Improvisation Examples and Timeline

In preparation for the International Society for Improvised Music conference in Switzerland next week and in advance of my article in the August edition of The Choral Journal, I will link some improvisation samples below.

Timeline of Improvisation at UNCG:

Fall 2012 – Improvisation with small groups in conducting classes.

Spring 2013 - Improvisation with The Josquin Project. Development of improvisation sequence.

Fall 2013 – Introduction of sequence to large ensembles. Performance with groups of 4 or 5 singers improvising together. Programmed as part of a concert centered on play.

Spring 2014 – Continued growth. Improvisation in an extended performance with the Women’s Glee Club, juxtaposing chants of Hildegard von Bingen with free improvisation. University Chorale improvised in performance in response to segments of poetry. 

Fall 2014  - Improvisation in rehearsal. Greater freedom from all singers immediately. No improvisation in performance.

Spring 2015 – Mixing modes: University Chorale performance blending improvisation with written music of Randall Thompson. Incorporated instrumentalists, explored solo and small ensemble improvisation with large ensemble improvisation.

The structure of our improvisation was initially as follows. For examples, please click on the links.

Opening Improvisation

The Light of Stars

     Improvisation A

         Solo

         Trio

         Piano/Violin

         Quartet

         Ensemble

Two Worlds

     Improvisation B

        Solo

        Ensemble

        Piano/Violin

        Solo    

        Ensemble
The Happy Shore

In performance, the structure did not adhere strictly to the outline. The full performance will be available soon.

Time

“In improvisation, there is only one time – The time of inspiration, the time of technically structuring and realizing the music, the time of playing it, and the time of communicating with the audience, as well as ordinary clock time, are all one. Memory and intention and intuition are fused.”

---Stephen Nachmanovitch, Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art

I am currently in Amsterdam, exploring the improvisation techniques used by Thomas Johannsen and The Genetic Choir. While this weekend's workshop will focus on rhythm, I attended a workshop yesterday focused on writing about improvisation. This is a timely topic as I continue to collate my thoughts on improvisation work with my choir as well as my own work with Collapss. 

The workshop attendees were a small group of women, many of them dancers, and was led by Thomas. We approached writing about improvisation through factual, descriptive, and non-linear means by improvising together and writing about our experience.

After warming up through a series of improvisations that explored the concept of phrase, we broke up into groups of four. One group improvised while the other observed and then we wrote about our experiences. I should emphasize that these improvisations incorporated dance, theater, and some vocalization, depending on the background of the performers. The improvisation in which I participated was primarily dance.

Many themes arose in our writing and discussion, but one that stood out to me was the concept of time. As Nachmanovitch mentions in the quote above, there is only one "time" in improvisation where the work unfolds through intention, memory, and intuition.  I suggest that within this one time exists many different "times" of each performer and that this is different from the "time" perceived by the observer. 

An observer wrote in my notebook: "Time. I like time. I like having time to watch and see. Time to let what I see arrive. Very little action is needed, yet I realize I am looking at strong performers. Their presence fills the space before any action". 

There are so many elements of time described here:

-presence which fills time

-action within time

-time to watch and see

-time to let what she sees arrive

This sense of time is so different from the "time" and "timing" of a performer. One of the performers in the same improvisation commented about listening to the phrases of the other performers and waiting for the right moment to add. She timed the beginning and ending of each phrase, sensing movement and listening, so that the time of her entrance would add rather than interrupt. 

The multi-layered nature of time is fascinating. There is only one time, but each of us can lose time, stretch time, speed up time, suspend time within the same performance. How do our perceptions of time affect each other in performance? Do those perceptions affect the audience in a perceptible way? Does time have energy? Do our experiences of time create energy?

I would love your thoughts on time in the comments below!

Improvisation for Scaredy Cats

Welcome!

I have been on a journey with improvisation ever since being introduced to the writings of Stephen Nachmanovitch in 2012 as a dear friend was finishing her (amazing) dissertation on play theory and musical analysis. Improvisation was always such a mystery to me. Those who had the skill were wizards...geniuses...something I could admire but never create myself.

I am a classically trained musician with no prior (intentional) experience with improvisation until I started exploring these concepts with small ensembles like The Josquin Project. These explorations helped form a sequence which I then used with my large ensembles during the 2013-2014 academic year. The process was extremely exciting! We made "beautiful" sounds, "ugly" sounds, non-western sounds, non-vocal sounds, long sounds, short sounds, and as many sounds as our imaginations would create. For an in depth look at the process and the results, including the sequence used, check out the August 2015 Choral Journal.

This blog will document some of the experiences my ensembles had over the 2014-2015 academic year as well as serve as a way to disseminate information gathered during continued research in this area including work with The Genetic Choir, the International Society for Improvised Music, and the experimental music group Collapss.

This is a journey I never anticipated. I am thrilled to share it with you!