Improvisation

I'm not sure I agree with you there Toddler (meh, I wish I knew your real name, I dislike talking to people through their screen persona's), then I'm not fully sure I understand you completely, or whether I'm even on the same page. Improvisation either works or it doesn't regardless of any cultural references or context - urban settings are no less restricting or open to improv than rural ones - the whole hip-hop rap culture is based upon improvisation, techno and rave was improvised, even line-dancing is improvised. It works or it doesn't is a judgement made by the audience in real-time, we can record it and listen back at our leisure to nit-pick and over analyse direction and knowing references and argue over an unresolved note being a technical mistake or an artistic inflection, but at the time the audience got into it or got bored, no other immediate analysis ensues - you liked it or you didn't. Sure the audience may be knowledgeable enough to pick-up a musical reference as it happens and that will be either acknowledged as a direct connection ("Oh, yeah, that's like from Freebird maann.. cool" - nod appreciatively, holding lit lighters aloft, air-guitar soloing as they went), or ignored as irrelevant ("¬_¬") or dismissed as cliché ("Oh maann, not Freebored again"). How the performers decide whether it works or it doesn't is entirely up to them, they know what they're playing and they (should) know how the audience is responding. If there is an improvised solo in the middle of a set piece then it must entertain or it has no reason to prolong the agony - showboating has to be entertaining, and not just for the spectacle - the purpose of any performance, whether strictly orchestrated or completely improvised, is essentially to entertain the audience - even if that goes spectacularly wrong - we love to see them fall flat on their faces as much as we dig a show of self-indulgence (and the line between one and the other is often so narrow that it can't be seen until it's too late). There is a trade-off between indulging yourself and indulging the audience - if both are in step then all's well, when they are not is it the audiences expectation or the performer's that is at fault? Common sense says it's a bit of both, if it isn't then both are at the wrong gig.

