Listening
The other day I was thinking about written language and how it is processed in our minds. We are taught to identify letters and words visually, which has an aural associative and equivalent component through spoken speech.
Through denotative language, we have a means of processing explicit information visually and aurally, and while there is an act of interpretation that occurs, there are commonly accepted definitions for understanding the information, and standardized syntactical structures that tie them together.
Aural language is a sound phenomenon, and giving them the structure of words allows us to communicate in an explicit sense with sound. However, plenty of sound that doesn't fall into the realm of verbal language has explicit associative content, and even more specific communicative content even if we don't or can't interpret it as such.
The sound of a bird chirping, a jackhammer pounding pavement, or a car horn beeping, all are associated with their phenomenal "happening." Even the sound of ice cracking on a frozen lake is in some sense the water speaking, the sound equivalent of its physical state.
Our ability to process the explicit information embedded in sound depends on our knowledge of its underlying phenomenon; beyond knowing that a bird is chirping and being able to identify it as such, the only way to understand what it's saying is knowledge of bird calls.
We experience and understand sound processually, dependent simultaneously on an understanding of the sound that has already occurred, the sound that is currently being heard, and a sense of momentum based on the past and present that helps set expectations for the future.
There's a sense when approaching any subject that is culturally embedded since birth, be it religion, language, or even our sense of what is or is not musical, that we have to first unlearn what we believe we know before we can start to understand the broader context of what it is or can be.
Oftentimes there is a quite steep curve of unlearning that must take place, but how can you learn to unlearn? Assuming unlearning is a positive development, how do we avoid the negative aspects of conditioned learning in the first place?
What would a negative theology of music look like?
These are the questions that keep me up late at night.
I've been doing a lot of listening lately, having rediscovered my voracious appetite for jazz and exploring the internal logics, stylistic markings, and musical personalities the rich history and tradition of American music supplies.
I'm consistently amazed when I follow the trajectory of an individual musician's career, how a unique musical voice can be identified in its nascent state and retain its character through stylistic evolution. Even geniuses who sometimes appear to arrive fully formed undergo subtle changes and refinements over the course of years and decades. For some musicians, these changes take the form of refinements, the shedding of excess, perhaps the exuberance of youth whittled down to its essence; for others it seems more akin to climbing a mountain, or stewing a pot of gumbo that somehow never ends up overcooked.
There's so much to explore that I get overwhelmed trying to process the various branches and historical trajectories while also keeping apace of what's going on now. I think my wallet feels the same way.
I approach it as a very serious endeavor that also brings me great joy. I try not to get too obsessive but it rarely wanes for long. I have always felt that music was important in a way that is difficult to explain in the same way that other generally accepted matters of importance are.
Needful things.
Recent listening has centered around the late, great, brilliant Max Roach in all his settings as a leader and sideman,and the development and brilliance of both Sonny Rollins and Ornette Coleman. I'm hoping to develop the latter exercise into a meaningful piece of writing at some point.
I've also been playing a lot and doing a bit of recording. It's interesting that listening to jazz doesn't necessarily lead me to creating jazz. I do a lot of improvising but music doesn't tend to come out as stylistically resembling jazz.
In addition, I'm currently reading a very interesting book entitled Jazz Consciousness: Music, Race, and Humanity by the musician and scholar Paul Austerlitz. Mr. Austerlitz is an alumni of Bennington College, where he had the pleasure of studying with both Bill Dixon and Milford Graves, devoting an entire chapter to the latter musician. Interestingly, it's not a chapter about Graves per se, as much as it's a chapter by Graves; Austerlitz prefaces Mr. Graves' writings with the following qualification:
"Rather than writing a chapter about Graves, I opted to present Graves's openions in his own prose voice: he has his own vocabulary that is supremely suited to conveying his ideas. Moreover, my own academic stance requires a detachedness that does not do justice to Graves's thinking."
I found this to be a fascinating way to introduce the chapter which I had assumed would be about Milford Graves rather than by Milford Graves. It was actually one of the primary reasons I had purchased the book, knowing that there was a whole chapter devoted to Milford Graves, a sorely under-documented figure in my opinion.
When I found that there was a whole chapter by Milford Graves, I was ecstatic. I love primary sources, and hearing it straight from Milford Graves' mouth was an exciting premise, even if it was a bit daunting as well. The other recent prose of Milford Graves' that I had read was in John Zorn's Arcana II volume that was recently released. That was a rather dense chapter about his medico-musical theories.
