Something specific to toy with?

[m1469]

Well, now that I've already bothered Derek in a private message, I've decided to also start a thread here, just in case somebody happened to have something to say .

I feel a little stuck again in my improvisation, and I could do "chord progressions" stuff, and maybe will, but a little bit ago Quantum started a thread on improvising out of our comfort zone ... I actually would *love* to do this, but I don't have a grasp on an actual style to do that with.  So, I'm wondering if anybody has a specific kind of idea that I could work with and help maybe get me moving?  Is this a big request or a small one?

Anyway, I'm just looking for a little idea ... I asked Derek in private about a Baroque kind of thinking that I thought he posted about before but I can't find.  Something with 3rds and 6ths ... I believe.  But, I'd love to explore something bluesy, too, or anything else for that matter.  I suppose the formal aspect of my thinking just wants something to grab onto that I know belongs to a particular style, rather than me just sitting at the piano waiting for something to magically come out.

[goldentone]

*Takes off spotter outfit and puts on garb of elegance*

You could try a late romantic style.  "For Wolfi" was different from your usual demesne, in a Rachmaninovian style.  What do you think?  I do like the Baroque idea.

[m1469]

*Takes off spotter outfit and puts on garb of elegance*

 

You could try a late romantic style.  "For Wolfi" was different from your usual demesne, in a Rachmaninovian style.  What do you think?  I do like the Baroque idea.

Yes, okay.  I will listen to that!  My concept of Rachmaninov style as of the moment is basically big hands = wide harmonies, and then I have some sense of spiritual/emotional content.  Like I wrote, I will listen again to my improv., but that's where I don't know if I actually have a grasp on a style.  I mean, probably that's not how one should scholarly describe Rachmaninov.  Thank you for pointing me in a direction . 

[Bob]

*Takes off spotter outfit and puts on garb of elegance*

  *Bob doesn't bother to put on the Sherlock Holmes hat, garb of Holmes.*

[Derek]

I like to think of Rachmaninoff, and even as far back as Chopin, as baroque minus counterpoint and plus color. In other words, functional harmony is there, there's less dense counterpoint (but it is still present), but a much heavier emphasis on chromaticism and sudden changes. I think in a way, the only part of western music that is really graspable on a conscious level is the common practice era harmony. The later you go, the more difficult it is to analyze. I know there are people who do and an awful lot of research that goes into it, but when you go beyond the basics I get pretty lost when people try to explain it. In other words, I think it makes sense to come up with a label for something as obvious as a perfect cadence. But when you get to some sort of winding chromatic progression that's sinuously moving through who knows what key...what more do you need than your ear?

[ted]

I don't know about you, m1469, but I'm so far out of my comfort zone at the moment trying to play Chopin studies that even the hairiest improvisation is a welcome relief.

Specific ? Combine different chords and scales, one in each hand. This mode of combinatorial thought gives rise to beautiful harmonies you probably wouldn't acquire by seeing them as one subset. For example, one among thousands, playing major or minor harmony in one key in the left hand and in the key a minor third above it in the right automatically generates a poultice of blues sounds without trying. e.g. Eb major in left hand + F# minor in right - must produce blue chords almost any way you play it.

Since we all probably already know a swag of simple chords and voicings, extending them via combinations is an easier way of producing rich harmony than extending them note by note. Brubeck made a big thing of doing it to very good effect.

[m1469]

But when you get to some sort of winding chromatic progression that's sinuously moving through who knows what key...what more do you need than your ear?

Well, this is I think the basic part of what I am feeling.  It's like when I improvised the two that I put in the Monsty thread, and also with "acceptance" ... there was something about what my ear was perceiving and the fact that I didn't have to work internally for it to sound like music to myself.  It's like I sit at the piano now, and even though I might find sounds that I like and some of them are a bit new and then maybe some of them aren't, it's like that other "sense" is missing ... the one that is perceiving composition, I guess.  It's like my ear and/or intellect fails at some point and I wind up at a dead end.  This is maybe just the reality of trying to push through something that I don't normally truly try to push through, instead of just waiting until my ears hear music again with that extra sense as well.

But, to counteract all of that, I am thinking I could just keep bulking up my foundation, which is very lacking still in terms of some fundamental things.  Ted mentions simple chords and voicings, and I could easily say I could still use so much practice in terms of having these either automatic in progression, or musical, etc..  I mean, I could probably play most of it in singular form, but actually doing anything with it is a bit of a different story, still, unless I am in a time of being "inspired" with that other sense.  I think though that my main idea is that I don't want to just wait around for the wind to blow a particular way, I want to work a bit to get through it instead.

So, the reality is that I might return to some of my former threads where I've started chord progressions and such, and keep learning how to use them, and then I'll read what you wrote me, Derek, and play around with what you wrote, Ted.  It just might not be anything amazing at all, and I guess I just need to be OK with that!  I have a sense that there will be something on the other side of it, at least .

Thanks .