Dean wrote: I'm not sure I agree with you there Toddler (meh, I wish I knew your real name, I dislike talking to people through their screen persona's), then I'm not fully sure I understand you completely, or whether I'm even on the same page. Improvisation either works or it doesn't regardless of any cultural references or context....I am merely making reference to the life of a musician. It's a little off topic, but since improvisation is an aspect to music that the audience reacts to , either positive or negative, much of the growth the audience needs to experience regarding improvisation is important to the arts. A person may be disgusted/jaded over a solo and they become discouraged over the entire record and regret the download or purchase. Ten years later ...after their brain develops in sophisticated areas which inspires them to investigate different walks of life, they will once again hear that particular recording at a friend's house and feel very confused as to why they may have reacted harshly at first. Now ..they want to purchase the recording again. That is a kind of growth expansion in society which is difficult to pin-point regarding the psychological patterns of it. Since improvisation is often misunderstood as much as it's understood, it creates an extreme mixed bag of opinions/emotional reactions/insults from your audience. The audience is very important and as a experienced composer/musician you must respect them and have love in your heart for them.   If there is an abundance of people who like your music , but dislike certain aspects of it...it will not hurt you, the musician/composer..or your ego..to give in just enough to please your fans. Maybe...they will understand later in life..(as I said before), you have to be concerned with the impression you leave with your audience . It is a job of a musician/composer to please the audience. Personal preferences or tastes in music of each individual in the audience is a seperate issue. It doesn't have too much significance when naturally most music fans change their opinion on music as they grow older. That's why it's important to reach your audience. As an artist...you may be misunderstood for a few years and then one day..people have an interest in you. That's basically the audience growing and if you are a very talented composer, it's a very good deed in working towards people hearing your music. It's a difficult goal, but a good deed as some people may be socially healed from your music. They can control their anger issues after listening to your music.         - urban settings are no less restricting or open to improv than rural ones - the whole hip-hop rap culture is based upon improvisation, techno and rave was improvised, even line-dancing is improvised. It works or it doesn't is a judgement made by the audience in real-time, we can record it and listen back at our leisure to nit-pick and over analyse direction and knowing references and argue over an unresolved note being a technical mistake or an artistic inflection, but at the time the audience got into it or got bored, no other immediate analysis ensues - you liked it or you didn't. Sure the audience may be knowledgeable enough to pick-up a musical reference as it happens and that will be either acknowledged as a direct connection ("Oh, yeah, that's like from Freebird maann.. cool" - nod appreciatively, holding lit lighters aloft, air-guitar soloing as they went), or ignored as irrelevant ("¬_¬") or dismissed as cliché ("Oh maann, not Freebored again"). How the performers decide whether it works or it doesn't is entirely up to them, they know what they're playing and they (should) know how the audience is responding. If there is an improvised solo in the middle of a set piece then it must entertain or it has no reason to prolong the agony - showboating has to be entertaining, and not just for the spectacle - the purpose of any performance, whether strictly orchestrated or completely improvised, is essentially to entertain the audience - even if that goes spectacularly wrong - we love to see them fall flat on their faces as much as we dig a show of self-indulgence (and the line between one and the other is often so narrow that it can't be seen until it's too late). There is a trade-off between indulging yourself and indulging the audience - if both are in step then all's well, when they are not is it the audiences expectation or the performer's that is at fault? Common sense says it's a bit of both, if it isn't then both are at the wrong gig.  Very true!   [A friend of mine formed a power-trio that he used to showcase his guitar skills (he played in several bands, including a dixieland jazz ensemble - any gig that would allow him to play and learn was a valid gig as far as he was concerned) - they'd play instantly recognisable covers of all genres simply so he could do what he loved - play the guitar. People went to his shows to see him play and the two other guys knew this, that was the nature of the gig. While the entire performance was a demonstration of his enjoyment in playing guitar, during a rendition of the Sesame Street theme tune (tv themes were a regular part of the set) he'd go off on an extended guitar solo and the drummer and bass-player would tag-along for the ride for the first five minutes, then the bassman would look to the drummer, put down his bass and head to the bar; a few minutes later the drummer would follow suit; they'd grab a brew and join the audience, sat cross-legged on the floor watching him entertain the masses with his fretboard dexterity and masterly study of the pentatonic scales; when they'd had enough they'd rejoin him onstage and continue where they'd left off, finally bringing the song to a conclusion with "Today's show was brought to you by the letter 4" (or similar, 'twas never the same twice). And the crowd went wild... I've seen that solo last for nigh-on 20 minutes on some nights (on a good night), if the audience was into it, on other nights it would barely last 5 and the bassman and drummer would miss-out on their half-time tipple.]   Interesting.   I'm not even convinced there is a cultural separation between improvisation and composed pieces on a social level either (high status vs low status music) - vis-à-vis between the sight-reading of the classically trained over the playing-by-ear of the self-taught musician - the former is capable of improvisation because that is part of the theory of music and historically was part of any orchestral piece, ad libitum is a classical music term that we use now as "ad-lib" - cadenza was a note to the soloist to let-rip with the improvisation - a directive to showboat that people like Paganini took to heart (it's only since the advent of recording has classical music become so rigid and definitive) and a self-taught musician can be just as restricted by what he has learnt as we perceive any classically trained musician to be - 16-bar blues becomes a constraint - verse and chorus must have four lines, it must be played in a minor key, modulation only permitted is between accepted keys, etc.

TODDLER wrote: ....I am merely making reference to the life of a musician. It's a little off topic, but since improvisation is an aspect to music that the audience reacts to , either positive or negative, much of the growth the audience needs to experience regarding improvisation is important to the arts. A person may be disgusted/jaded over a solo and they become discouraged over the entire record and regret the download or purchase. Ten years later ...after their brain develops in sophisticated areas which inspires them to investigate different walks of life, they will once again hear that particular recording at a friend's house and feel very confused as to why they may have reacted harshly at first. Now ..they want to purchase the recording again. That is a kind of growth expansion in society which is difficult to pin-point regarding the psychological patterns of it. Since improvisation is often misunderstood as much as it's understood, it creates an extreme mixed bag of opinions/emotional reactions/insults from your audience. The audience is very important and as a experienced composer/musician you must respect them and have love in your heart for them.   If there is an abundance of people who like your music , but dislike certain aspects of it...it will not hurt you, the musician/composer..or your ego..to give in just enough to please your fans. Maybe...they will understand later in life..(as I said before), you have to be concerned with the impression you leave with your audience . It is a job of a musician/composer to please the audience. Personal preferences or tastes in music of each individual in the audience is a seperate issue. It doesn't have too much significance when naturally most music fans change their opinion on music as they grow older. That's why it's important to reach your audience. As an artist...you may be misunderstood for a few years and then one day..people have an interest in you. That's basically the audience growing and if you are a very talented composer, it's a very good deed in working towards people hearing your music. It's a difficult goal, but a good deed as some people may be socially healed from your music. They can control their anger issues after listening to your music.

