# Improvisation in classical music



## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

There is possibly some ancient thread on this topic, but I'm not up for a search. I personally am fascinated with the idea of improvisation. I think that classical music has a variety of styles that would be interesting to use to improvise. So far, the only classical improv I've heard apart from talents like Gabriella Montero, the famous pianist, has been wimpy, overly tonal, bland and lacking in good music theory. I'm taking a basic music theory course right now and am learning about four part harmony and for my own purposes, I'm experimenting on the piano with the things I've picked up on in the class. I've been getting more and more interesting results as the weeks have gone by. 

Improvisation was common in the baroque classical eras, just a part of being a musician. Bach was great at it, as was Beethoven. What if, after the baroque, the classical era musicians took it a step further in their liberation of the deliberate high baroque style and through eastern influences devised a school of improvising classical music in ensembles, like Indian Music or Jazz? Why can't there be chamber ensembles in this day and age that train for eleven years like they do in India to be able to perform freely quality music of an interested aesthetic(possibly new)that is 90% improvisation or higher? There can be, but it probably won't ever be the next big thing. 

Hope this gets some discussion going. What do you think of improvisation? Do you think it should be practiced more in conjunction with the classical tradition in this age(perhaps not so extreme as my fantasy, but still practiced?)? Why are organists the only ones would seem to be able to improvise anymore? Maybe I should be an organist...


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## Tapkaara (Apr 18, 2006)

As you mentioned, improvisation was used widely up until the Baroque. As things became more and more standardized (notation, instruments of the orchestra) certainly improvison because less possible...and I guess less desired.

I fell improvisation is appropriate in music traditions where it is deemed, well, appropriate. I wouldn't mind hearing it in a baroque piece, I bguess, but if someone started improving in the middle of a Sibelius tone poem, for example, that would be completely out of line. My stomach would turn if someone started improvising with the cor anglais in the Swan of Tuonela!!

Personally, I am not a fan of improvisation. If someone is talented at it, they can do good things, but there is a heck of a lot of bad improv, too; it just sounds like noise. Again, it could be fun to hear such a thing in baroque music because it was most certainly a part of that tradition. But it seems as notation and orchestras were standardized, improvisation was deemed less and less undesirable, hence its ultimate (de facto) elimination.


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## regressivetransphobe (May 16, 2011)

One thing that always drew me to Bach is that to me, much of his music seems to carry the spirit of improvisation. I think it's great, but improvisation in the classical world these days will probably always be limited to the context of jazz musicians approaching classical material and then passing it off as strictly jazz, like Loussier.


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## Iforgotmypassword (May 16, 2011)

I'm by no means an impressive musician, but I honestly improvise more than I play composed music nowadays. I've played violin my whole life and I just find it the most enjoyable many times to just pick up the instrument and let the music come out. Honestly this may be a bit of a weakness for me because it means I never actually get any constructive practicing done anymore. I love it though, even if I need to balance it out more.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

^^^^^^^^
I agree, I find improvisation more enjoyable than memorizing and playing pieces or site reading(which I can't do very well anyway). The better I've gotten at it, the more music theory I've learned, the more satisfying it is to me. 

But on a more ambitious note, I like the aesthetic of Indian music and Jazz is starting to interest me as well, and I think there are so many possibilities in the tonal languages of classical music. Surely these styles can be actively explored in this day and age, just like Jazz and Indian Music is?


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

We're in an age where improvisation is integral to just about any art form, be it rock, jazz, or folk. I don't see why this can't transfer to classical, other than it's probably hard to do because you're having to back back into a time outside your own, which would prohibit you from exploring very many fresh ideas but instead limiting yourself to basically the confines of a bygone era and probably creating just a new museum piece. I'm not saying it can't and hasn't been done; as Tapkaara said, it just would be difficult to do well. 

I know of many modern pieces which call for improvisation, which is where that technique would seem to be most effective. 

I'm listening to Ludovi Kanta playing Boccherini and Haydn cello concertos on Naxos and playing cadenzas provided by Peter Breiner. They are adventurous but totally inappropriate for Haydn and Boccherini.


