water sample is on)
Aposiopesis
05:02
Sax attempts to suggest a new quiet sound scheme but it is abandoned to follow slap tonging from FL. e-rec joins sputatos.
Sax: 2
Anaphorae
REFUTATIO Big contrast by using mostly percussive sounds, rather than the long notes from the previous section.
05:07
Fl & LE: water sound samples stop. Silence Tutti of percussive sounds.
Fl: 3 Sax: 3
Aposiopesis
05:09 05:20
Fl: 3 Sax: 3 e-rec: 4 Trb: 3 4
35
05:21 05:34
Sax & Trb & e-rec: Trio on top of percussive sounds. e-rec: playing only LE.
05:35
e-rec: very low articulated rhytm Sax: builds up from erec.
e-rec: 3-4-3
Bombus
Sax: 3 5 3
Mimesis
175
05:39
Trb: descending musical comment Sax: develops Trbs input e-rec: LE fast, high ascending lines.
Trb: 2
Mimesis, Catabasis humorosa
Sax: 4 5 e-rec: 4 3 2 Antithesis, Parembole Anaphora, Mimesis
05:50
Duet: Trb & Sax Sax: fast material Trb & LE: embochure samples.
Memoria, Mimesis, Anaphora
06:04 06:08
Trb & LE: regular rhytm samples.
06:12 06:40
Trb & LE: faster regular rhytm samples. Becoming gradually irregular. Fl: Copy of melody from sax and imitates several times in exactly the same manner. Duet sax & e-rec
Trb: 3
23
06:12
23
Battologia
06:16
Sax: 3 4 e-rec: 3 4 2
4 3
Mimesis, Anaphora
176
06:33
Trb: slow upwards and downwards, low register gliss. Fl: Two slow descending notes in quasi gliss. Sax: Recitativ with grace notes. e-rec: Low tone in irregular slow rhytm.
Trb: 2
PERORATIO
Fl: 2
1 Sax: 3 2
e-rec: 2
06:57
Sax: trembling vibrato in a single note. Fl: High multiphonics e-rec: Low tone in irregular slow rhytm.
Sax: 2
Pathos, Memoria (similar to beginning)
Fl: 1 Parembole e-rec: 1
07:24
Silence
Homoioteleuton
07:30
Audience claps
FINE
Table 43.
177
7.1.2 The Hague, 2002 I have chosen this recording in order to give an example of free improvisation that had musical elements typical of jazz, and of how I tried to adapt my playing with the e-recorder to this environment. I have no experience in playing jazz; a factor that I still remember made me feel quite insecure. Even today, when I listen to this recording, I feel some discomfort because of my lack of acquaintance with this style. However, it is interesting to perceive the strategies I adopt in the course of the performance to attempt driving the music towards one with more non-idiomatic characteristics. This recording is also a good example of how negotiations during the performance can become a debate. In this case, the beginning of the session is characteristically more non-idiomatic giving way gradually to interventions in the style of jazz e.g. 00:33 and 01:00. At the same time, I try to avoid bending the music towards a style that I do not command, making efforts to play music that walks away from that e.g. 01:06 through 01:30 provoking some resistance and musical confrontation with Jeffery. At times I adventure myself into trying to fit my playing by contributing with a pseudo-jazz style e.g. 02:39. The main characteristic of this set is the activity of it. It begins and remains very energetic until the very end even becoming imbued with humour and satire.
178
THE HAGUE 2002 AUDIO SAMPLE C The Hague 2002 Cesar Villavicencio e-recorder Hilary Jeffery Trombone Diego Espinosa Percussion
Time Material Dynamic 0------7 00:00 Tutti: short rhythmic fast interventions. Big intervals. 45 Activity 0-----7 56 Inventio, Mimesis, NARRATIO I Parembole, Anaphora, Exclamatio, Emphasis, Longinqua distancia Interrogatio Rhetoric Section
00:12
Trb: single note arrived at from an upwards glissando. e-rec: Single note arrived at through a downwards glissando. Trb: solo in single note. Tutti: short rhythmic interventions. Attacks. e-rec: LE sample from Trbs single tone. Short Silence e-rec: solo low furulato. 3 1
00:13
Antithesis
00:14
Interrogatio
00:16
00:20
Memoria, Anaphora
00:22
0 2
0 1
Aposiopesis Memoria
DISPOSITIO I
179
00:23 00:45
Trb: short interventions. Perc: rapid and continuous bells, cymbals. e-rec: LE sampling perc.
34
00:25
Trb: short rhythmic interventions.
00:29 Trb: short melodic line (Arsis) 00:31 e-rec: rapid low acoustic sounds.
Parembole
00:34 Trb: short melodic line (Thesis) 00:37 Trb: upwards glissando. Perc: solo
Memoria, Interrogatio 4 5 Inventio Anaphorae
00:41
00:44 Trb: Imitates perc. e-rec: Imitates Trb. 00:45 Trb. & e-rec: Duo Perc: Filling up 00:54 Trb: long note approached by 00:58 upwards glissando with furulato. Per: Short interventions. 00:55 e-rec: acoustic intervention imitating Trb. Going down. e-rec: long low note crescendo. Perc: Begins groove, more regular rhythms. 4 4 4 4 5 4
Mimesis, Anaphora Parembole TRANSITION (Negotiation)
Anaphora, Catabasis, Parembole
00:58 01:03
56
Incrementum, Emphasis, Auxesis
180
00:59
Trb: Hooks onto groove making a phrase. Ends in an upwards glissando. Silence Trb. & perc. continue e-rec: proposes new material to brake regular beat of groove. Trb: Upwards glissando. Perc: Continues groove.
45
Parembole, Interrogatio
01:04 01:05
Aposiopesis
01:07
Inventio
TRANSITION (Negotiation)
01:11 e-rec: LE trying to brake regularity. 01:19 01:21 Trb: Affirming regularity.
Parembole, Antithesis Parembole, Antithesis
01:21 Perc: rapid regular rhythms 01:22 01:25 Trb: Melodic regular line upwards. e-rec: Mixed acoustic and LE interventions braking regularity. 01:26 Trb: upwards melody followed by short silence. e-rec: LE high intervention followed by silence. 01:27 Perc: Leading to next episode. 45 45 45 Anabasis, Abruptio 4 54 Parembole, Antithesis
181
01:28 01:31
Trb: Same as 00:59 transposed up. e-rec: Same unregular rhythm both acoustic and LE. Stronger.
Memoria, Auxesis
CLIMAX
01:32 Trb: Follows e-rec irregularity. 01:37 Accentuated, slow, off-rhythm, descendent notes. Stop. 01:40 02:04 01:52 e-rec LE & perc: Duo 3 4
Emphasis, Auxesis, Catabasis
INVENTIO, TRANSITION Parembole, Interrogatio
Trb: Short upwards glissando 01:53 furulato. 02:00 Trb: Very low tone followed by 02:04 higher short melody on rhythm from perc. 02:05 02:06 02:07 02:34 Trb: Enters regular rhythm sequences. e-rec LE: Rhythm very active and irregular. Perc: Follows irregular active tempo. 02:14 02:19 Perc: Stops. Perc: supports rhythmic regularity. 5 6 Silence
Antithesis, Mimesis
Aposiopesis
Memoria
NARRATIO II
Antithesis, Mimesis
Mimesis
182
02:35 03:25
e-rec: Acoustic attempt of a walking bass. Joins regular division of time. Trb: Solo. Jazz like. Quote on Bernsteins Maria .
03:13 03:26
e-rec: stops e-rec: Enters with strong LE sounds taking over the Trbs solo. Trb: follows e-rec Perc: follows erec Mimesis 6 6 Bomphiologia
03:40
e-rec: stops. Trb. & perc. Continue with duo and rhythm regularity. Grooving.
54
04:01
Trb. & perc.
3453 4 5
345
Anabasis, Exclamatio Parembole
TRANSITION
04:18
e-rec: LE sounds fitting in regular rhythm. e-rec: acoustic solo in an attempt to play jazz like. Trb: repeated notes. Perc: imitates repeated notes. e-rec: imitates repeated notes.
04:24
Mimesis
04:35
04:38
Anaphora, Bombus
04:39
Anaphora, Bombus
183
04:50
e-rec: single low tone. Trb: picks up from e-rec tone and develops it into another solo. Perc: fast in the cymbals.
45
345
PERORATIO
05:29
e-rec: takes over solo with strong attacks with LE. Trb: follows with short, strong attacks in several registers. Perc: playing less continuous responding to attacks.
46
Anaphora, Mimesis, TRANSITION Parembole, Longinqua distancia,
05:42
Trb: attempt to bring back melody. Trb: stops. e-rec (LE) & perc: duo Some voice sounds from Trb.
Memoria
05:54
5 3
45
06:10 06:12
Silence Trb: Comic vocal sound. Silence Trb. & e-rec: Comic dialog. Silence
0 1
0 1
Aposiopesis
06:13 06:17
0 32
0 1
Aposiopesis
06:19
END
Table 44.
7.1.3 Belfast, 2005 My participation in this concert was with the UEA Electric Orchestra. The solo set that I presented with the e-recorder had to crossfade with the end of Simon 184
Waters feedback flute presentation. As customary, I tried to avoid anticipating what I was going to play until I found myself on-stage with the e-recorder. I recall that I thought about playing in contrapositum or antithesis so as to produce something opposite and at the same time complementary to Simons input. The opposite to the clean and high sound of feedback meant for me to play a soft low contrabass recorder sound with a dirty throat frullato and wind noise, recalling the live-electronic processing for short periods of time in an emphatic manner. BELFAST 2005 AUDIO SAMPLE D Belfast 2005 Cesar Villavicencio e-recorder Simon Waters Feedback Flute (Fbfl)
Time Material Dynamic 0------7 00:00 00:02 Silence Fbfl: medium sounds with soft vibrato. 0 Fbfl: 2 3 Activity 0-----7 0 1 Homoioarche EXORDIUM Rhetoric Section
00:07 00:09
Silence Fbfl: rising fifth e-rec: low soft note
0 Fbfl: 2
0 1
Abruptio Exclamatio? Longinqua distancia
e-rec: 1 0 Fbfl: 3 e-rec: 1 0 1 Aposiopesis
00:12 00:14
Silence Fbfl: slow chromatic interval going up. e-rec: soft note going down.
00:21
Silence
Aposiopesis
185
00:22
e-rec: very soft low e-rec: furulato and keys. Fbfl: very soft Fbfl: three descending notes
00:25 00:59 00:30 00:34
00:38 00:53 e-rec: Introduces wind noise. e-rec: LE384 more active Silence 2 2
00:56
01:00 01:05 01:06
Aposiopesis
e-rec: continues Fbfl: very high tones e-rec: rough furulato, wind noise low notes. Antithesis
01:09
01:16
e-rec: LE Attack Silence
Emphasis
01:18 01:21 01:22
Aposiopesis
e-rec: Attack Fbfl: single high tone
e-rec: 4 Fbfl: 2
Symploce, Anaphora
384
LE=Live electronics
186
01:25
e-rec: short soft attacks in unequal rhythm using rough furulato, wind noise and LE. Fbfl: soft gentle notes.
Symploce
02:12
e-rec: acoustic attack feeding the buffer. Silence
02:14 02:17 02:19
e-rec: same as 01:25 but less active Fbfl: stronger feedback multiphonic. e-rec: LE attack e-rec: acoustic sounds in upwards interval + LE wind noise e-rec: LE double attack Silence Fbfl: Feedback with multiphonics. e-rec: joins with multiphonics e-rec: LE attack Silence
Symploce, Epistrophe
02:26 02:42 02:28
NARRATIO
Anaphora, Emphasis
02:33
Mimesis
02:42
Anaphora, Emphasis
02:43 02:44
0 4
0 3
Aposiopesis
02:51
02:58 03:00 03:01 03:04
25
Epistrophe
Aposiopesis
187
03:05
e-rec: soft multiphonics
e-rec: 2
e-rec: 2
DISTRIBUTIO
Fbfl: multiphonics. Fbfl: 3 Fbfl: 2
03:15 03:17 03:18
Silence
Aposiopesis
e-rec: soft multiphonics
03:24 Fbfl: joins with multiphonic with strong vibrato 03:25 e-rec: reacts to impulse of vibrato releasing LE activity. Many attacks. Fbfl: clean single tone solo e-rec: Very strong LE attack followed by combined acoustic/LE counterpointisti c phrase. e-rec: long note developing multiphonics.
4 56 4 3 2
45
Mimesis
03:40
Memoria, Antithesis
03:44
65
4 -5
Antithesis, Anaphora
03:51
Mimesis, Anaphora
Fbfl: clean single tone solo 03:55 e-rec: Counterpointist ic phrase. 45 34 Interrogatio
188
04:00 04:02
Silence Fbfl leaves stage. Only acoustic, short notes to return to soft multiphonics. Counterpointis tic phrase. Soft multiphonics. Soft multiphonics. Muli-layering with LE Percussive layer introduced. Layers become irregular rhythms and interact with eachother.
Aposiopesis
04:03
Memoria
04:20
04:25
04:32
04:40
23
EXORDIUM II
05:17
234
34 5
Inventio
05:40 05:42
Silence Variation on rhytms. Add acoustic low drone to LE rhythmical soundscape. LE add drone as well Acoustic drone. LE rhythms become faster and higher. 4 4 3 3
Aposiopesis, Abruptio
05:49
05:53
06:01 06:05
Anabasis
189
06:06 06:19
Acoustic drone. LE rhythms slower. The same cell repeated four times.
3 Palilogue
06:20 06:31
Acoustic drone gives way to acoustic rhythms. LE rhythms become faster and higher.
45
45
Anabasis
06:32
Only LE static electronic furulato sound. Soft LE sound.
Emphasis, Auxesis
CLIMAX 1
06:42
Abruptio
06:44
Back to rhythmic interactivity.
06:55
Low sounds, 2 3 4 2 3 4 3 full of silences. 3 2 2 Back to rhythmic interactivity. Major third between e-rec and LE. Silence 56 56
Anabasis, Caesurae
07:24
CLIMAX II
07:38
07:42
Aposiopesis
07:46
Major third between e-rec and LE. Silence High sounds, full of silences. E-rec and LE in parallel.
Emphasis
07:50 07:52
Aposiopesis Mimesis, Contrapositum, Abruptio
190
08:16
Acoustic sustained sound (7th of dominat chord) LE sound comes in with sustained sound (3rd of dominant chord) Most unfortunate (both intervals resolve into a sixth major chord.)
08:20
08:23
08:25
Trying to divert the attention drawn to the harmonic cadence by adding some elements. (e.g. a leap of minor seventh in the LE and filtering) Medium acoustic tone. LE: static electronic furulato.
08:33
Memoria
08:39
Low acoustic furulato. LE: static electronic furulato.
191
08:44
LE: The resulting note of the previous minor seventh leap is recalled and filtered in many ways.
Memoria
Phrase in the low acoustic register. 09:04 Acoustic low sustained sound LE: sustained sound produces a perfect fifth. Again, trying 3 2 1 to divert the attention of the fifth I introduce disturbance in the acoustic sound. Silence 0 1 PERORATIO
09:07
09:15
09:45
Homoioteleuton
Table 45.
7.2
University of California San Diego (UCSD) (April, 9 11, 2007)
The University of California San Diego is one of the few higher education institutions where the practice of FIM has been incorporated into the academic curriculum. My visit to this institution consisted on the presentation of a paper, an experience in a lesson on improvisation conducted by Mark Dresser, and the performance of a short discussion-concert with David Borgo and students of the music department. During my visit to the music department of the UC San Diego, USA, I had the opportunity of playing with two student improvisation ensembles. One of them was composed by a group of four students, which, in the words of Borgo, The groupis somewhat self-contained. They call themselves pfr (short for 192
performer I think--though they pronounce it like "fur"). Borgo was their faculty advisor for a couple of quarters and would attend rehearsals to offer feedback and sometimes play with them. The other ensemble was a bigger one, composed of less experienced performers and directed by internationally acclaimed bass player /improviser/ composer/ interdisciplinary collaborator Mark Dresser. Whilst playing with pfr and Borgo was an experience in which I could establish musical depth right from the first moment, in the second group I felt that participants were more constricted by having to comply with the rules set by Dresser. The rules specified, in the first block, the manner in which each individual should interact with a given partner(s) following a playing chronogram. In the second block, Dresser presented us with a written score and ideas for the performance of an improvised prologue and epilogue. Whilst the discussion with pfr focused on the collective issues and how the individual processes could change in order to serve the community, Dressers approach was one that concentrated in making the individuals aware of his concepts of what, how and when to do the music. This seems to be in tune with Borgos concept of a conventional approach where the teaching of musical improvisation tend to stress individual facility through memorization and preplanning, leaving little room for experimentation.385 The discussion-concert with pfr consisted of two short sets with an open forum in the middle where the public could ask questions and make remarks. It is important to say that this group has been playing regularly during two consecutive years. Consequently or not, the performances revealed more mature interactivity and deep levels of listening. Playing with them gave me a very comfortable feeling of cooperation and commitment with the music. As I will make clear in the analysis of the first set, there was an evident use of memory, complementarities, consistent imitation mimesis, antithesis and a clear perception of structure.
385
Borgo (2005) p. 185.
193
AUDIO SAMPLE E UCSD1 AUDIO SAMPLE H UCSD2 UCSD 1 William Brent Laptop (Lp1) Jason Ponce Laptop (Lp2) Jonathan Piper Tuba (Tb) Joe Bigham - e-guitar (eG) David Borgo EWI Cesar Villavicencio - Tenor recorder (Rec)
Time Material Dynamic 1---------7 00:00 00:04 Silence EWI, Tb, Rec: key sounds. Small insect like, percussive sounds. Tb: Low drone 0 1,2 Activity 0-----7 0 3 Homoioarche Intimate, careful EXORDIUM Rhetoric Section
00:28
00:30
EWI: low register sound delays EWI: low register sound delays Rec: wind sound Lp1: percussive sound followed by longer mid range sound. Decay. Rec: follows Lp1 with wind sound.
00:37
Anaphorae
00:41 00:50
2 2, 3, 4, 3, 2
2 1, 2, 1
2, 3, 2, 1
01:03
EWI: low register delays.
Anaphorae
194
01:08
Lp1: Percussive sound. Tb: low slow furulato. Rec: with Tb in wind. EWI: low continuous delay.
Exclamatio
Mimesis
3 3 2
01:13
Lp1: Percussive sound. EWI: low continuous delay.
3 3 2 Anaphorae
01:17
EWI: Delays Rec: key and wind sound.
01:19
Lp1,2: very soft continuous sound. Rec: key sounds EWI: Delays eG: fast soft string sound.
01:22 01:23
2 3 1
2 3 4
01:26 01:28
Rec: wind sound. EWI: Transposing delays up. Tb: low sustained sound. Rec: key sounds. EWI: Transposing delays up. Rec: low tone furulato. Silence
3 3
2 2 Anabasis
01:31
01:37 01:38
2 4
4 3 Anabasis, Anaphorae
01:48
01:51
Aposiopesis
TRANSITION
195
01:53
Lp1: Crackles EWI: Transposing delays up. Tb: Low furulato transposed up.
2 4
2 4 Anabasis, Memoria, Mimesis
DISPOSITIO
02:06
Rec: Glissando furulato up. EWI: Transposing up. Longer phrase. Rec: Glissando furulato up. Longer phrase. EWI: Transposing up. eG: Regular rhythm in delay.
02:12
02:19
Mimesis, Anaphora
02:29
Memoria, Anabasis, Emphasis, Auxesis
02:30
Rec: Furulatomultiphonics-pure sound. EWI: Transposing up. Grace notes. Lp1: Repeated high pitch fast. Rec: Follows Lp1 with furulato. EWI: Transposing up, very high. Rec: Multiphonics Lp2: some irregular rhythms. eG: Irregular rhythms and short phrases. Tb: Long low tones Lp1: Sustained note.
3, 4, 5
Emphasis
02:47
Anabasis, decoratio
02:59
03:00
Anaphora, Mimesis
03:06
CLIMAX 1
5 3
3 3
196
03:52
Rec: Follows Lp1 in unison. Tb: Low tone ends upwards.
Mimesis
INVENTIO
3, 2 4
2 5
Interrogatio
04:00
eG: Fast interventions. Rec: Converstation with eG using various glissandi.
04:12
EWI: Explicit delays in conversation with Rec. Lp1:
04:17
Rec: Short interventions in pointillistic building of phrases. Silence EWI: as in 4:12 Rec:as in 4:17
inventio
04:29 04:30
Aposiopesis
04:44
eG: Trill. Rec: Imitates eG.
2 2 2, 3, 4
4 4 3
Mimesis, Anaphora
04:50
Lp1 and Lp2: Soundscape. Rec: Goes down in short intervals.
Hypotiposis
4, 3, 2, 1 3
3, 2, 1 3
Catabasis
05:28
Rec: enters soundscape of Lp1 and Lp2 with whistling high pitches. Lp1: Waves of sound coming and going.
4, 5, 4 4 4
05:48
eG: Fades in long note. Rec: Follows eG in unison. Lp1: Strong phrase.
05:52
Mimesis, Memoria
06:05
197
06:08 06:10
Almost Silence EWI: Follows Lp2 phrase. Then follows Rec in active interactivity. Lp1: Strong sounds Lp2: Samples of Tb played back very low. Rec: Whistling in rapid interventions. Tb: Low slow notes.
0 4, 5, 6, 7
0 4, 5 Mimesis, Anthitesis, Longinqua distancia, Auxesis, Emphasis, Exclamatio. CLIMAX 2
07:35
Tutti: Decay Tb: Phrases with short notes. eG: short rhytmic sounds.
6, 4, 3, 2
6, 4, 3
Catabasis
08:13 08:15
Silence Lp1 and Lp2: Soundscape. EWI: Joins
0 4
0 2
Aposiopesis Hypotiposis INVENTIO 2
08:34
Rec: Joins with finger sounds. Lp1: Sequential use of small musical gestures in crescendo. Lp2: Inputs more active repetitive motifs. Rec: Short staccato going up. Rec: Develops staccato motifs on top of soundscape. EWI: high pitch phrases on top of soundscape.
08:43
2, 5
Emphasis, exclamatio
09:28
09:36
Interrogatio
09:46
Inventio, anthitesis
10:10
198
10:35
eG: Regular rhytms with accents. EWI: Joins rhythms Rec: Joins rhythms Tutti: Exit rhythmical section in crescendo going down. Rec: Long flutter tong note. Calling for change. EWI: Joins Rec. The soundscape is still there. Softer.
2, 3, 4, 5
10:49
10:52 10:55
4 4, 5, 6
3 5, 6 Catabasis
12:32
4, 3
12:48
4, 3
13:00
Tutti: Long, low and dense. Diminuendo. Lp1 and Lp2: Long and soft. Stop
PERORATIO
13:18
2, 1
13:30
Homoioteleuton
Table 46.
7.3
Lessons Learned
In particular, what I can draw from the experiences described above is that the differences that might have been brought by the accumulation of experience have changed the way I perceive making music in a collective situation in general. I have become more aware of the intentions embedded in other performers actions, which consequently has helped me tune the manner I use to express myself with that of the co-participants. The music performed at the Dartington project gave me the first insight into the dynamics of FIMs group performance. It was not only useful, but also a strong experience playing with someone as experienced and fluent as Parker. Also, having been exposed to dealing with performing a set that had characteristics of jazz, with which I am not acquainted, has shown that I felt 199
