Gesture composition
A precursor to Musicus Simplisticus is Gesture Composition.
Gesture composition is a subset of the John Cageian world, which uses alternative notations to create musical works. This type of composition is a cross-over technique borrowing from theatrical stage directions and visuals, dance choreography and timing, visual arts etc. Gesture composers also have an interest in Native and world musics. Especially when these techniques offer a way to create new fusions and cross overs. (More on this later).
Gesture composers confront the “tyranny” of music notation and seek new ways to interpret the main building blocks of music – harmony, rhythm and melody. This explains their interest in extended techniques. They also question the implied relationship of “composer” to “performer” where the “force” of notation tells the performer exactly what to do. This leads to a music, though still notated, that is “improvisational.”
There is a type of gesture composition I call “sound wrangling” where the composer arranges sound samples, either from a created pallet or improvised, live and/or recorded, created by the performers. Even in visual art the “curator” is now given equal billing with the “artist” whose works they arrange around a space.
Gesture composition and free improvisation
Much of this notated, composed music focuses on extended techniques, which oddly enough is also the focus of “free jazz.” (please note: I will call this music free jazz, or free improvisation for this article. I am a player not an academician so my language may be out of date. This page is for all to read and the use of specific jargon would be counter-productive ) The difference: free jazz is improvised, and gesture composition is composed. Overlaps between these two different types of music frequently occur. For example, even in free jazz there are composed compositions, not all of free jazz is improvised. Gesture music has a wide range of composer-player relationships, that is the amount of control bestowed by the composer on the performers. This can leave a lot of music up to the performers.
Improvisation, is of the moment, composition is of reflection. Gesture composers try to have both by giving up some control as composers. Free jazz comes to its gestures by emotion and listening, and by its history. For me, great free improvisation has the same effect as a great combo or chamber music, orchestra or jazz band without a text. It also questions the various roles and personas of the instruments and the players themselves. As you see both points of view have very similar aims but different departure points. “Jazz” builds on its history, “Gesture”, though now old enough to have its own traditions, is a re-invention.
How did gesture composers become free improvisers?
Perhaps it happened like this; noticing the vitality of the free jazz scene it did not take long for gesture composers to discover their similarity with free jazz. This led them to codify their gestures. Using their own gestures and others they created teaching methods and curriculum so that a “free improviser” could be created with training without any experience with the outside world of improvised music.
In a sense “free jazz” is reversed engineered by gesture composers.
Perhaps it was just part of the so-called uptown/downtown split, since both free jazz and gesture music would be labeled “downtown”. (Thats where I played “free jazz”, but I did not meet any gesture composers during my active years in NYC).
Differences remain. The most important difference between gesture composition and free improvisation is in the form of the works. “Free Improvisation” uses a beginning, middle, and end, an “Arch form, or an “Aural” form,” gesture composition may or may not. Also in free improvisation the music comes first, in gesture music anything goes. Music may be part of a multimedia presentation and not the center of the experience.
From a purely musical point of view, Gesture composition’s avoidance of formal concepts invariably creates a weaker musical tapestry. This can be augmented by visuals and other multimedia, but it also relegates music to a small cog in the wheel of something more important: “concept”.
In a purely musical terms these works, unlike improvisations, will tend to go on too long. Not because they are bad or slow works, but because a composed gesture that would seem aurally calling for, or, creating closure is ignored as specified by the composer, or concept, and we lose interest in the music. In “free improvisation” a gesture for closure is usually followed by all.
For some gesture composers the concept is primary as the music is only a means to an end.
Oopsey a problem, and a question of authenticity.
A certain resentment occurs when “jazz” folks who have worked all their lives at a technique suddenly find that their sound has been duplicated by “gesture” folks with whom they have not associated. Questions of race and also privilege occur because of color and the advantage of being part of the “academy.” At this point in time the academic study of music can encompass so many different possibilities that almost any stylistic approach could be called as a pejorative; academic.
There is also the issue of gender as many gesture composers are women. On that point the academy has been much more supportive, to my knowledge, than the public music world. There is also questions of Nationalism, interest and self interest, and “outside,” non-musical interests. There are also those who see music as a basis for social reform.
The following is also true: most gesture composers are associated with academia and its training, and most improvisers are not. (Perhaps I should say were not). In a University setting one also eliminates the risk or rewards of discovery, rejection and its social implications. There are those who wonder whether the academy is preserving a style of music or replacing it with something else. The Academy might argue that its influence on the public arts scene is at best limited, yet one finds that almost all of the performance spaces for this type of music are University affiliated.
I defer on all questions of race to George Lewis and the AACM.
I defer on all questions of gender to? I’m not sure yet. Please E-mail me!
True, many “free jazz” musicians are now professors and doing excellent work, yet questions remain as to where these disjunctions will lead.