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## HarpsichordConcerto (Jan 1, 2010)

Improvisation is almost a lost art in today's new classical music relative to the abundance of that practice during earlier periods. We are now obsessed with peerless performance of the written notes, which while important, losses the original spontaniety of many pieces of music. Composition and ideas often came out of improvisation. But obviously not every perfomer at the piano today is going to improvise like Bach, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin or Liszt, so maybe it's a good thing that they are there just to perform. And given that most of us are listening to recorded music now, even improvised recorded music brings familiarity upon repeated listening. While these are some of the pros and cons of improvisation today in 2011, I still think music schools ought to teach and encourage this art of improvisation to reinvigorate an almost lost practice where improvisation is due, and so us "sophisticated modern folks" need not feel challenged when old pieces of music have that added spontaneity. Yes, I would prefer a classical concerto's cadenza be fully improvised in a concert today.


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## Festat (Oct 25, 2011)

This sounds pretty weird every time I think about it and it seems even weirder now that I'm writing it down, but I have always somehow linked baroque music and bebop in my mind. I can't really tell why, but both bop and baroque sound less... strict to me. There is some improvisatory nature on them that makes the association pop up in my head often.
I would love to hear more improvisation in classical music, really. But I don't know if I can picture it being explored vastly anytime soon. Like Tapkaara said above, the orchestra has been very standardized and much of the repertoire became or was meant to be untouchable. If it happens, I see it coming from contemporary composers who are open to improvisation rather than improvising over "untouchable music".*http://www.talkclassical.com/members/tapkaara.html*


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

I wouldn't exaggerate too much. Savall, Manze and others do some improvisation, lots of performers have made new cadenzas for classical and romantic era works, and jazz performers like Jarrett are coming into classical and reinvigorating the tradition of improvisation. 

But there is room for lots, lots more and I expect the record companies to pick up on it as a way of getting people to buy new recordings of old classics.


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

the amazing ted greene improvising in baroque style on guitar






anyway, the too much maligned third stream "genre" is exactly an attempt to fuse in a good way classical structures and techniques with improvisation that are not limited to cadenzas


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## robertdebree (Oct 11, 2017)

I'm a bit late to the game ; but there are people who improvise with classical music even up to the 90% someone mentioned.

The Scroll Ensemble (www.thescrollensemble.com) does exactly this. We have improvised a new suite of dances on the Goldberg variations, a fantasia on the 'hexachord', new inventions based on Bach's two-part inventions where the audience gives us a theme with twigs, a concerto based on Bach's adaptation of a Vivaldi concerto, new variations on au clair de la lune, a 30-minute improvisation on the chorale "An Wasserflussen Babylon" inspired by the story around Bach and Reincken and many more things! Basically, all concerts are completely improvised and we have been working on this for nearly 13 years now.

We also teach, e.g. http://www.thescrollensemble.com/en/jam-session-1-greensleeves/ or http://www.thescrollensemble.com/en/improvisation-resources/learn-to-improvise-a-canon/
and for higher level at the royal conservatory of the hague in the netherlands.

If you have any questions, do let me know!


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

Depends what you mean by "improv". A folk musician said the first time you make a mistake, it's an accident, the second time it's 
improvisation, the third time it's a variation.

There are a whole range of techniques. If you look at Bach's sinfonia BVW 591, the standard version is fairly plain. The later version is nothing but ornaments totally overlaying the original structure.

The collection is described as



> Honest method, by which the amateurs of the keyboard - especially, however, those desirous of learning - are shown a clear way not only (1) to learn to play cleanly in two parts, but also, after further progress, (2) to handle three obligate parts correctly and well; and along with this not only to obtain good inventions but to develop the same well; above all, however, to achieve a cantabile style in playing and at the same time acquire a strong foretaste of composition.


It built on a whole style of playing against grounds where people were expected to be able to run with a chord progression and build a melody from it. The nearest equivalent today is jazz (and folk) playing from a lead sheet. Figured bass is an improvisation method where the writer can specify the chord inversions in a similar way to slash chords on a lead sheet.