limited. I could also say that, although experiencing playing solo with the erecorder was in many ways very enjoyable, the performance in Belfast was in some aspects also demanding in the sense that the unpredictability of the electronic controller rendered at times undesirable musical material. Finally, the performance at UCSD, in which I used a tenor recorder without the use of electronics, has opened new perspectives for me as an improviser. One particular characteristic of this recording is that sometimes it is difficult to perceive the source of the electronic sounds Laptop (Max/MSP), Laptop (Supercollider), e-guitar, and Akais EWI (Electronic Wind Instrument). Still, those who are familiar with the sound produced by Max/MSP and Supercollider could make a distinction between them. However, because of the lack of visual connection the difficulty of identifying the source of sound is an issue more present in the recording than in the live presentation. For me, this performance represents a very good example of decorum, of collective exploration embedded in good intentions and combined with interactive depth. It seems that this was an impression shared by many. Recently, David Borgo released a DVD in which he used both recordings I made with him and pfr at UCSD. Also it is important to say that playing with the tenor recorder rather than with the e-recorder made it easier to communicate with the other performers and with the audience. This is perhaps an indication that the instrumental control achieved by the performer helps attain a connection with the other participants because the performer can respond to his expressive impulses with more accuracy and speed.
200
Group Laboratories. Prescriptive and Pedagogical Strategies.
8.1.1 The Royal Conservatory, The Hague. The following describes the improvisation project that I conducted at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, The Netherlands, in the months of March and April 2004. The ensemble was composed by four musicians from the Classical Department and two from the Institute of Sonology. There were acoustic and electronic instruments involved. I developed a piece, entitled Modulus II (see score in the appendix), which guided the interpreters through graphics and figures of rhetoric. Whilst the micro-structures of the piece were obtained by making each musician follow specific rhetorical figures, the macro-structure of the piece was schematised according to a classical division of oratory: exordium, narratio, dispositio, refutatio, and peroratio. The score of Modulus II refrains from suggesting any specific musical material (notes and rhythms). The only indications are those of dynamics that have a direct connection with the rhetorical context, and the range that the instrument should use in specific places. Also, the organization of time in this piece is divided into minutes that were to be taken with flexibility. This project was directed to provide a new musical challenge to the participants in following a rhetorical guideline in order to express emotions through organized thoughts, without the need of preconceived sounds or rigid musical structures. Another objective was to present a process of learning through exploration aimed at developing interactive capabilities between players of acoustic and electronic instruments. Although some parameters are specified in the score, and rules do exist, the objective was to keep the spontaneous creation free. This was successful to a certain extent, as will be shown later in this chapter. For the development of the score, I applied rhetoric as a structural device for guiding form and for making the communication of emotions more objective. The hypothesis was that if structuring a medium for the 201
communication of emotions is absolutely central to human cognition and activity, an improviser, by training the development and communication of musical events without the existence of pre-specified music formulae, could provide the listeners with a fulfilling musical experience. Consequently, embarking on the discovery of how to produce and organize new sounds with the collective would hopefully represent not only extending the technical possibilities but also improve their instrumental abilities. The ensemble was composed by six musicians: Aslaug Holgersen contrabass Krista Vincent piano Diego Espinosa percussion Julien Chauvin violin Johan van Kreij electronics Juan Parra electronics The three-hour rehearsals took place at the Royal Conservatory, The Hague on: March 7th, 13th, 18th, 26, 28. April 9th, 14th, 22nd. The concert was at Studio I on April 23rd at 19:30. Modulus II was the middle part of the concert program. The opening was a set of FIM with tenor recorder, played by myself, Diego Espinosa on percussion and Johan van Kreij and Juan Parra with the electronics. The third and last set in our one-hour presentation involved everyone, including myself with the erecorder, in a set with no pre-specified rules or materials. It was a surprise to witness structures of Modulus II emerging in the third set. The effectiveness of previously rehearsed structures appeared in different shapes and orders and the musicians seem to feel very comfortable when this sort of thing happened. The last set seemed as if Modulus II was put into a blender and some extra ingredients were added. Since the instruments were kept with no amplification, the electronics needed to be careful to adapt into a more chamber music sound. The sound of the electronics came from two localised amplification systems instead of a general hall system. This mode of amplification was chosen so as to avoid 202
blurring the source of sound, which happens when the electronics are connected to four or more speakers around the audience. Using a localised amplification for each of the electronic performers made it possible for the other players to identify the source of the sounds, which I think contributes to the establishment of clarity in the interactivity. The results of this project prove that the theory of developing an intersubjective consciousness in an improvisation ensemble through the application of interactive rehearsed formulae is valid. Although this probably indicates just the obvious change brought about by training, it is very important to show evidence that this change is also valid in FIM, which has been a subject for many discussions in the past.386 This early project represented a great impulse in developing further ideas for guiding FIM groups because I sought that it should sponsor integration, control and flexibility in the search for establishing deep levels of expression in this collective artistic activity. On the individual level, this artistic form encourages the musician to search for the combination of his/her standard technique with new possibilities of creating sound, enabled by alternative or extended techniques. It must be clear that for searching and developing some control upon these alternative techniques, time and dedication are required, but at the end, when mastered, they become just a part of the sound possibilities of the instrumentalist. All players of acoustic instruments were students of the Classical Department of the Royal Conservatory. Both musicians with electronic interfaces were from the Institute of Sonology of the Royal Conservatory. The only performer that had no acquaintance with FIM was the violin player. He was a very skilled intrumentalist in the classical repertoire. However, his flexibility seemed from the very beginning to be compromised by scepticism. He was absent from three rehearsals and reacted with surprise to my calls which inquired as to the reason of his absence. Also, it seemed, he would not endeavour to search
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In conversation with Jonathan Impett, Vinko Globokar said that he believed improvisation should be done only once with a person with whom you have never played before.
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for alternative techniques at all. I did insist upon the strategy of isolating the classical technique, succeeding in making him play some sounds from extended techniques, but he gradually returned to exploring the standard sonic palette. His presence in the group started creating some unrest and several times I had to stress to the other members the importance of seeing this project as experimental and regarding the violinist as part of it. Borgo describes the discomfort felt by the group: if a musician initiates a pronounced idiomatic gesture in freer improvising setting, perhaps something with a wrong tonal or metric character to it, it can have the effect of limiting the options available to others.387 The score was relatively easy to follow. Generally, the performers were told to base their musical material on some relation with a specific source. At the beginning, for example, the violin is responsible for the invention and all the other instruments should relate to it by performing different kinds of imitation. Later, other figures are suggested, some that go contrary to the source. However, the changes between sections written in the score seemed to interfere with fluency. It was indicated that the exordium ought to come to a climax, and after a crescendo, mainly in the dynamic and not in the amount of musical material, a sudden stop should leave the piano performing the beginning of the narratio. The caesura at the end of the crescendo sounded, in my opinion, constricted, unnatural and clearly imposed. Next, in the course of playing the narratio the musical material starts developing leading to the dispositio. The change between those sections was performed in a very natural manner since they were given by cues from instruments playing or stopping to play. A second crescendo is presented in the confirmatio, which also gives the feeling of uncertainty, followed after by a decrescendo in the refutatio. The last section indicates the soft performance of a long anabasis with elements that increase the drama inherent in the concept of peroratio. The last section finishes with the instruments reaching the highest registers possible in combination with an equally extreme pianissimo.
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Borgo (2005) p. 59.
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The next musical example shows several places were the violin is performing. AUDIO SAMPLE 16 Modulus II (exordium) During this section, the violin mostly uses regular technique in contrast to the other players who are concentrated in performing primarily with extended techniques. At the same time, there is a palpable lack of connection between the violin part and the others. AUDIO SAMPLE 20 Modulus II (distributio) AUDIO SAMPLE 21 Modulus II (peroratio) It seems to me that the performance of the violin during the whole piece was one suitable for the peroratio. It might be due to the recurrent use of romantic elements such as vibrati and expressive glisandi in full real violin sound. 8.1.1.1 MODULUS II, THE HAGUE 2004 AUDIO SAMPLE A Modulus II Exordium This is the introduction of this piece. It is formed by the combination of rhetorical figures such as anabasis, mimesis, anaphora, auxesis, decoratio, transgressio, climax or gradatio, and abruptio. Anabasis is a musical ascending motion a musical passage through which something ascending into the heights is expressed. (Walther Lexicon). In this passage a sense of expectation should be created where at first only shadows of the main invention fill the atmosphere as to provoke curiosity for what it is to come. The violin has a strong role in this part and should be the point of reference for all the other members of the ensemble. The violin starts the musical ideas (inventio), the contrabass imitates (mimesis) the violin gradually adding anaphorae (repetition of one single musical idea before any new musical input) and, later, auxesis (an exaggerated imitation). Electronics 1 and electronics 2 are sampling the violin and the contrabass 205
respectively. They are devoted to the creation of ethos and later add grace musical interventions (decoratio). Next, the piano imitates (mimesis) single musical ideas either from the violin or the contrabass in a slower heavier tempo with plenty of silences. The climax arrives where the use of expressions increase in intensity. This will be evident in the last minute because of the use of auxesis and the indications of higher dynamic levels and pitches. Finally, a sudden decrease in sound density happens (abruptio) giving way to the second part; the Narratio. Narratio This part is essentially contrapuntal. The piano continues developing the exordiums climax as a bridge between the exordium and the narratio. The electronics are muted. After about 30 seconds contrabass and the electronics 2 joins in refutatio to the pianos idea. The piano gradually gives up and stops to come back with the electronics 1 in auxesis, exaggerating anaphorae taken from the contrabass. After some seconds the violin and percussion join with figures of decoration. Distributio This is the narratio further developed into a more elaborated discourse. Also in counterpoint, the contrabass begins having its discourse complemented (kairos) by the violin. The percussion and the electronics 2 join complementing (kairos) the counterpoint. The dynamic levels should be according to Logos; clarity should prevail rather than saturating the sound. Confirmatio + climax The piano and the electronics 1 join in appealing to the figure of memoria by using the same material as in the exordium. The first 2 minutes should develop a climax and, this time, activity and dynamic levels should increase. The climax ends by breaking up in pieces by the insertion of many silences.
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Refutatio Its fragmented texture is filled with silences and opposite dynamics. However, it remains an active section that presents a result of opposition to the textures existing in the confirmatio. Peroratio This is predominantly a soft section in which the direction should be concentrated on provoking emotions with the use of phatos. The violin plays in catabasis (downwards movement) and the contrabass in anabasis (upwards movement). The percussion plays several surprising emotional events as a sort of memoria and decoratio. Both electronics 1 and 2 should move in anabasis. The end is reached when the softness and quietest sounds as presented and the performance disintegrates in thin air. This was always reached by both the electronics. 8.1.2 Universidade de So Paulo (USP) The improvisation project at the Universidade de So Paulo (USP) took place in June 2005. The project was realized in three days with sessions of three hours on the first two days and a concert on the third day. After an introduction presenting what I understood of free improvisation, specifically referring to the understanding of the word free, I suggested questioning the meaning of it rather than solidifying it into a fixed idea. I asked the students all undergraduates to consider thinking about the possible diverse connotations the word might have or acquire according to their experience. The following instrumentalists were present: three pianists, a trombonist, an electric guitarist, two percussionists, a flautist/pfaro, a clarinetist, a cellist, and a contrabass player. I started by asking them to play in duo formation for ten to twelve minutes. So far, no direction to the realisation of specific techniques was given apart from questioning the meanings of free in FIM. During the performance of the duets it became very apparent that the musicians came from different backgrounds and 207
had diverse technical abilities. The first set was a pianist and a percussion player. Both were very much acquainted with the style of jazz. Also, when the clarinet and the trombone played together, the results showed very clearly their experience in Western European music tradition. Following my scheme, after everyone had had the chance to perform, I gave information regarding the use of the broadest possible understanding of free, asking them to abandon their traditional playing technique and concentrate on looking for new possibilities from their instruments. The idea was to encourage the musicians to explore the full potential of embracing FIM as a practice; to divorce from any possible notational idea, to play melodies and rhythms that could not easily be written, to produce effects that could not be notated, and so forth. I also presented the idea that free-improvisation might signify more than just a practice that came partly as a reaction to the status quo, but it actually expands the status quo itself. All the interactivity became more carefully done due to the difficulty in searching for new sound qualities and at the same time thinking aesthetically while playing together. After this second cycle was finished, there was a discussion about how to rationalize the interaction between the members. Why does it happen the way it happens? I approached them this time with something that made an enormous change in the music of the next block. I asked them to play in groups of four and told them to see behind the sounds so as to speculate on the source that produced a particular aesthetic. This could be an emotion, for example. At this point I pointed out that the style of free-improvisation might be the result of ethics. The discussion went on at this point in trying to separate the ideas some of the students had which mixed the concept of ethics with a moral meaning. The trombone player especially entered in a long discussion about it. The second day began with a free session in which the whole group plays. The beginning of this session is clearly an introduction, or exordium. AUDIO SAMPLE 22 USP05 (exordium 1)
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After this set was finished, I asked the students to describe what had happened at the beginning. There were some attempts to describe it, making reference to the interactivity, the dynamics, etc., but nobody could simply make the analogy with that of an introduction. Next, I presented rhetoric and the concept of exordium and asked them to play another set, taking the concept of exordium into consideration. AUDIO SAMPLE 23 USP05 (exordium 2) Although the sound material is different, since there were some changes in the instrumentarium, the second set has also strong characteristics of an introduction. One possible thing to say is that the second recording shows at the beginning a more substantial inner tempo than the first, which suffered from the interference of a piano practicing next door. Another possible remark about the second set is the use of complementary material that gives the feeling that the parts are more independent and contrapuntal (from 01:14 onwards) while the first shows a texture resulting from more direct imitation. Compared to the day before, the music played was more isolated from the jazz and classical backgrounds of the performers. There was one exception; the trombone player. He seemed either incapable or unwilling to use new techniques, sometimes unbalancing the whole ensemble. An example of that is in the climax played here:388 AUDIO SAMPLE 24 USP05 (climax) In this climax we can observe a loud, active and saturated part where at a point (00:59) the trombones input resembles music of composers such as Mahler or Wagner.
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The examples taken here are cuts from whole sets. The only part which had its characteristics described was the exordium. The Climax and the Catabasis happened naturally during the improvisation.
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Another example comes later in the same set. After a section that resulted in a successful performance of a catabasis, the trombone begins a melody (00:24) that transforms the music into something that resembles Stravinskys Petrouchka. AUDIO SAMPLE 25 USP05 (catabasis) It is important to say that the performers were not acquainted with the rhetorical terms at this stage. First, the trombone was in a collaborative mood helping in the achievement of clarity for the catabasis. However, after he decided to use the whole ensemble as background for playing a melodic line, he unbalanced the performance in such a way that it almost came to a halt. AUDIO SAMPLE F USP 2005 Closing concert The performance of the presentation is eleven minutes long. Its primary characteristic is the saturation of sound, probably brought by the constant high activity and the absence of silences. However, the introduction presents itself clearly, as well as some other subsections (01:42, 03:40, 04:56, 06:46, 09:18). The music does not resemble other styles such as jazz or classical music. There is one exception though; the trombone player plays a tune (06:20), which seems to set the whole ensemble into negotiating again. Many of them stop playing and gradually the trombone ends up playing by himself. Peculiarly, towards the end of the piece our trombonist ends the music playing with the sounds of his instrument filled with water. 8.1.3 Universidade de So Paulo II (USPII) The project was realised in September 2006, during three consecutive days. The duration of the sessions was of two hours per day. The following interpreters were present: Two pianists, a recorder player, a guitarist, an electric-bass player, a percussionist, an oboist, a trumpet player, a clarinettist, and a sax player. As usual when I start a new project, I asked all students to play and find something to do. In the performance, there was a predominance of long notes, short melodies, ornamentation, trills, and repeated thirds especially in the 210
