This class will track the passage of improvised music into, through, and out of the Western avant-garde. Through readings, listening sessions, workshops, and performances, participants will learn how improvisation has functioned as an approach to composing and playing music and, perhaps more importantly, as an appropriation of alien musical cultures in order to radically alter the structures of Western music and the expectations of listeners.
While considering the use of improvisation and new forms of composition that emerged in the early part of the twentieth century in Europe and America, the class will focus on the crucial period of the 1960s and 70s, when black artists—many of them experimenting with traditional forms of African music—developed free jazz, and predominantly white artists began integrating non-Western forms of structured improvisation—occasionally even becoming disciples of the masters of those forms—into classical and avant-garde compositions and performances. The class will go on to consider the eventual diffusion of these artists and the legacy of their work, especially in relation to contemporary experimental music, much of which eschews notation- and composition-based improvisation in favor of sound-based work. I imagine the class consisting of three to five reading and discussion sessions, perhaps bookended by actual improv workshops (no expertise necessary); these could be augmented by in-house performances or trips to shows at local venues.
Some questions to consider along the way: How did these diverse groups of artists use non-Western forms to question and even undermine the dominance of traditional jazz, academic classical music, and anodyne pop? What was the relationship between the racial divide that separated the artists who comprised those emergent movements and the work they made and the audiences they cultivated? How did the use of non-Western music cultures change the way we think about Western music, and the way we think about what exists outside of it? Why have these groups perennially excluded women? Despite formal similarities and political sympathies, why have there been so few musical exchanges between black artists working in the jazz tradition and white artists working in the Western classical tradition? How did they pit the values and concerns of their adopted musical cultures (purported to be mystical, apolitical, invested in timeless truths, etc.) against those of their native culture (cold war America)?
Potential artists to be considered: The Art Ensemble of Chicago, Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, Anthony Braxton, John Cage, Pandit Pran Nath, Sonny Sharrock, La Monte Young, Alice Coltrane, Tony Conrad, The Velvet Underground, Steve Reich, Sun Ra, AMM, Henry Flynt, John Zorn, Derek Bailey, Aaron Dilloway, Sun City Girls, etc.
Potential readings:
George Lewis, A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music (he's at Columbia and could potentially teach a session)
Alex Ross, The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century (he's in New York and could potentially teach a session)
Brandon Joseph, Beyond the Dream Syndicate: Tony Conrad and the Arts after Cage (also at Columbia, could also potentially teach a session)
John Zorn, Ed., Arcana: Musicians on Music (also in New York, could perhaps lead a workshop or host a performance)
Derek Bailey, Improvisation, Its Nature and Practice in Music
John Cage, Silence: Lectures and Writings
Comment
Just a few other upcoming shows:
Roulette:
3/18, 8:30, Mary Halvorson Quartet
http://www.roulette.org/events/event.php/HALVORSON10
4/17, 8:30, Konkpack + Shelley Hirsch
http://www.roulette.org/events/event.php/KONK10
And two other Stone seminars--a bit expensive. Implies that musicians will want to (deserve to) get paid to talk about this stuff? Anyway...
MONDAY MARCH 29—STONE SEMINAR 13
PETER EVANS
7PM to 9PM—TWENTY DOLLARS: Open to all.
The remarkable virtuoso trumpeter speaks about his techniques, practice methods and more!
MONDAY APRIL 26—STONE SEMINAR 17
EVAN PARKER
7PM to 11PM—THIRTY DOLLARS: Open to all.
Maestro Evan Parker returns to The Stone for an intimate lecture/demonstration of how he accomplishes the impossible on the saxophone. A two hour Q&A about the saxophone followed by a two hour Q&A about improvisation/music. FOUR HOURS OF MAGIC WITH ONE OF THE GREATEST SAXOPHONE LEGENDS OF OUR TIME!
10 Mar 2010 5:12PM
Hey everyone. Sorry to have been delinquent after proposing this class. It seems like there’s a good amount of interest, though, so I think we’re ready to start organizing class sessions and wrangling teachers. I think the following format would make the most sense: a few reading/discussing/listening sessions punctuated by recommended performances around New York. The performances would not necessarily be the focus of our discussions, but could provide some good context and will hopefully show how people are still renovating and reinventing these musical forms today. Then perhaps by the end we’ll all be inspired to bring some instruments to class and embarrass ourselves.
