Listening back to the recordings I can’t remember what I was playing or what’s coming next, but I can remember what I was thinking as I played. Such thoughts included “That doesn’t sound like what I expected”, “Now What?”, “Ha!”, “That was cool”, “Where’s he going with this?”, “What is that on the ceiling?” and “Should I finish here?” I think that, for me anyway, sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t (depending of course on how you choose to define ‘worked’) which I suppose is in the nature of these things. What I mean, I think, is that sometimes it sounded like two people performing together and at other times it was more like two people who happened to be improvising at the same time. Leaving aside any personal taste in the aesthetics of sound, I think it’s more fun to perform together. I don’t mean that the performers should always be ‘in tune’ with each other or mimicking each other but just in tune to each other. If that makes any sense. Most importantly, I had a blast. It was really good fun to improvise with another person and play with them, off them, against them. Fun fun happy happy fun times.

Number two (the one after the first thing): Playing for R.E.A.L.

I definitely wasn’t expecting the opportunity to play with this toy. Just before the second half of their set begins, and me thinking I was safely out of the frying pan and cosy in front of the fire, Jesse Ronneau comes over….

“I’m gonna start this half, and then any time you want you come up, and take the bass from me and take over….”

Cool. Deadly… wait, what? How am I going to make this not seem like a rude intrusion??

Should I go now? No… Now? Hmmm, maybe not. What about now…? Just Go!

What followed was me messing around with the best double bass toy I’ve ever come across. I’m not sure how fantastic my performance was but once again…

I had fun.

safety…

For me ‘oxleygrass (Marie’s phone)’ really doesn’t work as music. I think, at best, it’s a technical demonstration.

The ditty didn’t go anywhere: no changes (abrupt or otherwise) in dynamics, velocities, densities, complexities, (ir)regularities, etc. Pretty run-of-the-mill stuff. In that conversation with Melanie L Marshall, Paul Dunmall compared a successful improvisation to a string under tension: you want to increase the tension almost to breaking point without actually breaking it. In those terms, this ditty had no tension—no tug, no pull. Is that failure?

Does ‘choose your own adventure’ really work any better than ‘oxleygrass…’? Perhaps more successful (certainly more listenable) as music, but the results are a little too familiar from the performer’s point of view (that would be mine). No surprises, all hackneyed stuff.

So that raises an interesting question: not withstanding the desirability of both, is it better to fail as a piece of music, yet leap into the unknown, or is it better to craft a listenable piece of music, but remain in a safe space? [More discussion about safety and comfort…]

…nets

The lack of the volume pedal (a component of this cyborg guitarist that I’ve been questioning for some time) probably contributed to the nerves as (undesirable?) surprises awaited me as a result.

There’s a logic to the (controlled?) abandonment of safety nets. Their absence can reveal who you are (and might be) without those prothesis. In engineering terms, by removing a component, you can test out the behavior of the rest of the (cyborgian) system. (Franziska Schroeder recently introduced me to another derogatory term by Komposers for real-time interactive musicians—‘naked improvisers’. In that sense, does the lack of volume pedal makes me more naked?) What I discovered wasn’t exactly wonderful.

I’ve worried that my ‘phrases’ (defined rather broadly) tended to be uniform, and hypothesized that this was due to the minimum/maximum cycle of the leg-foot-pedal complex. What I discovered by taking the volume pedal out of the chain was that I hardly phrase at all without it, and, during those few moments when the gestures did delineate a phrase, its articulation was indistinct and had even less variation.

As I struggled with this, the tactician took a back seat, leaving larger term variation untouched. It’s only several minutes into the performance (at about the 4:50 mark) when I think to do something about it.

Where to go from here?

Melanie was surprised that I decided to abandon the volume pedal at the start of the gig (see ‘clichés: getting all the crap out of the way’ below). I agree that it was a risky strategy, and not very successful in this instance. I would, however, like to try such opening gambits again; they have the smell of potentially being dramatic for me (and perhaps for the audience).

negotiating risk

The duo with Ros Steer (‘it’s double bass night tonight at Stet Lab’) went better, even if (or because of) the logic of that improvisation was oblique. A disaster, perhaps, according to some formalist criteria, but that doesn’t bother me (I did, after all, give up being a Komposer a long time ago).

Even as I’m aware that she’s a newcomer to the Lab’s stage (and, I’m guessing, also a relative novice to this practice), I’m testing out the network: how does Ros deal with contrasting elements, with being left alone, with gestures that don’t (seemingly) relate to hers.

In contrast, during the closing quartet (‘siren’), the high-volume trio of Owen Sutton, Kevin Terry and myself threaten to overrun the quieter voice, Méadhbh Boyd. We give her space, but she doesn’t take it. The trio of familiar improvisers and a newcomer makes for a hazardous combination. Is that failure on the trio’s part?

clichés: getting all the crap out of the way

Han-earl Park: “I think I’ve run out of ideas.”
Veryan Weston: “That’s when the creative stuff happens.”

Recently, I’ve got into the habit (if that’s the word for it) of ‘getting all the crap out of the way’: starting the gig by throwing in (out) all my clichés, habits and standard tropes. I did that recently in a duo with Mark Sanders, and, to some degree, with Franziska this month. This requires you to trust yourself to still find stuff—that your creativity can still find expression—beyond what you already know you are capable of; that your craftiness isn’t bound by your history (even as it is based on, bounces-off of, and is perhaps defined by it).