The trouble is that as orchestras developed composers wanted to control the sound they got. They began to specify the precise harmonic structures they wanted and the instruments that would take particular harmony notes. You get the same thing with some bands, both jazz and country dance, where the band leader will specify the precise sequence of chords and inversions and allocate them to particular instruments to get a specific sound (think Glen Miller for example).

As playing becomes "following the dots" then imrpovisation skills have declined and also listeners expect a "standard" sound for any particular piece.


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## Celine (Dec 27, 2020)

Ressurecting this, given the shortness. Incidentally, I came here via a search for this kind of topic.

I consider improvisation a different path to a composed piece. My instructor would improvise on the piano according to whether he had material, for example a somewhat bolder sounding Hindemith sort of accompaniment to a half-phrase-modulating Star-spangled Banner. Dug it!

He also had an improvisation ensemble based in the use of basic compositional determinants, tending on the non-tonal side. Solo, he did a free twelve tone fugue based on the Bach motive, thinking this up as he sat down. (The video title illustrates my personal sentiment about Improvisation.)


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

^^^^Even as a composer myself, I am a little skeptical about seemingly random improvising in atonal fields and so to play devil's advocate here. A long standing problem with free improvised atonality as I see it, is that any musician suitably qualified can do this and do so almost without thought given the lack of any readily discernible boundaries and lack of immediate perception by the listener. That's not to say that improvising freely doesn't work musically or is expressionless. Improvising is in fact a vital tool in a composer's arsenal opening one up to serendipitous events, flights of imagination and new paths to follow.

But for my aesthetics, in order for a 'work' to gain validity within the freely chromatic and highly charged language of atonality, an imposition of order, logic, conscientious working out and will needs to be rigorously applied as a balance to free fantasy. This can then encourage trust and a sense of 'work' by manipulating what will be inevitable justifications in the choices and thus engendering a sense of control and sincerity. I believe too that in the working out of an idea, one gets to 'see' the composer and a more cogent exploration of the idea and its potential more clearly. 

Just my own thoughts on this, YMMV of course and rightly so as composition is a personal and at times unique journey.


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## Celine (Dec 27, 2020)

@mikeh375: my instructor's piano improvisation, according to the conditions I mentioned, satisfy what you said.

According to my experience and inclination, I think of composition in terms of generational principles.

I reckon the world according to a Kelvin scale analogue, from 0 (possibility) to infinity, measured in type and degree. This came partly out of the implicit definition of Improvisation of my instructor's. Hence his performance above consists of at least a near infinite degree of this.

My own music uses simpler and imminently short-range ideas - contours and cadences, nexi, etc that please me in the moment. In essence: can I make anything musical?

The music reflects my Nature in that I have little going on at any time - rarely do I even listen to music - and I move about as I wish. It also sounds nearly as I wish. I play what I want to hear, and dig it each time I listen to it.

'Sounds nearly as I wish', meaning the timbre behaves as I want, and it sounds the clearest I have gotten it to sound (over a span of decades). The average listener may need at least a few moments, perhaps a second or third listen, to acclimate their ears.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

mikeh375 said:


> ^^^^Even as a composer myself, I am a little skeptical about seemingly random improvising in atonal fields and so to play devil's advocate here. A long standing problem with free improvised atonality as I see it, is that any musician suitably qualified can do this and do so almost without thought given the lack of any readily discernible boundaries and lack of immediate perception by the listener. That's not to say that improvising freely doesn't work musically or is expressionless. Improvising is in fact a vital tool in a composer's arsenal opening one up to serendipitous events, flights of imagination and new paths to follow.
> 
> But for my aesthetics, in order for a 'work' to gain validity within the freely chromatic and highly charged language of atonality, an imposition of order, logic, conscientious working out and will needs to be rigorously applied as a balance to free fantasy. This can then encourage trust and a sense of 'work' by manipulating what will be inevitable justifications in the choices and thus engendering a sense of control and sincerity. I believe too that in the working out of an idea, one gets to 'see' the composer and a more cogent exploration of the idea and its potential more clearly.


What do you think of Scelsi's piano music?


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Mandryka said:


> What do you think of Scelsi's piano music?