trumpet and recorder. Initially, some performers searched for unisons and direct imitations. There is some lack of general sonic awareness by members for long periods of time, like a strong dissatisfaction with their musical contributions, which leads to a stronger concentration on the individual rather than on the collective. AUDIO SAMPLE 26 USP2006A If we compare this very first session with the last take on the third day,389 we can immediately perceive the changes brought by the pedagogical guidelines. AUDIO SAMPLE 27 USP2006B This sets beginning seems to follow principles of conversation and division, creating a general musical outline between the members of the ensemble, which is permeated with variation, and a comfortable tempo. It is possible that the rhetorical idea of exordium was in some way influential. I explained that the exordium aims for preparing the audience by using logic and ethics. Also in this set, there is a clear change of section at 04:35, which, after gaining some speed, rapidly disintegrates. There follows a period, from 04:53, in which the sound can be perceived as a transition. This section produces collective rhythmical structures that, apparently due to the satisfaction felt by the interpreters, moves from shy to daring, from unclear to defined, and, through an increase in activity and enthusiasm, it becomes even sensual. After that, at 06:20, a broken rhythmical part starts amid a clear conversation between the performers. At 8:05, there is an epilogue, which disintegrates before the listener gains a sense of ending. 8.1.4 University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV) I conducted this project in April 2006. It was divided into sessions of two hours during three days. Also, a concert was performed inside a full program of
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This project at USP did not have a conclusion in the form of a concert.
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contemporary music organised by the Department of Music of the university. As usual, I adopted the strategy of letting them play first . The following interpreters were present: a soprano, a pianist, a bass-trombonist, a cellist and a percussionist. All musicians were from the classical department. The pianist and trombonist besides being performers were also composers. I started dividing them into groups of two. First the soprano and the pianist performed music that seemed written. It sounded like a lied written by Schoenberg. Next, the trombonist and the violoncello performed in quite a chaotic way to begin with, getting more organised after the second minute. Last, I played the recorder in duo with the percussionist who was using the marimba. As I expected, my influence was strong and I felt that the percussion player was following my lead for most of the time. The second round, after the same explanations I made at USP, encouraged them to search just for new possibilities. Fluency of interactivity started to appear in the ensemble. I put the subject of insecurity up for discussion in order to give them some ways to express concerns and concentrate better on the process of improvising. I mentioned things like feeling lost, ashamed, and referring to all this as perfectly normal for somebody that is trying to speak without yet mastering the language. This language, I explained, they had to build for themselves. The musical results in the second round showed a fine commitment from the interpreters The second day they began directly with playing. AUDIO SAMPLE 28 UNLV2006A This session shows simple interactivity based on direct imitation and an element that recurrently repeats itself a strong short attack as an attempt to build a structure. The tempo is slow and the music does not seem to gain momentum at any time. I proceeded with the introduction of concepts of ethos, logos, and pathos and their role in building the introduction, or exordium. This was followed by applying those principles into practice.
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AUDIO SAMPLE 29 UNLV2006B During the first 4 minutes of this session we can perceive that great care had been taken in building up the performance. There is an abundance of silences which points to their attention in listening to each other. After this, the music starts to develop carefully, presenting lots of interactivity at 06:45. New proposals happen at 08:00 in the percussion, and at 08:56 in the trombone. A return to the beginning seems to happen at 09:35, and what sounds like an epilogue begins at 11:00. If we now compare the first session (UNLV06A) with the recording of the concert there is with no doubt that the ensemble demonstrates deeper interactive processes, a more solid inner tempo, and more fluency of discourse, contrasting episodes and even humor. AUDIO SAMPLE G UNLV 2006 Closing concert AUDIO SAMPLE 30 Humour - UNLV2006 8.1.5 Centro Mexicano para la Msica y las Artes Sonoras (CMMAs) In April 2007 I conducted the FIM project at the CMMAs. This new center for sonic arts is situated in the city of Morelia, state of Michoacn, in an old monastery from the Spanish colonial period built in 1582. Among the participants: one accordionist, a guitar player, two percussionists, an electric guitar player, two guitar players, two dancers/actors playing objects. This project was composed by two sessions of 3 hours each. On the first day, I divided the group into several subgroups of two. From those subgroups, I have chosen one to demonstrate how it is difficult to free improvise when defined styles are followed. The first example shows the electric guitar player performing in the style of rock. The percussionist could not find room to play, or was unable to do so: AUDIO SAMPLE 31 CMMAS2007A
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Later in the same session, the guitarist performs sounds that are a bit more distant from a specific style. AUDIO SAMPLE 32 CMMAS2007B In this example it seems that there is more space given by the guitar player so that the percussionist was able to engage into some interactivity. After the duets, I presented the idea of isolating known materials and techniques and paying attention to the collective character of performing and to the ethics that this involved. This was followed by a session in tutti. I joined this session that had a duration of more than 27 minutes. The beginning reveals typical dynamics of the rhetorical introduction exordium: AUDIO SAMPLE 33 CMMAS2007C On the second day, however, ethics and care for collective creativity did not seem to work. The people playing a variety of objects (typewriter, megaphone, scissors, marbles, and paper) began to explore sounds that could be produced by hitting the floor, furniture and windows. Although the improvisation was loose and chaotic, it maintained a firm commitment to explore new ways of producing sound. Also, during almost 36 minutes, the preponderance of rhythmic regularity, absence of silences, and superficial imitation was very evident. It is very likely that these elements contributed to the lack of clarity, integration, and variety shown during this long session. Here is the whole recording. AUDIO SAMPLE 34 CMMAS2007D 8.1.6 University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB) At the invitation of Clarence Barlow I conducted a project at the UCSB in April 2007. Among the participants: two sax players, a violoncellist, two pianists, a percussionist, and an electric guitarist. The project was divided into sessions of two hours during three consecutive days and a closing concert in the evening of the last day.
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As in some of the previous projects, the result of the first session produced tonal music with strong hints of jazz. Rather than beginning by making them play in groups of two, as in some of the other projects, I asked everyone present to perform. I changed the strategy because it seemed to me possible that the observance of other colleagues improvising for the first time would interfere with the natural first engagement with the practice. The playing began with one of the pianists, who had previously affirmed very confidently that he had experience in free improvised music. His input was very much in the style of jazz and was followed by both sax players and the violoncello playing long notes. The guitar started to input some extended techniques followed by the violoncello in a shy manner. The pianos remained in the jazz mood throughout the whole session, which lasted about seven minutes. Next, I proceeded to present the strategy of isolating known instrumental techniques. This was followed by the performance of nine minutes of music. As in all previous projects, the group played a beginning that clearly exposed a rhetorical introduction (exordium). Possibly, the eagerness for exploring the unknown made the members perform with a complete absence of silences, paying little attention to the interactivity. However, a more cohesive interactivity began to appear towards the end. Next, the use of a diversity of silences (see 5.3.1.4) and the explanation of the concept of exordium was presented. Also, ideas about the use of a bigger palette of rhythms, densities and dynamics were communicated followed by a twelve-minute improvisation session. The result was a confident exordium, rich in silences and provocative uncertainties. Some conscious collective use of densities was played amongst several lost musical episodes. The concert was divided into two sections. First, the performers presented a set which I composed. The composition had no score but a verbal explanation of how to proceed. I explained that after the exordium, a climax should be reached in which the sound volume and density become saturated. After, following the idea of the refutatio, silences ought to appear together with a great variety of irregular rhythms. The rehearsal of this piece showed the tendency of having 215
doubt on when and at which speed to proceed to the climax. This was solved by adding the element that I called the waves. Following the waves, the performers should gain momentum by performing two crescendos before the crescendo which would end in the climax. In the recording, the first wave begins at around 6:40, the second at 7:45, and the third starts at 10:00 followed by the refutatio that begins at 12:20. The end follows the natural path of fading out after the refutatio. Here is the recording: AUDIO SAMPLE I UCSB1 Closing concert The second section of the concert presented the complete ensemble, including myself. For this set, no prior plan was presented. AUDIO SAMPLE J UCSB2 Closing concert 8.2 Lessons Learned
Revisiting the tools offered by rhetoric and applying them to evaluate the musical results of the projects has produced mixed results. I think that the connection between the concepts of the figures with the practice of FIM remains open for interpretation and further development. Some of the interpretations arrived at by this study are clear while other figures, when used in FIM, can be unclear. For example, while catabasis retains a strict and unquestionable interpretation as a descending musical passage and the musical representation of a climax is also indisputable, the difference between figures like dubidatio and interrogatio can become blurred. Other figures that are discussible are emphasis and exclamatio since both present the qualities of a musical superlative. Furthermore, another angle of rhetorical analysis that has revealed very interesting results is to focus on the groups dynamics through ethics. This can allow us to understand deeper levels of the collaboration intrinsic in this practice as well as an idea of the level of expertise of performers. It was also possible to bring to light many of the problems of consistency and balance by comparing some of the performers behaviours with rhetorical stylistic vices. The combination of both angles of rhetoric provides the possibility of gaining insight into the material and human 216
creative dynamics. One example of that is the analysis I made of the music recorded at the Dartington Summer Festival in the year 2000. In this recordings beginning, Evan Parker brings about the first concrete musical idea giving content to form by putting together sounds coming from the other three performers in the group. If we focus on this through a rhetorical angle, we could perceive that Parkers invention (inventio) was created through the assimilation (anaphora, mimesis) of material that was already present, which he transformed into a consistent musical phrase (eustathia390, emphasis, auxesis). The fact that he opted to listen to every musical contribution made by the other participants can also be regarded as ethical and in compliance with decorum. Last, listening to the recording it is clear that Parker thought very carefully about the right moment to start his invention, act that harmonises with the idea of kairos. We have to take into consideration that this kind of achievement might only be produced by an experienced improviser. On the other hand, inexperienced performers that disregard the group and resort to isolation have produced examples that unbalance the music and the ensemble to an extent that the music stops. We have actually two examples of this from the project at the University of So Paulo, in 2006, and from the University of California Santa Barbara, in 2007. The first case comes from a trombone player who at a point during the performance suddenly changes his musical behaviour from one that was in harmony with the ensemble to another which apparently had the objective of attracting more attention to his musical contribution by using a self-agrandising manner or a vice known rhetorically as bomphiologia. In the second, the performer responsible for unbalancing the ensemble was engaged in playing spoons in a way that could be rhetorically referred as the vices of bomphiologia, battologia, and homiologia. It is possible that the low musical expertise of most of the participants in the project at the CMMAs in Mexico might have contributed to the lack of integration and for the
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Promising constancy in purpose and affection. Silva Rhetorica on-line source. Accessed on 12/04/2007.
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unbalanced musical result. Another recurrent issue that is possibly typical of the young improviser is that in most of the projects silences were almost absent during the first two or three sets. Outside the music, the participants presented some concerns. At the UNLV the students showed some apprehension, even if in a joyful way, about what their colleagues would think about the presentation. The trombone player, who is also a composer, said, I am going to be cast out from the trombone department. The performers at the UNLV even asked me to elaborate an explanation for the public prior to the concert, which shows that they thought it necessary to prepare the audience in order to increase acceptance. The comments that students made during the projects were in general related to describing the sensations felt during the first musical session one that had no prior guide or presentation. It was described as an experience that was humbling, surprising, confusing, which provoked some degrees of shame, curiosity and even scepticism. None of the performers manifested any sort of undeterred excitement. Quite the contrary, there was always a sense of responsibility and an impetus for sharing and discussing ideas. I felt that the seriousness of the commitment represented at times a burden for the group. In those occasions, in order to refresh the ambience, I presented the possibility of giving to the music more humoristic qualities. The best example of humour in the projects was in my opinion the quotation of the Queen of the Nights aria "Der Hlle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen" from Mozarts opera The Magic Flute by the violoncellist during the performance of the final concert at the UNLV. It may be possible that the experience accumulated by directing the projects has taught me how to change status from teacher to coordinator in a more effective way. In the last project at the University of California Santa Barbara it seemed as if I had managed to achieve the role of co-participant already during the first day. It is important to note that this project presented the possibility of explaining aspects of rhetorical thought that in previous projects could not be presented due to a lack of time. At the UCSB it was feasible to give an idea of the whole classical structure of rhetoric while in other projects time and conditions 218
allowed me to refer just to the first and second divisions, exordium and narratio. Also in Santa Barbara, it was possible to apply a new experiment for structuring the music. During a session, I rehearsed the ensemble by giving the group some structural and intentional guidelines. The score was transmitted orally rather than in a written piece of paper. Another encouraging factor of this project was the enthusiasm of one of the performers for the study of rhetoric and its connection with music. Since then he has graduated from the UCSB and now follows studies in rhetoric at the University of Pittsburgh. After having conducted the projects, I am convinced that a fixed set of strategies cannot be applied to teaching FIM. It is necessary to develop a system that adapts to the technical and social circumstances of each group. However, I have learnt that the results that I have considered of inferior quality are generally produced either by the lack of proficiency or inflexibility of the performer.
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PART IV CONCLUSION
Results and Roads for the Future Now though we gladly leave to orators their classifying and do not even want to undertake precise investigation of how they are firmly grounded with their high, middle and low styles in the true art of classification; still our musical style cannot accrue any indisputable rules from such oratorical precepts: since music has many more parts than the art of poetry and oratory. Hence it is quite certain that a completely different product would result if one would carefully consider and precisely analyze everything. Johann Mattheson In a recent ISIM conference (International Society for Improvised Music), during December 14-17, 2007, in Chicago, the theme was Building Bridges: Improvisation as a Unifying Agent in Education, Arts and Society. The narrative of the event tells us that reflecting the melding of diverse cultures, ethnicities, disciplines, and ideas that shape society at large, todays musical world is increasingly characterised by creative expressions that transcend conventional style categories. Bennett Reimer, in the opening ceremony of the ISIM conference, told us how he believed that the music educational system was in need of reform. He asserted the importance of acknowledging all dimensions of intelligence, affirming that the physiological dimension of intelligence is universal. Intelligence, he said, develops in roles, personality and opportunity, and involves the body, the emotions, communal direction and the use of technology. The bottom line is that creativity is not different than intelligence which is the fundamental reason why Reimer thinks our actual music educational system is generally obsolete. During the three snowy days I spent at the conference in Chicago I had the chance to participate in round tables, paper presentations and music concerts. I believe that the changes brought by free improvisation and the use of computer technology in combination with the myriad of experiences that have been brought by the new concepts of time and space, present such a drastic change that meeting great resistance is 220
understandable. During the conference of ISIM, most of the directions and thought given to improvisation were permeated with principles of permanence in the form of exercises, formulae and ideas to make it fun and accessible to newcomers. Some of the music played during the event also reflected this preoccupation. It seems that at times people feel incapacitated to understand FIM for what it really is, building around it an array of recycled traditional concepts so that it becomes comfortable to understand. Free improvised music, as we have seen, it is not a practice that can be considered simple either to make or to listen. Since the observation has to go beyond the music that is being played into the observation of human interactivity, any system for coming close to its contents ought to take both levels into consideration. Rather than thinking about the future of improvisation, I think it would be a better strategy to surrender to change and let the multiplicity inherent in this practice help to build up human expressions through the paths it comes to meet in the course of development. During the years of research I spent at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague creating an electronic system to manipulate sounds through a bass recorder, I embraced improvisation as a tool to test and develop the interactive system of the instrument. Since then, the central areas of this study rhetoric and free improvisation have been very important in my development as a performer and have truly expanded the way I appreciate music as a whole. The great potential that I found in the connection between rhetoric and improvisation gave me the determination to develop it further, which I hope I have accomplished in this investigation. I sought they could produce a very harmonious hybrid system for better understanding the dynamics of this kind of music making, and also for the elaboration of guidelines for the inexperienced so that it could eventually become part of the curricula of music educational institutions. This research reveals that those who are dedicated to the performance of FIM can develop through experience the connection between the simultaneous creation of musical material and its inherent communication qualities intentionalities, meanings, etc. Although experience and the predisposition for change might by itself increase the chances of attaining tangible results, rhetoric 221