My sense is that the sessions could entail something along the below lines. (I’m also including a list of teacher suggestions people have made; of course, if people feel comfortable facilitating any of these classes themselves, that would be great.)
1. Free jazz: experimental tribalism, thumb-piano symphonies, and the invention of a black American avant-garde.
– Potential facilitators: George Lewis, William Parker, Ben Ratliff
– Potential readings:
George Lewis, A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music
Ekkehard Jost, Free Jazz (1974): the first examination of the style.
Edwin Prevost, No Sound Is Innocent: AMM and the Practice of Self-Invention—Meta-Musical Narratives Essays (1997)
Ben Ratliff, Coltrane: The Story of a Sound (2008)
William Parker’s writings
Anthony Braxton’s writings
2. Free rock: classical instincts, Eastern gurus, John Cage, and the drone.
– Potential facilitators: Brandon Joseph, Tony Conrad, Christoph Cox (if he’s in town at some point), David Grubbs
– Potential readings:
Brandon Joseph, Beyond the Dream Syndicate: Tony Conrad and the Arts after Cage
Christopher Cox and Daniel Warner, ed., Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Music
John Cage, Silence: Lectures and Writings
*Perhaps we should also screen the great film of the 1972 Can Free Concert as a separate session
3. What came later: the New York (and L.A. and European) scene, the meeting of punk, free jazz, noise, and improv; electroacoustic music and the legacy of the sixties (I think this class could be split in two, but it should probably depend on how interested people are—and in what—after the first two classes).
– Potential facilitators: Mary Halvorson, Jon Abbey of Erstwhile Records, Brian Olewnick (writer working on biography of AMM member Keith Rowe, who now does electroacoustic improv work), Michael Schumacher (director of Diapason)
– Potential readings:
Christoph Cox and Daniel Warner, ed., Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Music
John Zorn, Ed., Arcana: Musicians on Music
Derek Bailey, Improvisation: Its Nature and Practice in Music
What do you all think? Let’s try to hammer this out and start contacting potential facilitators in the next week, then try to schedule the first class for later this month or early April?
And here are some upcoming shows that may be relevant.
The Stone
3/15: Stone Seminar #11 w/ Erik Friedlander: “Modern American Musicianship”; 7-9pm, $20
Bring your questions about composing or performing to the free-wheeling two hour class given by Downtown improviser and composer Erik Friedlander. Erik will address your questions and will speak about being a working musician/composer in 21st century as well as about pizzicato techniques, improvising strategies, and getting the most out of practice time. Players and non-players are invited to attend and cello players are invited to bring their instruments. If you would have a particular technical issue or question and would like to perform just let Erik know by dropping him an email at stoneworkshop@erikfriedlander.com.
3/16: Aurora Josephson: Numbers, 10 pm
Aurora Josephson (voice) Lisa Mezzacappa, Damon Smith (basses) and Weasel Walter (drums, percussion), performing Ayler, Mingus, Sun Ra and Feldman (so far) and improvising.
3/26: Mary Halvorson, Okkyung Lee, Miya Masaoka (and possible special guest); Miya Masaoka (koto) Okkyung Lee (cello) Mary Halvorson (electric guitar); 8pm
Issue Project Room
03/24 @ 8:00pm - Porter Records Showcase: Matthew Welch, Nate Wooley, Matt Bauder
http://issueprojectroom.org/2010/02/03/matthew-welch-with-nate-wooley-ma...
04/01 @ 8:00pm - Alexander Schubert’s Laplace Tiger + Ignaz Schick with Maria Chavez, Chris Forsyth, Sean Meehan, Aaron Moore, Aki Onda & Nate Wooley
http://issueprojectroom.org/2010/01/28/ignaz-schick-with-maria-chavez-ch...
10 Mar 2010 4:54PM
Someone interesting to contact might be Claudia Gould, who runs the ICA in Philadelphia. In the 80s and early 90s she worked on an "audio cassette magazine" called Tellus. The whole run is on ubu and is great survey of avant-garde sound from that time.
http://www.ubu.com/sound/tellus.html
10 Feb 2010 11:29AM
Tony Conrad spends a lot of time in the city, as well, so it's quite possible he would be available and willing to teach a segment of the class. If there's further interest in this, I can help you track down his email, at the very least.