I haven't heard any until this moment now, listening to the 3rd piano sonata as I write. I am swept along with it even though I know it is improvised. The improvising is highly sophisticated and musical imv, brilliant in fact, if at times a little too dense and unrelenting for me.

There's always exceptions to the rule but the unstated implication I was hinting at - that atonality is open to abuse and insincerity by unscrupulous practice - is a problem that can undermine the tenet of the art, especially so far as the average lay listener might be concerned. With Scelsi, I can sense a questing musical mind and that is quite something. One wonders how improvised this work at least was improvised from scratch, in the moment so to speak. Is that how he worked or did he do preparatory work?

I still think that stronger unity, potential and personal expression within a piece is gained from considered reflection and manipulation of material allied to imagination and invention, but yeah Scelsi is a good 'YMMV' to my way of thinking and a good example of the complete embracing of the full implications of liberated notes.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

There's a phenomenon in modern composition called structured improvisation. Basically a composer writes sections of music for the composers to play, but between these sections there are points for free improvisation. Richard Barrett is one of the prime movers of this genre.

Re Scelsi type music, one of my favourite releases of the year is this CD -- 11 free improvisations for solo cello made by Anton Lukoszeviez during the big UK lockdown in March


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Yes I like him and am going to listen to his orchestral work. Thanks for bringing him to my attention. In fact I've gotten to know some excellent music through yours and others posts so thanks again. There just isn't time to listen to it all sadly.

My take on atonal improvisation is influenced by the fact that I can improvise in such a manner as to be reasonably convincing enough. When I attempt it, I find it interesting, almost like a brain dump, unhindered by concentrated thought and convention, that manipulates the stuff of music without any responsibility other than in a musically intuitive sense of loud, soft, fast, slow, dense and thin over time. It's relatively easy if you completely let go and that's the problem for me, the fact that atonalities effect is instantly achieved in improvisation. I can make improvisation convincing in a linear sense, even in an inevitable sense, but the vertical is more problematic as voice leading and function are not really applicable nor desirable and as a result randomness can become prevalent. I personally don't like that for such an important organising principle and so tend to not completely trust verticals with no apparent obligations. That's just me though and how I improvise in this mode (or perhaps my limitation). I'm also aware that over time, one can get used to anything even without justification and try not to close my ears off to that.
It is however exhilarating at times, especially when it flows and begins to acquire a logic one can pursue. It has led to promising avenues to explore further and that's how I see it, as a means to finding an end, or a way in and nothing else. The good stuff for me happens when I apply my mind to anything found because then, on reflection, one can see underneath so to speak, draw out more and make it a little more intelligible - pack and present it well.

(That said and somewhat ironically, I'm on a sentimental journey through extended tonal, functional practice at present.)


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

mikeh375 said:


> Yes I like him and am going to listen to his orchestral work. Thanks for bringing him to my attention. In fact I've gotten to know some excellent music through yours and others posts so thanks again. There just isn't time to listen to it all sadly.


yes well that's the problem. My solution is to stop listening to things written between 1750 and 1950.

Improvisation is a fairly important organ skill, and there's some interesting master classes from David Porter on youtube, for specialists in baroque and renaissance music. It seems to be partly a matter of acquiring some basic models, recipes: basic structures and ways to link them. It reminds me of some stuff I once read on Homer, on oral story telling techniques. Porter starts about 6 minutes in, I'm sure he's an inspiring teacher.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

I could miss out 1750 to 1850 but my time is also taken with trying to write the darn stuff. (btw I've just listened to Scelsi's 'Uaxuctum').


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## RICK RIEKERT (Oct 9, 2017)

Mandryka said:


> There's a phenomenon in modern composition called structured improvisation. Basically a composer writes sections of music for the composers to play, but between these sections there are points for free improvisation. Richard Barrett is one of the prime movers of this genre.


In Hindustani classical music most performances begin with free improvisation and then move on to structured improvisation. The free improvisation part of a performance is called alap, meaning "prelude," while the structured improvisation part is called bandish, or gat in the case of instrumental music, meaning "composition."

