Abstract
Freely improvised ensemble music offers a distinct and immediate form of creative collaboration. Although many established, even long-running, ensembles exist in the genre, much value is placed on the ‘encounter’; the meeting of improvisers in one-off performances in which the particular line-up of musicians has rarely been heard together, if at all. In such encounters, musical elements such as riffs, steady grooves and themes, which contain repetitive structural components, may affect the moment-to-moment hyper-flexibility that is a hallmark of much European free improvisation, and are often consciously avoided by practitioners. This chapter identifies the challenges that elements such as riffs, grooves and themes present for the other musicians when introduced by a member of the ensemble. The manner in which contemporary musicians have found ways to improvise these elements with a sense of ‘rightness’ is then discussed, using an ensemble of respected young British improvisers as a case study.
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Notes
- 1.
For a full discussion of the ‘conversation’ metaphor in jazz, see Ingrid Monson, Saying Something: Jazz improvisation and interaction (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1996).
- 2.
Joelle Leandre cited in Daneil Fischlin, Ajay Heble and George Lipsitz, The Fierce Urgency of Now: Improvisation, rights, and the ethics of cocreation (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2013), 21.
- 3.
Ibid.
- 4.
See Fischlin, et al., The Fierce Urgency of Now, 2013; Ajay Heble and Rob Wallace, eds., People Get Ready: The future of Jazz is now! (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2013); Rebecca Caines and Ajay Heble, eds., The Improvisation Studies Reader: Spontaneous acts (London and New York: Routledge, 2015).
- 5.
Cesar M. Villavicencio, ‘The Discourse of Free Improvisation: A rhetorical perspective on free improvised music,’ Ph.D. dissertation, University of East Anglia, UK, 2008.
- 6.
Ibid., 131.
- 7.
Adam Fairhall, ‘Free Trade Haul,’ interviewed by Daniel Spicer, The Wire, 387 (May 2016), 36.
- 8.
Evan Parker, ‘Invisible Jukebox,’ interviewed by M. Barnes, The Wire, 195 (May 2003), 45.
- 9.
Ibid.
- 10.
‘Time-no-changes’ is a method in jazz in which a walking bass and pulsed drumming may accompany a soloist in much the same way as in conventional bop, but without an underlying harmonic cycle or a metric structure.
- 11.
Examples of this maybe found throughout Tippett’s solo album Mujician (1982).
- 12.
For the purposes of this chapter, the term ‘non-free element’ refers to a musical element that relies on a regular or fixed parameter for its characteristic nature.
- 13.
Gary Giddins, Visions of Jazz: The first century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 503.
- 14.
Richard Williams, Alexander Hawkins Trio [Liner notes] [album, CD] (Alexander Hawkins Music, 2015).
- 15.
See Kevin Whitehead, New Dutch Swing: An in-depth examination of Amsterdam’s vital and distinctive Jazz scene (New York: Billboard Books, 1998).
- 16.
Ibid., 526.
- 17.
See, for example, Collider’s session for Jazz on 3, Jazz on 3 [Radio] UK: BBC Radio 3 (3 September 2012, broadcast at 23:00).
- 18.
Martin Pyne, Improvised Music Isn’t Dying—Just Evolving! (10 March 2014), Tallguyrecords.com. http://tallguyrecords.com/page8.htm (date last accessed 17 September 2014).
- 19.
Ibid.
- 20.
Ibid.
- 21.
Derek Bailey, Improvisation: Its nature and practice in music (Ashbourne, Derby: Moorland, 1980).
- 22.
Derek Bailey, ‘Derek Bailey Interview,’ interviewed by J. Martin (16 August 1996). European Free Improvisation Pages, http://www.efi.group.shef.ac.uk/fulltext/mbailin2.html (last accessed 17 September 2014).
- 23.
Bailey’s term has been controversial. Andy Hamilton has argued that Bailey’s playing is indeed idiomatic, and without this quality it would risk ‘non-communication’. Evan Parker has commented that Bailey ‘painted himself into a corner’ with the term. Nonetheless, journalists such as Ben Watson continue to use the term to designate the kind of free playing that Bailey helped develop. Bailey’s intentions regarding the term, including his reference to concepts in linguistics, were clarified in a 1996 interview.
- 24.
Cited in Williams, Alexander Hawkins Trio (2015).
- 25.
The general outline of the bassline is fixed for a significant period, although creative variances in accent pattern and phrasing are utilised throughout.
- 26.
A code, according to Michael Klein, is ‘a convention of communication that organizes signs into a system correlating signifiers to signifieds within a particular cultural domain’. Michael Klein, Intertextuality in Western Art Music (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2005), 51.
- 27.
Daniel Spicer, ‘The Spirit Farm,’ Jazzwise, 197 (June 2015), 44.
- 28.
The initial adoption of this episodic structure may have partly been a result of the group’s approach to stage management; several pieces began with only one or two musicians present on stage, with the other musicians seated in the front row. The seated musicians were then free to walk to their instruments when and if they wished to contribute. This resulted in a more measured approach to the entry of parts than in many freely improvised music performances.
Bibliography
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———. 1996. Derek Bailey Interview. Interviewed by J. Martin. European Free Improvisation Pages, August 16. http://www.efi.group.shef.ac.uk/fulltext/mbailin2.html. Accessed 17 Sep 2014.
Caines, Rebecca, and Ajay Heble, eds. 2015. The Improvisation Studies Reader: Spontaneous Acts. London/New York: Routledge.
Fairhall, Adam. 2016. Free Trade Haul. Interviewed by Daniel Spicer. The Wire, 387 (May): 36.
Fischlin, Daniel, Ajay Heble, and George Lipsitz. 2013. The Fierce Urgency of Now: Improvisation, Rights, and the Ethics of Cocreation. Durham/London: Duke University Press.
Giddins, Gaty. 1998. Visions of Jazz: The First Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Heble, Ajay, and Rob Wallace, eds. 2013. People Get Ready: The Future of Jazz is Now! Durham/London: Duke University Press.
Klein, Michael. 2005. Intertextuality in Western Art Music. Bloomington/Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Monson, Ingrid. 1996. Saying Something: Jazz Improvisation and Interaction. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Parker, Evan. 2003. Invisible Jukebox. Interviewed by M. Barnes. The Wire, 195 (May): 42–45.
Pyne, Martin. 2014. Improvised Music Isn’t Dying – Just Evolving!. Tallguyrecords.com, March 10. http://tallguyrecords.com/page8.htm. Accessed 17 Sep 2014.
Spicer, Daniel. 2015. The Spirit Farm. Jazzwise 197: 44.
Villavicencio, Cesar M. 2008. The Discourse of Free Improvisation: A Rhetorical Perspective on Free Improvised Music, Ph.D. dissertation, University of East Anglia, Norwich.
Whitehead, Kevin. 1998. New Dutch Swing: An In-Depth Examination of Amsterdam’s Vital and Distinctive Jazz Scene. New York: Billboard Books.
Williams, Richard. 2015. Alexander Hawkins Trio [Liner notes] [CD] Alexander Hawkins Music.
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Fairhall, A. (2020). The Right Thing to Play? Issues of Riff, Groove and Theme in Freely Improvised Ensemble Music: A Case Study. In: Blain, M., Minors, H. (eds) Artistic Research in Performance through Collaboration. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38599-6_6
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