is an area of thought and practice that can help in understanding the organization of structures simultaneously with the concatenation of intentionalities. Rhetoric has been presented, tested and accepted in this investigation as an ad hoc area to assist in distinguishing successful and unsuccessful musical/interactive moments. Rhetoric facilitates distinguishing those moments, allowing the improviser to react more quickly to the musical environment. However, from this experience it is clear that rhetoric in connection with the practice of FIM is too large a subject to be thoroughly investigated in all its aspects in a single volume. This subject is very much in need of further academic and practical exploration in order to reveal the full potential of the application and elaboration of rhetorical figures, strategic aspects, the full depth of concepts such as kairos, decorum, res, verba, and the importance of memory and audiences. As we have seen, one of the qualities introduced by FIM is the expansion of the musical material brought by the extended acoustic instrumental techniques and the use of electronic technology. As a consequence, new ideas for organizing sequential musical events have to be developed. It must be clear that the great variety in improvised creation brings perhaps richness in material but also a more complicated manner of obtaining clarity in the delivery. Whilst there is more time available for organizing the music when dealing with few elements, playing with abundant amounts of material, which is part of the modus operandi of FIM, requires a different set of mind in order to deal with the risks and the exploration of dynamisms produced by coming closer to the edge of losing control. In that equation it is arguable that each improviser, or improvisation group, would profit from acknowledging that to explore fully the medium of FIM one should experiment in finding various balances between the use of a very broad palette of sounds in combination with different levels of intensity and control. It might be useful to engage in developing control of how much lack of control you want to achieve at different moments during the performance. FIM allows for the exploration of limits, which is possibly a very interesting strategy to follow since the exploration, if dealt with artistry, becomes a particular element of this way of making music. 222
This study has dealt with issues that conditioned the development of FIM. One of the characteristics that I have presented is that of freeing the interpreter from the constraints of musical composition. We should see that it is possible that in the process of emancipation the performer became somehow over-sensitive to issues that might represent constraints or signify oppression. As a consequence, any attempt to devise a system to approach FIM analytically risks being associated with limiting forces. One of the consequences of such a dogma may have influenced the development of a proper mode of discourse. A mode of criticism possibly will question individual musical decisions which, according to the dogma, are not supposed to be questioned but rather respected as they are. We have also seen that in the process of FIMs development radical thinking took place such as Baileys idea of non-idiomatic improvisation or Vinko Globokar considering improvisation only as pure when it is the result of the first time you improvise with someone. Supposedly, the factor of getting to know one another jeopardises the original stance, diminishing the natural collaboration of extemporizing through this kind of music. Taking a closer look at the issues that are involved in creating music collectively made me reflect on ways to present the importance of cultivating the angles of social experience. To build a discourse in FIM it is perhaps necessary to reflect on understanding the social issues inherent in this practice and at the same time the influence of those issues on the elaboration of content and its relation with form. Since this practice is considered by this study as one in which communication processes are inherent, content must be also intrinsic. However, we need to formulate modes of discourse that can address content and form developed cooperatively. Since existing models of examination do not seem to offer this potential, I have proposed using rhetoric because it is a field that deals with content and form simultaneously while, at the same time, it considers the influence of social relationships via concepts such as kairos and decorum. This study has also considered that rhetoric could be useful to devise proper models for teaching it. As much as FIM needs a suitable system for discourse, it also represents a paradigm of challenge for music education. Teaching FIM would 223
profit from the elaboration of a method of inquiry that takes the content and form into account, linked to the dynamics of social relations intrinsic in collective creation. With regard to the issue of teaching FIM, we have seen a diversity of approaches. Most of them I regard as too restrictive because they maintain the traditional relationship between pupil and teacher. This investigation defends the view that for establishing a method of teaching FIM, the role of the teacher has to be one that sponsors the natural development of issues through establishing a decorum that permits debate and heuristic discovery. One issue that I would like to clarify is the idea that the educated performer is inflexible during the initial stages of experiencing FIM. John Stevens, a pioneer in teaching improvisation, quoted in Baileys book On Improvisation, says, When somebody is a professional musician it often means that his involvement is a bit limited. To my mind come the numerous occasions I heard comments with respect to the inflexibility of educated musicians when confronted with improvisation. Probably, if there is something to blame, it is perhaps the methods used in some educational institutions that result in directions that are dogmatic and inflexible, as a consequence rendering the performer incapable of free improvisation. However, in the course of this investigation I came to see this problem from another perspective. I think we should examine the educated performers inflexibility by considering the questions: Why would a trained musician be less spontaneous if he deals with expressive mechanisms on a regular basis? Wouldnt it be more accurate to say that the inflexibility we witness in the early stages of free improvisation comes as result of aesthetic self-criticism and the new relation between the performer and his instrument? For the experienced musician, playing free improvised music for the first time is almost like learning a second instrument. The frustration and consequent stiffness that derives from it might come from the expectation of achieving consistency and failing to accomplish it. I think that it is natural for the experienced musician to deal with some frustration during the first experiences with FIM. The manifestations of these frustrations may come as a natural result in an environment where the 224
interpreter is involved for the fist time in formulating, organising and delivering the music by himself. Since this would not have existed if he had received any preparation prior to the activity, he feels unprepared and, at the same time, because he is a proficient musician, he still strives for accomplishing unity and balance and, by mostly failing to achieve it, he becomes frustrated. In order to look at it from a rhetorical perspective, we have to go back a bit and begin to analyse it from the characteristics of oratory. As I stated before, rhetoric was made part of the so-called Trivium together with dialectics and grammar. Dialectics is the philosophical side of rhetoric which deals with logical methods of cross-examination. Rhetoric is the pragmatic side that deals with objective presentation. We also have grammar which is the set of rules governing language. If we now make the analogy between oratory and music, vocabulary and grammar would be represented by a pre-formulated set of sounds and combinations of them respectively. However, in FIM neither are the sounds fixed nor the musical grammar set. As this study has shown, the relation between content and form in FIM is symbiotic and variable. So for the trained musician it is odd to get involved in an activity that puts him right in the middle of the field of music-making without the tools he would use in a normal situation. The trained performer taking his first steps into FIM has to manage the frustration of dealing with the ambiguity of having the expressive apparatus tuned and mature, and having to invent the ABC plus its grammar, with an instrument with which he used to perform with smoothness, grace and agility, but which now, because of a new concept of control, represents an obstacle. So we could expect that when the stage of becoming acquainted with this practice has passed, most certainly the performer will be capable of using his trained expressive apparatus plus his knowledge about music in general in the performance of FIM. It is relevant to note that in the project in which most of the participants were not proficient performers, at the CMMAs in Mexico, the results produced were inconsistent. The performers did not show enough dexterity in searching for extended instrumental techniques, and also my pedagogical guidelines failed to make the performers develop any skill in elaborating music as a collective. In 225
conclusion, we could also say that those who do not have their expressive mechanism matured by training and experience will not perform FIM as well as those who do. Although this seems a pretty obvious thing to say, I think it is a necessary statement because of some ideas I had come to learn which disregard the necessity of proficiency to achieve artistic quality in FIM. One recurrent issue in the projects was that those who manifested that they had experience in improvisation were normally those who engaged in long discussions on the subject. Coincidentally or not, I noted that these performers were amongst those who were paying too much attention to themselves, compromising their development inside the community. Although the re-interpretation of the musical-rhetorical figures represents a contribution in itself, this study demonstrates that the application of the existing musical-figures in FIM presents some inconsistencies. This is basically for two reasons. First, due to the fact that some figures are only useful for the application of rhetoric in composed forms of music such as cathachresis (successive sixthchord progressions), antistaechon (substitution of a consonance with a dissonance), fuga (fugue), etc. Second, as I have mentioned before, it is difficult to perceive the differences between, for instance, emphasis and exclamatio when these are applied in FIM. However, as I have said before, the reformulation and creation of new devices for the analysis of FIM remains a field to be explored. I have rather concentrated on presenting the idea of connecting rhetoric to free improvised music as a harmonious and very profitable combination for achieving better insights into its dynamics. More important than the presentation of a mature set of new figures are the deep concepts that connect the manner which performers use to construct the environment for the creation of this spontaneous musical art. Those deep concepts are represented by the ethical principles embedded in the notion of decorum. I now consider decorum to be the root of FIM. Knowing how to behave decorum in combination with when to act kairos signify the foundations upon which all the other elements are developed. We have seen the necessity of decorum for building the musical discourse collectively. Therefore, decorum ought to be created in an environment in which 226
egalitarian conditions exist. In teaching FIM I realised that the presence of the traditional figure of the teacher unbalances the decorum because the structure of the group is one that is commanded by one person rather than by the community. I cannot deny that my presence during the realisation of the projects exerted some influence. However, I tried to change my role from that of a teacher to one of a coordinator. The aim of this strategy was to allow the ensemble to acquire its own momentum in the search for expanding the music material (sounds, rhythms, silences) and developing an awareness of collective creation and intersubjective relations. So, at times I fulfilled the role of either a co-participant or just that of an observer or audience. After reframing rhetoric for the purposes of this investigation, I came to the conclusion that there has been a significant change in the purpose of rhetoric in its adaptation for its application in a discipline like FIM. FIM, in being a collaborative practice, has inherent dynamics of collective creation. If we compare the improvisatory practice of oratory to FIM, we should try to understand the differences between the individual qualities of the first and the cooperative dynamics of the second. Since persuasion is intrinsic in the practice of rhetoric, it is very important to understand how it changes when applied to the collective environment. Persuasion then, rather than aiming for the acceptance of a preconceived idea, might refer in FIM to the energies involved in the exploration and mutual inquiry, while performing in such a way that the audience engages in a parallel perception to that of sounds; the dynamics of personal engagement in the decorum of creative activity. I can conclude that to achieve a more holistic understanding in the observation of FIM, analysing the sonic results should be done parallel to the observation of the process involved in the musical interactivity. In the latter, it should be possible to observe the qualities of communication between the members in order to understand the character of the first. Although there is an obvious subjective variety in the reception, it may be said that to a certain extent members of a group and audiences can be persuaded to adopt a homogeneous angle of perception. The process fulfils itself only when both the intention and the reception are as solid as the circumstances allow for. 227
Today, it is common to encounter the combination of several branches of learning fields of expertise. Questions that had been central in the traditional disciplines are gradually being replaced or radically transformed. These transformations are mainly due to the technological developments that have affected practically every area of knowledge today. Chaos and indeterminacy theories in the sciences and mathematics plus the developments in technology and changes in travel and communication affect a general questioning of teleology (Lochhead (2002) p. 6.). We have also learned how time has been transformed with the use of computer technology. Together with time, the concept of space has also changed. Physical distances do not represent the same as they did in the past, since social and cultural distances have become dramatically shorter. These factors have had a strong influence on epistemological thought. Knowledge has ceased to be absolute and has become dependent on interpretation. Consequently, in the dynamics of thought based on non-absolute truth the act of perception has become a creative act. It does not take a great effort to identify the new role of audiences and the principle of creative reception in the practice of FIM. In FIM the creator and receiver together form the meaning. Roland Barthes essay, The Death of the Author (1977), for instance, locates the source of meaning from the author towards an interaction between the creator and the receiver (reader, listener, viewer), each of whom is understood as part of an intersubjective context that confers meaning (Lochhead (1992) p. 7.). We could say that because of the new concept of time, space and meaning, knowledge is dependent more on a process than on fixed concepts. We have seen that the process in FIM does not develop along pre-defined lines. As a result, a traditional notion of time, as a continuous and linear progression (chronos), is insufficient for the analysis of this practice, since it only marches forward in a predictable path; we must now articulate a qualitative sense of time represented by the concept of kairos. I am confident that the lines I have set out are in tune with those who think it necessary to develop this artistic field further by elaborating grounds upon which discussion can be promoted. Evan Parker, in the liner notes of the LP The 228
Topography of the Lungs, from 1970, acknowledges, We operate without rules (pre-composed material) or well-defined codes of behaviour (fixed tempi, tonalities, serial structures etc.), and yet are able to distinguish success from failure. In this aspect, I hope that this study represents a contribution to the discussion of the conditions and characteristics that result in either failure or success in FIM. For it must be clear that if a common agreement on those qualities can exist, it this must be based on something that people can share and that can be, to a certain extent, communicated verbally. One of the characteristics of FIM is that it brings an inherent drive for change. As I have argued earlier, change frequently meets a contrary force which holds onto tradition and values of permanence. And, since those changes are happening very rapidly, perhaps even those who a few years ago were considered the avant-garde have now become reluctant to accept or most possibly incapable of understanding FIM in its full context and importance. One controversial issue in FIM might be the fact that never before in Western music was the interpreter cut loose completely from the idea of the composer as the creator. This may be a sensitive matter for those who regard the realisation of musical invention in improvised practices not as serious as in music composition. As I have said earlier, commercial business still depends on the existence of the artist-centred performance as an object of adulation, and there is (still) no business potential in exposing an egalitarian, democratic, ethical, collaborative manner of creating music such as FIM. However, I have witnessed through my experiences as improviser, people learning how to value and understand FIM. In this regard, I hope that the contribution I have made through this study encourages a positive debate so that this practice can spread the music it creates together with its intrinsic values of justice, democratic relationships, pluralism, and that it helps to restore the natural connection between performers and audiences, which due to egocentrism, individualism and monetary interests that profit from the artists adulation, has deteriorated. Analysing the Seconda Prattica and the contemporary movement called Historically Informed Performance (HIP) Haynes accepts that it would be 229
pointless to force the analogy between them too far. He considers that the similarity between both practices is striking because of qualities such as the rejection of the dominant style and the resort to history (Haynes (2007) p.122.) However, Hayness concern with not carrying the analogy too far seems to be well put. Whilst HIP moves forward with the preoccupation of recreating the style and thought of rhetorical music, the Seconda Prattica believed it was recovering a tradition that had been lost in antiquity, but there was no intention in restoring any particular style of making music. If we now think of FIM, we could also draw significant similarities with the Seconda Prattica. Like FIM, the Seconda Prattica radically rejected the mainstream. We could also consider that FIM seems not to have emerged as a rejection of the dominant style but as a reaction to the domination of the performer by the score and that somehow it is not only concerned with the future but also intrinsically willing to restore the past by trying to bring back the natural connection of the performers expressive apparatus. Perhaps Monteverdi was not intending to create such a great stylistic shock. Perhaps he was only endeavouring to create new music moderna musica because the change presented itself as inevitable. Perhaps the implications of the Seconda Prattica were unintentional. The full significance of free improvised music is still unrevealed and it will probably mean a transformation in the manner we create and perceive music in the future.
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11 APPENDIX 11.1 AUDIO SAMPLES DVDR