I judge music with my ears not my eyes - what a rock journalist says about a style of music is their opinion not mine - we take what we read to reinforce our predelictions, preconceptions and personal preferences - if a hack journo says something complimentary about something I like or something negative about something I dislike then that bolsters my own opinion, if we disagree then that also strengthens my opinion - it is unlikely they would ever change or affect my opinion. The simple observation that we are here talking about Progressive Rock 30 years after the rock-press's backlash against it is proof positive of that - those of us who liked Prog in the 70s are still here liking Prog in the 21st century irregardless of what the bandwagon-jumpers of the 1980s were saying.

 

Improvisation has it's place - bands like Pink Floyd and Van der Graaf Generator would not have produced the magnificent set-peices they did without improvisation even when that improvisation was in a recording studio or infront of a live audience. With Floyd we see that "in real time" with the development of songs like Astronomy Domine or Set The Controls from Pschedelic Rock studio recordings to Progressive Rock live recording and the expansion of the live The Son of Nothing into the studio version as Echoes and we can see the 4 minute Embryo develop into a 20+ minute live jam that eventually went nowhere. As I implied before with improvisation in classical music, once someone records a (popular or sucessful) version of a cadenza or ad libitum to a piece of classical composition, it becomes the definative version - subsequent recordings and renditions tend to replicate that improvisation rather than create one anew, and so it is with rock music (in the main ... I'm not sure whether Amon Düül II's epic Yeti improvisation was ever performed the same twice, we only have the studio album version to go by).

TODDLER wrote:    It was such a "cut-throat" scene in the 70's when I played in Prog cover bands. All the bands were squeezing original songs into their acts and playing covers of Prog was a means of gaining the respect of a huge following of Prog during that time. If you continued the path and exceeded your expectations , you would find yourself opening for Prog acts in theatres of the U.S.  If the headliner disliked your band because the musicians in it were more seasoned, they would tip the sound tech and request the tech to clutter the sound with echo, muffle all lead guitar solos, produce the drums to sound like cardboard boxes, produce phony and intentional feedback sounds through the P.A. of the most offensive nature to the audience's ears...while your band was performing. I'm sorry to say, but back in 1978...very few people knew it was a sabatoge of the most horrific magnitude and simply assumed your band was horrible. It's very moronic and disappointing for only a minority of audience members to read between the lines and as a result defend your position. Unfortunately..over decades a majority of people dislike improvisation due to a stunt like that. It lacks glory , it's cowardly, but it brainwashes the average listener into believing the false side of the particular event/show.

I have experienced this too often to dismiss it as co-incidence, though I don't know the real reason for it - I too have always assumed it was something to do with the headline act (management, sound techs/engineers, whoever) not wanting to be upstaged by the support act rather than professional jealousy. Too many times has the sound level and sound quality has taken a significant jump from support to headline that (as someone who understands these things from a technical aspect) the cause is obviously the result of deliberate intent rather than the support band being bad. Having said that, as a once promoter of live gigs I have experienced bands who couldn't be arsed to sound check before going on stage ("We don't need a sound-check, we're a plug and play band" ...) leaving the sound engineer to wing-it, tweaking the sound has they played - this phenomenon is easily recognisable because the overall sound will improve as the band plays (assuming the sound engineer was worth his salt) - I would never permit the band I managed to do that - I insisted that they "hit the ground running" and that required a good sound-check before going on stage to get the levels right. Having sat through many sound checks I know the dramatic difference a small amount of EQ can make to a drum sound or guitar tone, then I also know that room acoustics change when people are added, but that does not account for the drastic improvement in sound heard when the main act starts playing.