I never went through that moment on March 10th, and perhaps that frustration finds expression during that last quartet. Now, is that failure?

Having said all that, these atoms—clichés or otherwise—inform me (and perhaps audiences and my fellow performers) about who I am—my history, my lineage, my identity. As I’ve said before I can trace almost everything I do to my musical ancestors.

the fourth wall: or maybe I should listen to my own advice

Last year I actually did something (near-direct quotation during an improvisation) that I warned my students against as too risky, and I did something similar this month (breaking the fourth wall). I managed to pull it off last time, but I don’t think the results were worth the gamble this time.

During this month’s event, I though it’d be an amusing, humorous gambit to start with a restart. (It was also an attempt to explode the improvisative practice.)

I also decided to do the same with the closing quartet. Though I think Kevin and Owen got the joke, in retrospect, perhaps it was an alienating moment for Méadhbh. (It also maybe came across as an assertion of leadership, though Kevin admirably seemed to take it as a call to rebellion.)

The breaking of the fourth wall can work sometimes (it did that time), but apparently not under these conditions, and not this particular way. If a significant aspect of the art of improvisation is the art of persuasion, I lost the trust of the audience (and my fellow performers) at that point. …And it felt like it put a spanner in the works for the rest of the event (and not in a good way).

(This was doubly problematic as curator, and that’s part of the reason for delegating the task of refereeing to Kevin. I’ve said that curating Stet Lab is “an art, not a science”, and I’m still learning on the job.)

aiming for greatness?

I think Owen found the last quartet a disappointing experience. I told Owen that it wasn’t going to be great every time. It can’t be. We aim for greatness (however you define that) perhaps (I know I do), but we often fail.

I told Owen that, regardless of the success or otherwise of the performance, he has at least the right attitude for this way of musicking. An attitude that encompasses a personal (or shared) understanding that some outcomes are more desirable (however you gauge that) than others. Add to that a sense of how to improve (evolve, mutate and adapt)—a creative intelligence—that makes the next one likely better than the last, and you have the model improviser. Aren’t we, to borrow a term from Mark Dresser, involved in a personal pedagogy? (Dresser (2000), ‘A Personal Pedagogy’ in John Zorn (ed.) Arcana: Musicians on Music (New York: Granary Books), pp. 250–261.)

A big thanks to the R.E.A.L. ensemble (Francis Heery, Piaras Hoban, James Fortune, Nora Salmon and Jesse Ronneau) for performing, and, hey, if I’m allowed to thank myself on behalf of the Lab, to Han-earl Park for opening the event. Major kudos to everyone who took to the stage, both Stet Lab (ir)regulars (Owen Sutton, Veronica Tadman and Kevin Terry) and newcomers (Méadhbh Boyd, Áine Mangaoang and Ros Steer). Special thanks to Kevin for refereeing on the night, and to photographer, John Hough.

Finally, as always, thanks to all who came to support this event.

As with all the recordings since December 2008, this month’s recordings are covered under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. [More info…]

Also performing will be guitarist Han-earl Park who last performed solo in Cork almost exactly a year ago. [Listen…]

It should be an evening of compelling performances. Hope to see y’all there, and many thanks for your continued support.

Stet Lab with the R.E.A.L. Ensemble plus Han-earl Park

Tuesday, March 10th 2009

9:00 pm (doors: 8:45 pm)

Upstairs @ The Roundy [map…]
Castle Street
Cork, Ireland

€10 (€5)

Stet Lab presents the debut of a live electro-acoustic group, the R.E.A.L. Ensemble, upstairs at The Roundy, Castle Street, on the Tuesday, 10th March 2009 at 9 pm.

The R.E.A.L. Ensemble is composed of an award winning composer and improviser, Jesse Ronneau (double bass), plus four of Cork’s most exciting emerging artists, Francis Heery (laptop), Piaras Hoban (laptop and iPhone), James Fortune (electric guitar and effects) and Nora Salmon (laptop).

“We focus on spontaneous creation of immersive sonic landscapes produced by merging digital technologies with amplified acoustic instrument,” explains Francis Heery, one of the founders of the ensemble. Plundering techniques and technologies from contemporary composition, rock music, algorithmic music-making, drone music, minimalist electronica, musique concrète and noise, “sounds are played, processed, synthesized, reorganized, digested and regurgitated, creating a self-generating interactive entity, unpredictable, uncompromising and constantly engaging.”

One of Stet Lab’s regular performers, Veronica Tadman, adds, “Stet Lab has not hosted anything like the R.E.A.L. Ensemble before; it is going to be an exciting fresh venture. I personally am intrigued by what an iPhone can do musically, so will be looking out for its appearance on the night. A performance not to be missed!”

Opening the event will be guitarist Han-earl Park. In contrast to the cutting-edge technological resources of the R.E.A.L. Ensemble, Park will be demonstrating what new musics might be made with an amplified guitar, with some imagination, skill, and a little luck.

With the opportunity for the adventurous to sit-in and perform with the programmed acts, this month’s event will be a leap into the exciting outer-reaches improvised music.

The event will begin at 9:00 pm (doors open at 8:45 pm) and entry is €10 (€5).

Stet Lab will be back in April with more left-field, real-time musical interactions.