A. Modulus II 2004 Improvisation Project at the Royal Conservatory, The Hague. Aslaug Holgersen (contrabass), Krista Vincent (piano), Diego Espinosa (percussion), Julien Chauvin (violin), Johan van Kreij (electronics), Juan Parra (electronics). Direction: Cesar Villavicencio. 18:46 B. Dartington 2000 The Meta-Orchestra Hypermusic and the Sighting of Sound. Evan Parker (sax soprano), Cesar Villavicencio (e-recorder), Clo Palacio-Quintin (flute and electronics), Hilary Jeffery (trombone and electronics). 07:41 C. The Hague 2002 Cesar Villavicencio (e-recorder), Hilary Jeffery (trombone), Diego Espinosa (percussion). 06:20 D. Belfast 2005 Sonorities Festival. Simon Waters (feedback flute), Cesar Villavicencio (erecorder). 08:13 E. UCSD1 2007 William Brent (Laptop), Jason Ponce (Laptop), Jonathan Piper (Tuba), Joe Bigham (e-guitar), David Borgo (EWI), Cesar Villavicencio (Tenor recorder). 13:31 F. USP 2005 Closing concert. 11:05
G. UNLV 2006 Closing concert. 09:50 H. UCSD2 2007 William Brent (Laptop), Jason Ponce (Laptop), Jonathan Piper (Tuba), Joe Bigham (e-guitar), David Borgo (EWI), Cesar Villavicencio (Tenor recorder). 08:51 I. J. UCSB1 2007 Closing concert. 16:12 UCSB2 2007 Closing concert. 26:15
11.2 AUDIO SAMPLES CDR 1