 

I suspect you are right and people are swayed by this subterfuge - too many times do you read "I saw band X support band Y and they were horrible" .. sad really.

moshkito wrote: Dean wrote: moshkito wrote: It's the veritable STAFF banging on the ground in "Amadeus" ... or nowadays ... even worse ... the DAW! What does this even mean? I mean literally and semantically btw, not  philosophiocally or ideologically or metahysically or any of that make-it-up-as-you-go-along drivel. The staff, the fun example you can use from the film ... is the meter ... you have to follow it, and stay on it ... that is ... so to speak ... the academic view, and in this case ... the poopular view ... which has a tendency to hurt new forms of music and you know that!

Dean wrote:   moshkito wrote: There is no "implicit knowledge" in the design and work of a "raga", for example, WHEN IT HITS, though more than likely the player will start with a theme, and the idea is to lose it and become so tied to the music itself that the "notes" become invisible, and you just sit there and appreciate the music coming, and this is NOT the classical music appreciation society counting every note and every this and that and telling you that you don't know what the iambic pentameter is all about (no kidding! btw!).   And all I ask is you explain that one effing phrase. What does Iambic Pentameter have to do with classical music appreciation?   Come on. Be reasonable and help me understand what you typed - help me understand the words you wrote,   I know what Iambic Pentameter is. I understand what it is and how it works. I also have some knowledge of music theory and classical music and yes, I understand that too to some degree. All I want to know is what you think that connection is. That's all. No personal attack, no ridicule. Serious enquiry.

Edited by moshkito - September 07 2013 at 15:11

I'd like to hear an improvised piece of iambic pentameter. Solo, in the middle of a jam. And use rhyme royale, please.

Dean wrote: The Dark Elf wrote: I'd like to hear an improvised piece of iambic pentameter. Solo, in the middle of a jam. And use rhyme royale, please. That's one for the rap boys - the ta-dum beat (dubstep) and double couplet at the end of each stanza would suit rap quite well I think.

Rapped by none other than Will-i-ambic.

The Dark Elf wrote: Dean wrote: The Dark Elf wrote: I'd like to hear an improvised piece of iambic pentameter. Solo, in the middle of a jam. And use rhyme royale, please. That's one for the rap boys - the ta-dum beat (dubstep) and double couplet at the end of each stanza would suit rap quite well I think. Rapped by none other than Will-i-ambic.

nice  

The Dark Elf wrote: Dean wrote: The Dark Elf wrote: Dean wrote: The Dark Elf wrote: I'd like to hear an improvised piece of iambic pentameter. Solo, in the middle of a jam. And use rhyme royale, please. That's one for the rap boys - the ta-dum beat (dubstep) and double couplet at the end of each stanza would suit rap quite well I think. Rapped by none other than Will-i-ambic. nice   In lieu of applause, please be so kind as to interpret Moshkito's posts instead.

Must I?

The Dark Elf wrote: Dean wrote: The Dark Elf wrote: Dean wrote: The Dark Elf wrote: Dean wrote: The Dark Elf wrote: I'd like to hear an improvised piece of iambic pentameter. Solo, in the middle of a jam. And use rhyme royale, please. That's one for the rap boys - the ta-dum beat (dubstep) and double couplet at the end of each stanza would suit rap quite well I think. Rapped by none other than Will-i-ambic. nice   In lieu of applause, please be so kind as to interpret Moshkito's posts instead. Must I? Yes, I am afraid you must. There is a codicil at the end of the Prog Archives Site Administration Agreement (fourth line from the bottom, in miniscule Carolingian script) that states, and I quote: Any posts of an obscure, illegible or eccentric nature, including hieroglyphics, run-on sentences, walls of text and treatises of new-age philosophical meandering best read in a haze of patchouli oil whilst wearing a t-shirt embossed with the likenesses of Alan Ginsberg, René Magritte, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jim Morrison or Carlos Castaneda, must be deciphered for the edification and education of the Prog-Archive users at large by said Site Administrator, within reason and dependent on whether or not it is complete gibberish or spam, until death do you part. Amen.

Fairy snuff. If you insist.