On Improvisation

"...composition is improvisation, given the benefit of time to reconsider and refine the product."

-John Duarte

I placed this quote in the music page of my website, because it represents well my approach to composition, in music and other things. In improvisation, you can create wonderful things, as long as you relax, and let the music flow. There is a great method for learning to play an instrument called Improvi-Taping. A friend mine named Win Wenger originated the method, and describes it on his website. I was house-sitting last week, and had a lot of free time on my hands. I found that the homeowners had a nice 88 key MIDI keyboard with weighted keys, velocity sensitivity, and even a pedal. I've wanted to learn to play piano for a long time, and I saw this as a good opportunity to practice a bit. We have a small cheap keyboard at home, but it's no fun to play. I used it a bit when I was studying some music theory, for constructing chords and such, but it just sounds so... electronic. Their keyboard sounded very nice, and I found one instrument on it that I especially liked. The harpsichord with pedals sounded almost like a hammered dulcimer. I found a few of their lesson books, and started working on them a bit, but found it rather tedious.

I played around and found several chords which had a sound that evoked a strong feeling in me. I wrote them down and memorized the position of all the keys. I then remembered that my camera could be used to make high quality stereo sound recordings. I had all the ingredients ready to do some improvitaping. I did a fifteen minute session one day, and I liked it so much that I did a 30 minute session the next day. I figured out how to make a better quality recording after the first session, so the second one turned out very well. I experimented mostly with rhythms, since I had already found all the notes to use. As I got into a flow state, I shifted between the various chords every so often, and found bass lines that complemented them. It was great to see new melodies emerge from this fairly simple set-up, similar to the minimalist music of Philip Glass.

I took a snippet from several minutes into the second session and posted it on my webpage so you can listen to it if you like. I put the music on my iPod shuffle to listen to while walking their dogs after dark. It went along amazingly well with the mood of the cool full moon-lit night. I showed my dad the chords I had found and he said that they were very Asian sounding. I'd have to agree. It is interesting to find another place where memories of a past life may have come through in this current incarnation.