1- Hypotyposis J S Bach Matthew Passion, BWV 244 NR. 11 Recitative. La Petite Bande, Gustav Leonhardt, 1990 BMG MUSIC.CD1 Track 11. 2- Aria : Erbarme Dich J Bach Matthew Passion, BWV 244 La Petite Bande, Gustav Leonhardt, 1990 BMG MUSIC.CD2 Track 10. 3- Anaphora G. Ph. Telemann Quator in E minor for flute, violin, violoncello & b.c. Musica Amphion, Pieter-Jan Belder,2003 Brilliant Classics. CD4 Track 9. 4- Anaphora UCSD1, 2007. 5- Antithesis Modulus II, 2004. 6- Antithesis C Ph E Bach Symphony for strings No.5 Wq. 182 in B minor. Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Gustav Leonhardt, 1990 Virgin Veritas. CD1 Track 13. 7- Regressio Norwich, AMM at UEA Eddie Prvost and John Tilbury, 2005 Matchless Recordings Track 1. 8- Anabasis J S Bach Mass in B minor Collegium Vocale, Philippe Herreweghe, 1998 Harmonia Mundi CD2 Track 6. 9- Anabasis Modulus II, 2004 Royal Conservatory, The Hague. 10- Bombus Dartington 2000 Devon. 11- Catabasis USP 2005 So Paulo.
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12- Aposiopesis 1 UNLV 2006 Las Vegas. 13- Aposiopesis 2 UNLV 2006 Las Vegas. 14- Memoria Norwich, AMM at UEA Eddie Prvost and John Tilbury, 2005 Matchless Recordings Track 1. 15- Exordium J S Bach Mass in B minor Collegium Vocale, Philippe Herreweghe, 1998 Harmonia Mundi CD2 Track 1. 16- Exordium Modulus II, 2004 Royal Conservatory, The Hague. 17- Exordium Dartington 2000 Devon. 18- Bomphiologia UCSB 2007 Santa Barbara. 19- Homiologia Dartington 2000 Devon. 20- Distributio Modulus II, 2004 Royal Conservatory, The Hague. 21- Peroratio Modulus II, 2004 Royal Conservatory, The Hague. 22- Exordium 1 USP 2005, So Paulo. 23- Exordium 2 USP 2005, So Paulo. 24- Climax USP 2005, So Paulo. 25- Catabasis USP 2005, So Paulo. 26- USP 2006 A, So Paulo. 27- USP 2006 B, So Paulo. 28- UNLV 2006, Las Vegas. 29- UNLV 2006, Las Vegas. 30- Humor UNLV 2006, Las Vegas. 31- CMMAs 2007 A , Morelia. 32- CMMAs 2007 B, Morelia. 33- CMMAs 2007 C , Morelia. 34- CMMAs 2007 D , Morelia.
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11.3 AUDIO SAMPLES CDR2