[Derek]

I really think I went through a lot of similar feelings as you m1469. In other words, I too received Ted's wise advice about cultivating the spontaneous impulse and not worrying too much about theory. But, I too have a particularly strong taste for common practice era harmony. One thing I recall "struggling" with and thinking that I must think about it on an intensely conscious level is modulation. Theory books made it seem so damn complicated and hard to understand. They always interpret the chords before the pivot and after the pivot in two different keys. Personally, I think that's a very stupid way to analyze it. Yes, I'm saying the way we've studied modulation for the past I don't know 100 years? Is stupid. The reason it is stupid is, are we honestly going to think about interpreting roman numeral chords in two different keys at once when modulating during improvisation? Of course not. All one really thinks about during improvisation is introducing a chromatic note/chord. In other words, a sudden change. But, traditional modulation "smooths over" sudden changes by being a change to a closely related key and then re-establishing the key with a cadence as though to say: "yes, we're really in the new key."  I found a quote on wikipedia of Schenker saying "there's no such thing as modulation in music." In other words, a modulation is really only a prolonged tonicization. Once I realized this, I understood that I had been doing it in my improvisation for a long time and it is a very simple process. I no longer believe that there is any value in thinking about it consciously, now that I realize how simple it really is. In other words---all the "theory" I've absorbed thus far have had far less to do with creating interesting music than cultivating the spontaneous impulse as Ted has wisely advised. no amount of conscious analysis or willpower can bring about good music just by merely thinking about it.  Maybe it can if you write something down on paper and toy with it for months and think about it in excruciating, brow furrowing detail, but, personally I find the idea of working that way horrifying. Partially because I can only devote about a half hour a day to music, I'm more or less forced (though it doesn't feel forced) to cultivate spontaneous improvisation or not create music at all.

Just to clarify/qualify---I think it's fine to go through this stage of wondering whether you ought to be thinking with great struggle about theory---after all, that's what all the universities and textbooks seem to tell us to do (and so one is inclined to give these books the benefit of the doubt...weren't they written by "experts....?"). But if you have as much creative power as I think you do from listening to your improvisations---at the other end of this tunnel will be the realization that all that stuff is smoke & mirrors, hiding the real truth of what creating music is all about. (that's my personal feeling anyway).  That doesn't mean "don't study theory," so much as...find a way to study it without absorbing the schoolmaster along with what he has to teach. You don't want an ugly old music theory professor in your brain telling you you're wrong while you're improvising, in other words.

*edit* one more thing. Consider how prolific a composer like Bach was. Has anyone honestly tried to claim that Bach works the same way modern music theory students do when they try to compose fugues? If Bach worked that way I'd bet his output would be an extremely tiny fraction of what he created. The standard modern answer? Bach was an immortal genius, we are mere mortals and cannot possibly imagine the extent of his genius. It may be true he was a genius, but that doesn't mean that we "mere mortals" today cannot find efficient ways of exploring music that do not involve excessive brow furrowing, symbol making and book poring.

[m1469]

Hi Derek,

I have just wanted and wanted to repond to your very nice post here, and Ted, I hope you realize I didn't mean to be ignoring yours!  I wasn't ignoring it, I just included a bunch of things together before.  Sorry, I'm getting really sleepy.

Anyway, something came out the other night which was by far different than I've ever had anything else come out.  I am still not sure where to take it, exactly, but it definitely helped to shed some light on what in the world is going on inside of me.  This was by far the most huge sound in the world ... I'm pretty sure about that.  It was an entirely different way of thinking about the instrument ... for me anyway, and helped me better understand what "my voice" is trying to do/say (man, it's pesky!).  Well, I have no idea if I'm really making any sense!  But, I really wanted to post something in return, but it's a work in progress (like so, so many things ...)... \

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[Derek]

Maybe something simple rather than a wall of text would be more helpful (like Ted's post). I think if you're really interested in the "traditional" sounds (something to work through, as you say you desire) you should not only know the patterns of but should actually improvise around (in roughly this order, though admittedly my own learning smeared each into one another):

-all major and minor keys and their chords
-cadences in all major and minor keys
-progressions by thirds and fifths/fourths, and by step
-now,start learning how to insert dominant 7th chords and diminished 7th chords. If you flat 1 note of a diminished 7th, you get a dominant 7th. practice learning how to resolve into the key defined by that dominant.

I think I started to gain a feeling for the above topics after about 4 or 5 years of study

For me, recent things I've been learning have been:
-tasteful use of deceptive cadences
-tasteful use of tonicization of subdominant (especially in minor key, this can be a very poignant change, used a lot throughout common practice era)
-harmonization of chromatic lines (lots of major/minor alterations, combined with experience with altering diminished 7th chords).

For some reason the above topics took me longer to pick up---probably due to not making a concerted effort at any given point to specifically absorb traditional sounds. I think rather that I accidentally began realizing that I was using traditional stuff and then decided to affirm it rather than avoid it, since I seem to like those sounds naturally. The wind blew in the traditional direction for me, I guess!

Eventually once you get really fluent with the above, you'll find crazy ways of transforming chords chromatically but still remain "diatonic." I think this is where all the magic and power of some of the harmony of the great composers come from. And, personally I think one gains much more familiarity with it just by doing it and experimenting with it than from reading about it. There are a ton of things I know how to do which probably have names but I can't really be bothered to learn because "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

Oops, that was a wall of text.

[Derek]

That stuff is only useful to a point. I don't want anybody who reads these posts to think they must learn all those things in order to improvise---they are just specific ideas that were abused for several hundred years  .  I'm sort of a musical schizo. I try the "force things and think things out" for a while, realize it doesn't work, and return to being creative.

[ongaku_oniko]

I thinkm1469should try to improv something longer than 2 seconds.

[m1469]

I thinkm1469should try to improv something longer than 2 seconds.

haha ... what in the world are you talking about?


I haven't forgotten about this thread!