The alap (free improvisation) involves freely exploring the melody of a raga without a composition. During this type of improvisation, the challenge is to keep the music focused so that it will hold the audience's attention, because without a composition or a rhythm cycle to return to at regular intervals, it's very easy for the music to drift aimlessly and become confusing.

Improvising around a composition (structured improvisation) takes care of that problem to some extent, but it presents a different set of challenges. A composition has a set melody and is designed to fit into a specific rhythm cycle (taal). When you improvise around it, you have to make sure to come back to the composition once in a while, at the correct beat in the rhythm cycle. The main challenge here is to train your brain to do two different things simultaneously - improvise melody while paying close attention to the rhythm cycle. As with free improvisation, structured improvisation also takes place in different tempos.


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## pianozach (May 21, 2018)

21 posts and no one has mentioned the concertos of the Classical era, indeed, claiming that improvisation stopped with the Baroque era.

I'm familiar with some of Mozart's piano concertos, and there's generally cadenzas somewhere near the ends of the 1st and 3rd movements. All my scores have a written-out cadenza, although some have an additional alternate cadenza. 

But those written-out ones are there for those of us that aren't up to improvising our own, indeed, the written ones are generally transcriptions of some performer's cadenza.

And even in the Romantic era, pianists like Chopin and Liszt would write down their "Impromptus" and other improvisational-type material. No one had any problems with that at the time.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

pianozach said:


> 21 posts and no one has mentioned the concertos of the Classical era, indeed, claiming that improvisation stopped with the Baroque era.
> 
> I'm familiar with some of Mozart's piano concertos, and there's generally cadenzas somewhere near the ends of the 1st and 3rd movements. All my scores have a written-out cadenza, although some have an additional alternate cadenza.
> 
> ...


Do we know anything about 18th and 19th century musicians learned improvisation? Was it confined to public spectacle type concerts or did improvisation happen at home and in Church?

When you say that Chopin and Liszt 's impromptus were improvisational, do we know whether they were composed by improvising at the piano? Like Scelsi's piano sonatas? Do we know whether their other work was improvised and then written down -- it would be interesting to know whether something like the big bad Liszt sonata is in fact an improvisation notated after the event.


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## Celine (Dec 27, 2020)

Free NOT as in 'free improvisation', but as in *non-serial*.

If you had listened to the performance before posting, you may have noticed that, though the simplicity of the description seems to have eluded you as well. I posted again, saying more, as well as including a performance of my own music, which apparently has received censorship.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Celine said:


> Free NOT as in 'free improvisation', but as in *non-serial*.
> 
> If you had listened to the performance before posting, you may have noticed that, though the simplicity of the description seems to have eluded you as well. I posted again, saying more, as well as including a performance of my own music, which apparently has received censorship.


Celine, it appears as though there has been a misunderstanding here. My browser unfortunately did not show your post15 this morning, either that or I didn't scroll down enough (more likely) and so I didn't get the context of your response above which came over as (perhaps understandably) aggressive. My apologies for that as I wouldn't want a discussion on an interesting and vital aspect of the composer's armoury to descend into vitriol.

I've now listened to your guitar piece and whilst listenable to, I'm afraid I don't see it as art (as your title implies), in the refined sense. As an ex guitarist myself, I listened and thought of it as perhaps a stem/take for a fuller production.
There's clearly an expression, a musical personality in your playing, but music can readily and quite easily express such things and so for me, that is not enough to qualify music as art. Imv, a composer would do well to impose their will upon the material to reveal via familiarity with the material, their aesthetics and self, if a piece of music is to have a shot at enduring appeal. For that reason your improv does not qualify for me at any rate, as art music, i.e. that of a 'work'. Not that it's bad you understand, I'm just questioning your titles validity when up against recognised works by great masters be they composers or performers in any genre.