1- Daniel Landau. COR (Composition Organ Recorder) (1998) 2- Erik Stalenhoef. Yidaki (1998)
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11.4
Daniel Landau COR (Composition Organ Recorder) (1998).
COR is a piece realized after a long process of exploring and developing these two bizarre instruments: The MIDI-Recorder and a midi controlled microtonal organ. These instruments carry a long tradition of baroque music which made the challenge and motivation even greater in incorporating this acoustical signatures into our current technological environment.
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11.5 Erik Stalenhoef YIDAKI (1998). Yidaki is the Australian aboriginal word for didgeridoo. The piece is based on the sounds of this instrument and the mentality of the aboriginal people. Their concept of time and space is incomprehensible to us. Time and space are nonlinear and much related to each other. This means that what happens now will always be related to the place where it happened, and not to the time when event is taking place. Eventually this will drive a western mind into chaos, while the aboriginal soul accepts the chaos as part of the dream that is time and space. The piece is collaboration more than a composition and is especially written for Cesar Villavicencio.
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11.6 Cesar Villavicencio MODULUS II (2004).
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11.7 Aria: Erbarme Dich, Johann Sebastian Bach
244
245

Villavicencio, C. (2008) - The Discourse of Free Improvisation. A Rhetorical Perspective On Free Improvised Music (Doctoral Dissertation, PHD Thesis.