10 Feb 2010 11:15AM
I think Ekkehard Jost's Free Jazz belongs on the reading list. it's a classic analysis of the emergence of 'free' forms among black musicians from a music theory perspective, written in '72, and covers Coltrane, Mingus, Ornette, Cecil Taylor, Archie Shepp, Ayler, Don Cherry, Art Ensemble, and Sun Ra. (http://www.amazon.com/Free-Jazz-Roots-Ekkehard-Jost/dp/0306805561)
bassist William Parker lives in NYC and is anchor of the avant-garde scene -- he's written theory and poetry reflecting on his music, and would be an amazing speaker to bring in, or if we're really lucky could run a workshop. likewise for Daniel Carter, who is very approachable.
also, Tony Conrad does teach at SUNY Buffalo, so it's conceivable that he could teach a class...
9 Feb 2010 10:19PM
I like all these suggestions, though there's been a lot of writing out there about "noise" (rather than "improvisation") of late, and this class might be a good chance to push back a little bit.
Perhaps Jon Abbey of Erstwhile Records could speak or recommend someone?
http://www.erstwhilerecords.com/
http://www.stylusmagazine.com/feature.php?ID=55
Also, I think Ben Ratliff's book on John Coltrane is excellent and worth adding to the reading list--the subtitle is "The Story of a Sound," and it's very good about discussing all the work that got folded into Coltrane's improvisation over the years. I could potentially approach Ratliff about teaching a class, as well; he writes about jazz, of course, but does a good job of keeping up with everything else.
A few potentially helpful NY-based musicians: Mary Halvorson (former Braxton student I think), Peter Evans, and Weasel Walter. E.g. http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2009/05/weasel-waltermary-halvorsonpeter-e...
9 Feb 2010 6:34AM
An adequately disorganized array of thoughts:
-- I could get in touch with both Cristoph Cox, editor of the Audio Culture volume and Branden Joseph, both of whom contributed to a recent book I worked on about Max Neuhaus.
-- I could also reach out to Marian Zazeela and La Monte Young, responsible for The Dream House (www.melafoundation.org) in Tribeca. Whether or not Marian and La Monte come through as teachers, The Dream House could potentially be a great place to bring a class. There's a suggested donation of $5, but the place is packed with information about Marian and La Monte's careers, including their longstanding collaborations with non-Western artists, namely Pandit Pran Nath (Dia also has some extensive archives on their history). Plus, the Dream House volunteers are always extremely knowledgeable.
-- Diapason Gallery (www.diapasongallery.org) in Sunset Park could perhaps be a place to consider seeing a show. They have a few performances a week. Michael J. Schumacher is the director and he positions his own practice as drawing directly from this moment of the 60s and 70s…maybe he’d consider teaching a class there?
-- I'm certainly curious about exploring the idea that these groups (either/both Western avant-garde and non-Western) have oft excluded women. Pauline Oliveros (http://paulineoliveros.us/) is a good example of someone who could definitely fit into the list of artists to be considered and the evolution of her practice is in many ways aligned with this interchange of musical cultures and traditions.
-- Other contemporary artists/performers to think about could include Christian Marclay (http://www.whitecube.com/artists/marclay/), Stephen Vitiello (http://www.stephenvitiello.com/), and Kabir Carter, who recently participated in a show at apex art (http://www.apexart.org/exhibitions/skurvida.htm). His work and even this particular project seem to have some thematic intersections with contemporary iterations of improvisation/experimental music.
-- Another academic to consider could be Allen Weiss at NYU (http://performance.tisch.nyu.edu/object/WeissA.html).
-- My last suggestion is to look into Phill Niblock's foundation/archive/performance space Experimental Intermedia (www.experimentalintermedia.org). They could be a potential resource for a reading-based discussion session, performance, or workshop as well.
4 Feb 2010 5:05PM
The anthology Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Music (ed. Christopher Cox and Daniel Warner) contains several readings of interest, including essays by John Zorn, Anthony Braxton, Derek Bailey, George Lewis, Ornette Coleman, and Frederic Rzewski. Even Umberto Eco weighs in, exploring the poetics of the 'open work' and its alliance to new scientific approaches—specifically, the indeterminate world of quantum physics—and the contemporary world view as one always in the process of development or movement.
Another potential New York resource is David Grubbs, particularly for discussions around contemporary experimental music. Here is his faculty page at Brooklyn College:
http://www.brooklyn.cuny.edu/pub/Faculty_Details5.jsp?faculty=512
4 Feb 2010 9:23AM