Just my opinion of course YMMV considerably and rightly so. You ask if you can make anything musical, well these days the answer is probably yes. Whether you should is open to debate.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Celine said:


> Ressurecting this, given the shortness. Incidentally, I came here via a search for this kind of topic.
> 
> I consider improvisation a different path to a composed piece. My instructor would improvise on the piano according to whether he had material, for example a somewhat bolder sounding Hindemith sort of accompaniment to a half-phrase-modulating Star-spangled Banner. Dug it!
> 
> He also had an improvisation ensemble based in the use of basic compositional determinants, tending on the non-tonal side. Solo, he did a free twelve tone fugue based on the Bach motive, thinking this up as he sat down. (The video title illustrates my personal sentiment about Improvisation.)


The first two minutes of this sound random. I can't care what comes after that. Mikeh375 comments that "any musician suitably qualified can do this." I would suggest that almost anyone, musician or not, is suitably qualified, except for the fact that non-musicians striking out wildly at a keyboard are likely to pick out something that makes a modicum of sense. Only the highly (and historically recently) trained think that incoherence is artistically significant.

I made a living for 35 years improvising at the piano. 35 years of avoiding incoherence.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Jennifer's Walshe's _This is why people OD on pills_ is an example of improvisation in classical music.

Here's the score



> THIS IS WHY PEOPLE O.D. ON PILLS /AND JUMP FROM THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE
> 
> This piece is performed by 1-10 performers performing on any instruments (including voice). Each performer prepares and practices their own individual "path" according to the directions given below. The piece consists of the performance of this/these "path(s)." If the piece is performed by a soloist, it should be a minimum duration of 5 minutes long, and is called "THIS IS WHY PEOPLE O.D. ON PILLS."
> 
> ...


and here's a performance


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Mandryka, do you consider this musical art? I like some of the sound he gets as an interesting timbre and musically, quite possibly useful. I've even abused my battered old cello in similar fashion for media work (no I can't play it), but jeez, I mean, c'mon...really? That is theatre, not music....can he even play that instrument or is he the roadie? Does being able to play matter these days - it bloody well should imv? Am I too old fashioned? Is it because I didn't get my grade 8 in skateboarding or practice my scales up walls?....

Scelsi=great, this = errm, not so great as art music. ymmv.


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

> Jennifer's Walshe's This is why people OD on pills is an example of improvisation in classical music.


I watched it. At least the title is apt.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

mikeh375 said:


> Mandryka, do you consider this musical art? I like some of the sound he gets as an interesting timbre and musically, quite possibly useful. I've even abused my battered old cello in similar fashion for media work (no I can't play it), but jeez, I mean, c'mon...really? That is theatre, not music....can he even play that instrument or is he the roadie? Does being able to play matter these days - it bloody well should imv? Am I too old fashioned? Is it because I didn't get my grade 8 in skateboarding or practice my scales up walls?....
> 
> Scelsi=great, this = errm, not so great as art music. ymmv.


I thought what was interesting is the way the directions are so physical. She gives a framework for improvisation on a musical instrument and it's all about skateboarding movements.

It is, by the way, a sort of overtones piece - very common in music, ad nauseam IMO



> Choose a pitch on your instrument. Skate your imagined path on this pitch. (You may choose to skate the path in slow-motion.) Every micro-detail of the pitch (tuning, timbre, dynamic, envelope, consistency, colour, texture, weight, feel, pressure, clarity, strength) should correspond absolutely to the experience of skating the path in your head. Pay attention to every minute detail, the micro-cartography of the path you are skating, the tiny shifts in muscle, weight, speed, direction. Carve through air in long, sweeping paths with the sound you produce. Reveal and inhabit new spaces, smooth new lines.


I agree that the performance is not so interesting, it was the first one I found. I checked out the musician, he has a couple of recordings which you can sample, all rather unpleasant for me at least.

Your comment about theatre is interesting. Have you heard Lachenmann's Pression for cello? Or better, have you seen it? It's very tightly notated, no improvisation. But the way I found to enjoy it is to see it, to see the sorts of things the cellist has to do to make these unexpected sounds.

(Not seen this one, just the first I found.)


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

consuono said:


> I watched it. At least the title is apt.


I was wondering why she called it that, now I know.

(Don't! Life is sweet.)


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

Mandryka said:


> I was wondering why she called it that, now I know.
> 
> (Don't! Life is sweet.)