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Villavicencio, C. (2008) - The Discourse of Free Improvisation. A Rhetorical Perspective On Free Improvised Music (Doctoral Dissertation, PHD Thesis.

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The Discourse of Free Improvisation

A Rhetorical Perspective on Free Improvised Music

Cesar Marino Villavicencio

School of Music, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK

Th e Disco urs e of F ree Im p ro visati on

Ces ar Villavi cen cio

Th e Disco urs e of F ree Im p ro visati on

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Current Limits of the Discourse in FIM ....................................................................... 76 4.1 Concluding Observations....................................................................................... 83

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5.3.1.1 5.3.1.2 5.3.1.3 5.3.1.4 5.3.1.5 5.4 5.5

How Rhetoric Addresses the Unspoken in FIM ........................................................ 158

7.1.1 7.1.2 7.1.3 7.2 7.3 8

8.1.1.1 8.1.2 8.1.3

Universidade de So Paulo (USP)............................................................... 207 Universidade de So Paulo II (USPII) ........................................................ 210

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8.1.4 8.1.5 8.1.6 8.2

Lessons Learned ................................................................................................... 216

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PART I CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

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Lydia Goehr (1992) p. 180.

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Jorgensen (1997) xiv.

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Th e Disco urs e of F ree Im p ro visati on

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Dewey (1934) p. 48.

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FIM and Social Dynamics

Smith & Dean (1997) p. 16.

Hoffmann (2005) p.35. Lochhead (2002) p. 6.

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Smith & Dean (1997) p. 4.

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