Improv on the theme Happy Birthday

[quantum]

Felt like recording some improvs tonight.

Improv on the theme Happy Birthday
Mics: (2x) Studio Projects B1
Interface: Edirol UA-25
Piano: Yamaha C3

Enjoy!

[ted]

I think I find this the most attractive one you've posted so far and have transferred it to the CD I keep for permanent listening. In a fashion typical of me I didn't read the post, listened and didn't hear the tune either ! That's just my lack of aural acuity and will surprise no one.

What I did hear was a fascinating tour through a considerable variety of what I would term musical archetypes. I began hearing Ireland, Bridge, Messiaen, Ives and even, at one stage, late Beethoven. This is not in the sense of surface imitation, but because you are couching their favourite archetypes in your own musical terms. To what degree this is intentional, accidental or maybe in my own imagination, matters little. It is rather like looking through a window on a train journey, starting perhaps in a city at night but soon hastening through a clear landscape in which one observes and reobserves significant features.

The fact that you do repeat certain things, for example the descending left hand run and several very poignant changes of harmony - the one around 7:20 is very striking - gives the improvisation an odd sort of coherence and prevents the polyglot randomness which is an easy trap in this type of playing.

[Derek]

Haha this was totally sweet, I loved it. Makes Happy Birthday ever so much more wicked. I love the harmonies in this piece, how do you achieve some of these sounds? I have my own palette of wicked harmonies but i'm pretty sure there are others I haven't yet explored (probably many thousands in fact)

[quantum]

Ted, interesting that you mention recognizing these musical archetypes from various composers.  As I listen to recordings I pick up on any particular sounds that I am attracted to and try to remember the overall effect of the figuration and the emotional response from the point of a listner.  Such careful listening I put to use as additions to my pallette of sound when improvising.  I'm quite fond of Messiaen, and many of his motifs have worked their way into my playing. 

Sometimes it these archetypes appear unconciously, as they are just another colour on my pallette which I decide to draw out at any particular moment.  But in this case you are spot on with Beethoven - my reference to late Beethoven was a concious decision. 

Derek, keyboard topography plays a great importance when I am trying to search out new forms of harmony.  This coupled with a sense of counterpoint is a great combination.  For example placing your hands in a random formation and playing whatever that is can yield sometimes surprising, sometimes dissappointing results.  But if you couple such exploratory finger technique with a sense of counterpoint and voice leading you can make chords link to one another and give them more meaning rather than random occruances.  Complex harmony can be made very effective if coupled with counterpoint.

Also some of the other harmonic devices I use are chains of chords based on 5ths, 7ths, 9ths, etc.