No no, doesn't even cross my mind. That was just a little bit of snark. But be honest: that video and that "work" is what "the well's running dry" looks like.


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## Celine (Dec 27, 2020)

@mikeh375: I don't take Music and myself serious in that way. 'great works' concern Craft only. Enjoyable works happen to concern Craft, and what I prefer to hear in music. In a similar vein, I don't feel, think, and speak in terms of 'is-ness'. I use an eletric guitar in a way that allows me the timbre and expression I wish. I also see it as a solo instrument, and hence make solo music. And no one - especially no 'guitarist' - has capacity to see similar.

It reminds me of a story my instructor told me: as a college student he wanted to take a painting class. The department required Drafting. My instructor went to the head of the department saying he had no interest in Drafting, and wanted to go straight to Painting. The person asked him, "Do you know what you see?...Or do you see what you know?"

I call this Science [of Self]. Along that line, and re-iterating the Kelvin scale analogue: Art exists in type and degree.

Music I call something that has some distinction of pitches and pulse. Dones do not qualify. Select Steve Roach electro-ambient does. The cello piece above does not. Percussion does not constitute music - ugh. I can eshew the performance. Elements beyond the aural I consider multi-media, and may or not eschew the performance. In Art I usually eschew the performance. I have no interest in programme in Art, and I have encountered what I have needed to develop my sense of and sensibility in the cosmos.

@Woodchuck: I recommend considering, the above - and re-reading the performance description, listening to the performance, paying attention to the first four pitches, and continuing from there.


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## Celine (Dec 27, 2020)

I guess poignantly, and succinctly, I notice the degree of Craft in something, and look for certain kinds of sounds and rhythms and articulations that please me. I have no interest in the personality of the composer in their Music. I have interest in the personality of the performer insofar as it elucidates the material in some way I find novel.

I have nowhere near the Musical facility I think at least most here have. I have the tools I desire and need to fairly appreciate what I hear.



I grew in the 70s mostly hearing music on TV and far less so in movies. I noticed the qualities of the music and performances, and the audio production. I noticed the more 'colorful' (chromatic) the music, the more I liked it, but I pursued nothing. Exposure to pop music gradually increased via my other kids, and then in particular when cable came to town in '83 and I saw MTV. I watched some of it, but I didn't much sit and listen to music and such until about '84, when I got into modern Country through a neighbor kid. Even there I preferred more colorful music, and blues-oriented and gospel turned me OFF. Within a couple years, I moved a bit into the local Classical station, and then right into thrash metal, on into death metal in '92, those consisting of the majority of my listening - if I listened to music, which I mainly did if I drove, and I didn't drive to work after eighteen....

I played no instrument until '92, where I started a band thing as a vocalist and aspiring 'song-writer' with a guy who played electric guitar and had just bought a half-stack. We wanted two guitars (versus guitarists), could find few and none who played Metal, and I took up rhythm. We played only our music. Through a curious turn of events, I found myself formally studying music three years later. In that semester I met another guitarist, and we made only instrumental music, two high-gain (scooped mids) guitars. Had a cellilst for a few months the next semester. The next semester the guitarist started Classical guitar, and I hit Twen-Cen literature, full blast and LOVED it, wherein I realized He didn't and we split. I spent another two semesters in Music and stopped school.

Over-driven electric guitar has some unique properties that make the timbre much bolder than 'guitar', and offers different kinds or articulation, specifically, palm-muting. Palm-muting offers a great range of subtle yet audible, and satisfying to me, articulation.

But the typical 'tone' has a brashness that causes a lot of issues, foremost in the sound space and in combination with other sounds. For decades I have endeavored to retain the peculiar aspects of a high-gain tone, while clarifying it - a difficult task. Listeners, especially 'musicians', and in particular those who 'belong' to things in this world - or vice-versa - hear things in the context of their cultural experience, etc. I do not, as I have had no affiliation WITH Culture. I try to make what I consider a traditionally 'musical' timbre within the conditions provided. I have in mind next-generation technology designs that would make it not a guitar, and producing a clearer vision of the timbre I hear in my mind's eye.


