#collective improvisation

[nofoodjustwax]

The Art Ensemble of Chicago - We Are On the Edge

The Art Ensemble of Chicago – We Are On the Edge

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[anamon-book]

Marginal Consort　Collective Improvisation P.S.F. Records

[nofoodjustwax]

John Coltrane - Concert in Japan

John Coltrane – Concert in Japan

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[nofoodjustwax]

John Abercrombie, Dave Holland, Jack DeJohnette - Gateway 2

John Abercrombie, Dave Holland, Jack DeJohnette – Gateway 2

Released in 1978 on ECM Records Format: LP, Promo Style: Atmospheric Jazz, Jazz Fusion Vibe: Airy, Ethereal, Open, Adventurous, Triumphant Musical Qualities: Collective Improvisation, Instrumental, Technical, Atmospheric

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[nofoodjustwax]

Wadada Leo Smith - Spirit Catcher

Wadada Leo Smith – Spirit Catcher

Released in 1979 on Nessa Records Format: LP Style: Avant-Garde Jazz, Chamber Jazz, Modern Creative Music Vibe: Intertwined, Open, Patient, Flowing, Noir, Suspenseful, Spiritual, Communal, Abstract Musical Qualities: Poly-Free Improvisation, Polyphonic, Acoustic, Complex, Instrumental, Dynamic Instrumentation: Trumpet (muted), Harp, Vibraphone, Upright Bass, Clarinet, Trombone, Wooden Flute,…

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[driftglazz]

“Although neither improvised solos nor collective improvisations were documented in the brass bands of the Civil War or Reconstruction period, improvised music was recorded in the Black Civil War regiments in a variety of forms. Improvisational modes of group composition helped coalesce a Reconstruction civic spirituality that could claim victory even in bleak moments by channeling the power of now, conjoining the agency of artist-activists and the listening power of the audience in a political context of epic proportions. Heble, Fischlin, and Lipsitz observe that “the actions of the listener or receiver of the improvised performance are every bit as significant . . . as the performance, for to discern the performance the listener must in a sense cocreate it.”24 Listening so deeply so as to recreate the sociosonic experience of musical improvisers became a kind of intersubjective training, which enabled organizers to make sense of the diverse political, social, and spiritual epistemologies of a newly constituted multitude. (p.214)

A story relayed by Union general Henry G. Thomas about the Black troops in his division explores how both emotional and political consensus was achieved through improvised song. Through the repeated performances (and revisions) of these improvised works, Black musician-soldiers continuously recreated the democratic culture by which such songs were collectively composed:

Any striking event or piece of news was usually eagerly discussed by the white troops. . . . Not so with the blacks; important news…was usually followed by [a] long silence. They sat about in groups, “studying,” as they called it. They waited, like the Quakers, for the spirit to move; when the spirit moved, one of their singers would uplift a mighty voice, like a bard of old, in a wild sort of chant. If he did not strike a sympathetic chord in his hearers, if they did not find in his utterance the exponent of their idea, he would sing it again and again, altering sometimes the words, more often the music. If his changes met general acceptance, one voice after another would chime in; a rough harmony of three parts would add itself; other groups would join his, and the song would become the song of the command.25

These improvisatory vocal traditions fused affective and sociopolitical dimensions of Black music-making, prefiguring a cultural technology that would be essential to Black Reconstruction. While apparently sonic decisions, these processes also modeled participatory democracy, as they were literally born of it. Rather than conceptualize democracy in the framework of liberal theory, wherein legitimacy lies in “winning” an election and “defeating” the opposition through majoritarian rule, this ethos was persuasion, not defeat; conversation, not conversion; and dialogue, not domination.26 Such a conception resonates eloquently with a democracy in and of sound: if the collective spirit does not move, the song cannot move forward. These practices of consensus-building through trial and error, call-and-response, had immense implications for the participatory character of Reconstruction politics and portended music’s importance in the decades between the Civil War and Jim Crow. Improvised music enacted what political discourse envisioned, and by rehearsing new social relations, it produced respond-ability and accountability. Much more than authored by a single great composer, these pieces were born out of the performance situation itself, demonstrating how improvisation was a testimonial in which “the particulars of encounters are inscribed.”27 The encounters of brassroots democracy—mass meetings and public celebrations in which an apartheid state was outadministered by a grassroots, Black-led multiracial movement—inscribed within improvised cultural forms the capacity to embody and reproduce this revolution’s communitarian ethos.” (p.214-215)

from Brassroots Democracy (2024) by Benjamin Barson

[nofoodjustwax]

Sunburned Hand of the Man - A Grand Tour of Tunisia

Sunburned Hand of the Man – A Grand Tour of Tunisia

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[nofoodjustwax]

Don Cherry - Om Shanti Om

Don Cherry – Om Shanti Om

Released in 2020 on Black Sweat Records [Archival] Recorded 1976 Format: LP Style: Ecstatic Folk-Jazz, Devotionals Vibe: Communal, Spiritual, Ritualistic, Uplifting, Earthy, Intertwined, Mystical, Religious, Warm Musical Qualities: Acoustic, Chants, Collective Improvisation, Percussive

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