two baroque improvisations

[Derek]

I recorded these a few days ago, listened to them today and am rather pleased with them. Over the past year or so I've been developing a "system" for building baroque vocabulary, for myself, and it seems to be working well. I don't think very quickly on the spot so it had to be a system which could get baroque vocabulary deep into my subconscious. I think it is working. I wonder if the system bears any similarity to partimenti practice, that bach and others used back then. It feels very practical.  One key difference between my system and partimenti is I do not rely on embellishing written works, it can be generated on the fly.

One big challenge in this style is the timing and placing of cadences, and balancing high and low points during an improvisation. I'm gradually getting a feel for it, and it's producing more and more satisfying pieces as time goes on. One thing I can definitely tell you is I don't think on the spot, it is all intuitive feel.

[countrymath]

Can you explain it a little more?

How did you learn to do this?

[Derek]

I think I started out practicing a variety of common baroque progressions like circle progressions, stepwise sequences of 6/3's, etc. and improvising around those. Eventually I discovered a "trick," namely the stepwise bassline. The simplest baroque bassline may just spell out a scale, from top to bottom. Harmonizing such a bassline in thirds or sixths will almost literally create a chord progression for you, complete with a cadence. Once you're used to that you can start "breaking up the scale" with stair-stepping motion, or any limitless number of possibilities. Also, I like to think of thirds, sixths and tenths as "magnets" to which dissonances and some perfect consonances like to "snap."  After that its all trial and error really. And being lazy. For some reason, baroque is what I "default" to when I feel least like thinking, ironically. Sometimes I'll improvise in two voices with one hand while I hold a mug of coffee in the other, sleepily, in the morning.

I have a way to go though. My ultimate goal would be to fluently improvise a 3 part fugue, subject and all, all spontaneously. The system I'm developing is taking a gamble in that I hope it will lead me to being able to do that---time will tell if it succeeds.

I'm bad at explaining. There's obviously a lot more to it than that. I'm amassing a document full of tips specific to this style, but currently the tips are fleshed out well enough only for me to recall clearly how I developed each part, they're probably not sufficient to explain or teach others. If I ever have a student of any kind I'll undoubtedly want to flesh them out more.

[ted]

You have now gone beyond my ability to tell the difference between your improvisation and "genuine" baroque composition. This statement isn't actually as complimentary as it seems, because you could fit my knowledge of baroque, classical, or any common practice composition, on a postage stamp.

One thing I can pick out though is that your individual strands are beginning to hold interest. That is to say, it isn't just a mass of harmonious counterpoint - anybody can do that, even me. The individual melodic phrases must hold interest aside from their simultaneity. This is the property I am starting to hear in your baroque playing, and it wasn't quite there before.

[countrymath]

I think I started out practicing a variety of common baroque progressions like circle progressions, stepwise sequences of 6/3's, etc. and improvising around those. Eventually I discovered a "trick," namely the stepwise bassline. The simplest baroque bassline may just spell out a scale, from top to bottom. Harmonizing such a bassline in thirds or sixths will almost literally create a chord progression for you, complete with a cadence. Once you're used to that you can start "breaking up the scale" with stair-stepping motion, or any limitless number of possibilities. Also, I like to think of thirds, sixths and tenths as "magnets" to which dissonances and some perfect consonances like to "snap."  After that its all trial and error really. And being lazy. For some reason, baroque is what I "default" to when I feel least like thinking, ironically. Sometimes I'll improvise in two voices with one hand while I hold a mug of coffee in the other, sleepily, in the morning.

I still dont get it. What is circle progression? and stepwise sequences of 6/3's? And how do you harmonize that on thirds? what you mean?

[Derek]

@ted: Thanks. I think that's what I felt happening with these and why I wanted to share them. My earlier baroque work was less "broken up."

@countrymath: I often make the mistake of attempting to distill years of experience into a couple of paragraphs, and obviously it can't work that way. I do have a system which I believe breaks apart baroque improvisation into easily learnable, constituent parts, but it'd be hard to explain in a "nutshell," because while each part is actually quite simple it may not be simple to explain in words without examples, etc. or knowing exactly what a student may need to learn next in order to get it...

Not to mention some of the more recently devised parts of my system are things I'm still practicing (though the first fruits of them are evident in the above two pieces I think)

But to answer the simpler question...a circle progression is one where the root of the current chord keeps going down by a fifth, or up by a fourth. you stay within the key. So in A minor, the progression would be : A minor, D minor, G major, C major, F major, B diminished, E major, A minor.  You can also go backwards through this progression, but it will sound softer and end with a plagal rather than a perfect cadence.

A stepwise progression of 6/3 chords is just taking chords in first inversion (so for C major, it'd be EGC), and then just moving up and down a scale. It's the only full parallel voicing of triads you will find in a long sequence. An awful lot of baroque music is based on simple sequences such as these.

There are lots of other sequences that combine the above two. Down by a third, up by a fourth, down by a third, up by a fourth, or down by a fourth, up by a second, down by a fourth, up by a second.  Pretty much any imaginable sequence can be found somewhere in baroque music.  Some of them are favored over others because they have a more striking effect, I think.

And then obviously not all baroque music is just a pile of sequences, often you'll have much shorter progressions which take a "shorter path" to a cadence than a full sequence, but they still follow the same principles.

Hope that partially answers some of your questions!  My talk about thirds, sixths and tenths is based on the observation that the whole point of common practice era harmony is to emphasize the fullness and pleasure of the third of a triad. Anything which diminishes that fullness (parallels, excessive doublings, etc) reduces that pleasant effect of always treating the third with care. It's only "wrong" to violate those things in so far as if you're playing baroque music, you want it to sound baroque.

[pianoplayjl]

Nice use of ornamentation! did you really usea harpsicord? bit dumb of me, really but I still want to know.

[Derek]

It's an add on for the Pianoteq software. Impressively good for software, I think.

[keyboardclass]

Wow, great music Derek - it seems late Renaisance to me though, especially the first one (reminds me of Froberger).  And where's the clavichord?

[Derek]

Thanks.  The clavichord is alive and well, I haven't recorded it in a bit though. My 3 year old nephew and his mother are visiting for a while and the little brat won't leave my instruments alone, especially when I am playing (thankfully I can shut him out of my office and use headphones on my digital piano however). Fortunately at the moment the clavichord seems like a boring old table with the lid closed, so I'm happy to leave him ignorant of what it is for now.

Out of curiosity, were there specific features of the music that made you feel it tilted earlier than baroque in style? I actually have a cd of Froberger and Frescobaldi's harpsichord music, but I've listened much more to Bach, Handel and Scarlatti. From what little I've read, earlier than baroque the music tended to be more organic and free in pacing, form, rhythm etc. Perhaps that is why.

[keyboardclass]

You ought to take up continuo playing.

[Derek]

I've thought about it, but there aren't many baroque ensembles around here (none that I know of), and I don't really know anything about how to read figured bass. I've tried it but I find I enjoy generating everything myself more than using something written.

[chopinatic]

These are great, although i dont often play or improvise in a baroque style so it is hard to comment on it properly, but they were certainly very good and stayed true to the genre from my very limited knowlege. Thanks