The World of Improvisation

Particularly for many classically trained musicians, the art of improvisation quite often seems like a world of mystery which—upon beginning to delve into the field—can quickly lead to a deep abyss! We spend so much time from a young age practicing and studying how to feel comfortable playing our instruments, how to sense a purpose in our sound, and ultimately how to mold the very fine black dots and stems on the page into a cosmic energy that we call music. The methods to classically train on any instrument are endless, but each has a common goal of building a foundation for the instruction of music education. And through music education, an aspiring musician can embark on a lifelong pursuit into the study and practice of music. But where does one learn and feel comfortable enough to become the creator rather than the interpreter?

One of the most fascinating elements of music history is the longstanding tradition of musicians and composers working together in a symbiotic relationship. Although composers including W.A. Mozart, Johannes Brahms, Franz Schubert, Frederic Chopin, Samuel Coleridge- Taylor, Benjamin Britten, and a number of others performed regularly during their time, they each relied on very close instrumentalist colleagues as invaluable resources for both technical and musical limitations. As a result of these composer-musician partnerships flourishing over centuries, it was only natural that musicians were given the opportunity for more performances and a larger number of works to add to their repertory. In particular, the baroque trio sonata and (later) concerto genre provided instrumentalists with an opportunity to create a spontaneous improvisation on a fixed number of measures, if even a few. Often times, for example, in a trio sonata the violinist would play a series of extended harmonies in a section marked “tasto solo”, where the continuo would hold a pedal point in the bass. Passages such as these could feature multiple string techniques in the violin improvisation, like ondeggiando (alternating bowing between three or four strings in a wave-like motion), arpeggiation, or a series of harmonic suspensions to fill out the section.

Fast forward to the mid-late 18th-century, the concerto genre was flourishing and composers at this point were often improvising entire cadenzas in concert. The nature of a cadenza is an unaccompanied set of measures that often presents and follows thematic material stated previously in the movement (although into the 19th and 20th century concerto cadenzas became increasingly free form and sometimes even opened a movement, in the case of the Adagio movement to Ravel’s Piano concerto in G Major). So why did classically trained musicians start refraining from improvising cadenzas as time progressed? Fundamentally, I believe this is a complicated question but has very much to do with the rise of the recording industry, technological advancements in instruments (and Industrial Revolution), and the nature of classical music pedagogy. All three of these are very much intertwined but what is certainly true with our classically trained education is that we are often not encouraged enough or given any course of instruction on improvisation as a skillset. We might turn to our colleagues “across” art forms such as jazz, popular music, bluegrass, and other genres to only then seek out an opportunity to “lay down a solo” but without any pre-conceived structure or idea as to what we are actually doing. This isn’t to say that improvisation must follow a certain traditional formula in the way that a composer would observes rules regarding species counterpoint when constructing a fugue, but being familiar with any art form is very different from being thrown out to the deep end navigating your way through murky waters with sharks! And moreover, these non-classical genres do offer something in the way of a chord/melodic progression, bassline, or general “rule” for which to improvise.

In my own experience (while being predominantly classically trained but having played jazz in various occasions), improvisation was something that I neither sought nor received formal training in school. Most of the opportunities that I had to improvise in a classical setting came out of avant-garde opportunities—often with a new music ensemble in which a certain section of the work I was a part of included a composer’s indication that I or any number of my colleagues were to improvise over a set number of bars, or completely alone (effectively a cadenza of sorts). Because the genre was so foreign to me at the time, I somehow felt compelled to whole- heartedly embrace the idea even if it meant feeling completely vulnerable. I think in large part, this idea of abandonment and vulnerability is something classically trained performers often depart from especially as they mature musically and technically in their craft. When this fear of failure is combined with an already dearth of opportunities to improvise in classical music (except for the occasional baroque “eingange” or recitativo like flourishes in trio sonatas and the like) it is no surprise performers are often left dumbfounded if instructed to perform a piece or any section completely spontaneously.

Despite this, today is the ripe time for performers to let go of fearing the unknown and allow themselves to fail, even if at first in the comfort of their own solitary practice rooms. Much easier said than done of course, but so many individuals would be flabbergasted (and liberated!) when realizing their full creative potential if they allow this vulnerability to take over. When teaching the art of compositional improvisation (such as for my students in my Mannes Prep course I teach “Musician as Composer”), I often will instruct individuals to begin with what they are most familiar with—for string players and keyboardists, this might be any solo Bach movement; for wind and brass players, maybe an orchestra excerpt or etude. From these more fundamental works I instruct them to “play down” the piece as written multiple times, and then repeat the work by altering any number of bars by creating scales, sequences, or moments of stasis with solid chords to fill out the harmony. This often proves quite successful (although jarring for first timers) but then this can grow later into the art of improvising sections of cadenzas, transcriptions of vocal repertoire, to ultimately and finally taking a pre-existing melody (such as the National Anthem) and creating an entire work based on the “theme.” Not only have I been truly inspired, but I’ve also realized ultimately that indeed, there is a whole other WORLD OF IMPROVISATION, and really a world of music that is just waiting to be discovered fervently by current and future generations of musicians near and far.