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## Celine (Dec 27, 2020)

I would replace my last with the following:

Speaking of knowing what I see: my lack of participation in the Life of Music contrasts and, to whatever degree, inhibits the spirit of the Community, who Live Music.

Good day, All


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

"The instrumental fugue seemed at first to be at most a useful model for improvisation at the keyboard, or so he reported in multiple letters from the 1770s and 1780s."
http://mrc.hanyang.ac.kr/wp-content/jspm/20/jspm_2006_20_10.pdf#page=8

*Levin's performance of Mozart and Beethoven piano sonatas*:
He plays Mozart K.533 , Beethoven Op.90 , and Mozart K.576 in order, and in between the pieces, 
he improvises some bits of music that act as "transitions":





some interesting lectures by him:


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

pianozach said:


> And even in the Romantic era, pianists like Chopin and Liszt would write down their "Impromptus" and other improvisational-type material. No one had any problems with that at the time.


I remember reading the following excerpt from the notes of this recording my father owned (https://www.allmusic.com/album/rele...ses-op-posth-ecossaises-mazurkas-mr0003221299):

"In almost all editions of Chopin, the Polonaise-Fantaisie op. 61 is grouped with the polonaises. Yet the polonaise rhythm appears only in the opening section, and it is clear from a surviving sketch that it was added as an afterthought, when the main theme had already been drafted with a more conventional accompaniment. The work is more "fantasy" than "polonaise" and in its overall formal design it is closer to the great F minor Fantaisie op. 49 than to any of the polonaises. Both works open with a slow introduction and both have a "slow movement" in B major at their heart (in op. 61 this was originally drafted in C major). As the genre title Fantaisie might suggest, the linking factor is the influence of improvisation. These works represent the closest meeting-point between Chopin the composer and Chopin the improviser."


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)




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## EmperorOfIceCream (Jan 3, 2020)

En blanc et noir and Nikhil Hogan are two youtube channels that cover 19th and 18th century style improvisation respectively; I hope that it can be revived in the future. I know a music professor who, as a gimmick, will ask for a tune like Happy Birthday and then any composer and will then start convincingly improvising in that style, so it's not some mysterious thing. Look at this incredible video: 



. Part of our problems with classical music I think is that musicians are too specialized. If it were up to me, everyone would have to be at least competent in analysis, composition, and improvisation even if their goal is performance. I mean, Beethoven impovised the solo part for the 3rd piano concerto! Everyone rigidly focuses on mastering performance of music 1700-1920 and then we wonder where all the great composers are. To be sure, these are larger cultural forces at work, but our musical culture would really become healthier if more diversification was encouraged. How great would it be if you go see Pollini or Kissin or whoever, they play a classic, then some repetoire that you've never heard before, and then they improvise or give their own composition. It doesn't have to be a masterpiece, but it would sure be more interesting than hearing music from the same 6 or so composers, as masterful as they are.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Mandryka said:


> I thought what was interesting is the way the directions are so physical. She gives a framework for improvisation on a musical instrument and it's all about skateboarding movements.
> 
> It is, by the way, a sort of overtones piece - very common in music, ad nauseam IMO
> 
> ...


I like some Lachenmann, but not this (I took in about 8 mins of it). Perhaps part of my problem with what I'd call sfx music is that coming from a media career, creating sound like this for film/TV is the norm and most who have a DAW (digital audio workstation) and are working in that industry, think nothing of creating sounds like this. I've abused tables, pots, bits of metal, hell anything over the years in order to create sfx, even musical sfx for a film or ad. It's too easy and there is no musical art in it imv.

My old bow looks a lot more baldy than his....


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## pianozach (May 21, 2018)

Ah.

Has no one mentioned the popular *Theme and Variations* niche yet? Many composers over the centuries have "composed" sets of these, and I'd say that most of these variations start as improvisations.

I'll do this at parties and during down time in rehearsals (although certainly NOT to the level of sophistication as Mozart or any other revered composer). Like, I'll take a simple tune like *Itsy Bitsy Spider*, then give it a boogie bass, then again in waltz time, then maybe a thrash metal version, then something Haydn-esque.


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