Mr. Graves makes an interesting distinction at one point, stratifying musical practices into three ways of approaching music. To paraphrase, he says that the first mode is to play for the "regular people," and play music that will touch them. The second way is to play for other musicians, what he calls "the in-group, the clique." The third way he mentions is when musicians cultivate themselves, by playing for their own furthering as well as for a "higher force." At this point, Graves says, "Once you have this, you can go into a state where you do not operate according to earthly laws any more. Then you can really stretch out" (p 172).
I'm not quite sure which earthly laws he's referring to, but it's an interesting point. I've done some writing on the general subject previously, improvising musicians' spiritual beliefs and how they may or may not interface with their musical beliefs. One issue I've always grappled with is transcendence, and why this plane of musical experience is often posited as transcendent and above rather than an expanding of the immanent human experience.
Until next time...
I've always been fascinated by contrast. Issues of juxtaposition, proportion, and contour . Opacity. How things have meaning not only because of what they are, but also because of what they are not, and what they are surrounded by. This goes for phenomena in the visual, aural, and tactile realms. Mind objects as well.
Dark/light, heavy/light.
Cold/hot, wet/dry.
Don't get me started on sacred/profane. You can have your deities and eat them too.
They don't all have to be binaries and dualisms. It might seem like doing and not-doing are opposites, but really there is not-doing and then there's every other shade of action. Not-doing is just a point of reference.
What happens when you don't-do deliberately? Is it then absorbed into the realm of doing?
Apart from any implications or meanings, I just like the phrase.
It's a quality that I try to cultivate as a listener of music. Otherwise I create mental friction with the music that detracts from my ability to receive without distraction. I can't eliminate mental bias, but I can reduce. I'm still not sure if that's desirable though.
These thoughts gestated during a prolonged morning of sitting and just listening to a new record player I recently acquired. I rediscovered all these great vinyls in my collection that had been sitting dormant after my old record player broke. Errol Garner! Lester Bowie! Bessie Smith! Elvis Costello! Arthur Blythe! I traversed untold worlds and spacious galaxies from the comfort of my chair, which I carefully positioned to maximize my experience of the stereo image.
There was such a strong impulse to do, even as I listened. Read the paper, pay the bills, you name it. Instead, I sat, absorbed, and was absorbed.
Welcome to Part Four of an ongoing series of posts on the topic of listening. You can find past posts on the subject here:
In the last installment in this series I talked about the ways we could understand acts of listening and improvisation as two parts of a co-creative or mutually causative process. Specifically, I wrote about the ways we could analyze this phenomenon in the light of general systems theory. In this post, I'd like to tie the same angle into the Buddhist concept of pattica samuppada or pratitya samutpada. Pattica samuppada is a Pali phrase, and is equivalent to pratitya samutpada in Sanskrit, roughly translated as mutually arising or co-arising phenomena. This concept offers an understanding that is remarkably similar to the mutually causative relationship expressed in general systems theory, and I believe it can act as a paradigm for approaching the act of intuitive improvisation.
The concept, or doctrine depending on whom you ask, of pattica samuppada is a central aspect of understanding the Buddhist worldview. In this doctrine, the Buddha “…presented causality not as a function of power inherent in an agent, but as a function of relationship – of the interaction of multiple factors where cause and effect cannot be categorically isolated or traced unidirectionally” (Macy, 19).
In other words, “…no effect arises without cause, yet no effect is predetermined, for its causes are multiple and mutually arising. Hence there can be novelty as well as order” (Ibid). Novelty as well as order....hmmmmmm. That sounds like an excellent way to describe the practice of improvised music, which is structured by the improvisers but continually creates novel output based upon the changing of the music.
In this sense we can view improvisational music as a teleological entity that exhibits design and purpose in its intuitive unfolding. “Paticca samuppada is not a theory to which one assents, so much as a truth one is invited to experience” (Ibid).
In the study of a system such as improvisation, especially as performed in a group context, linear causation is inadequate for understanding what is going on. Pattica samuppada at least offers us a conceptual tool for understanding the phenomenology of the improvisational unit. Pattica samuppada is “…the pattern of change itself. As such, it represents a dual assertion – of change and order, or order within change. In the linear view of causality, order requires permanence, a static basis impermeable to change. But here order and impermanence go hand in hand” (Ibid, 35).
In jazz improvisation, musicians give order to music, going in and out of pre-composed sections, and spontaneously creating compositions in the midst of improvisation, and the audience mentally constructs order as part of listening and understanding what is going on in the music. “To understand this we must consider everything, not as statically existing, but as 'happening' or 'event'” (Ibid, 52).
The event of music only occurs at the time it is played; a recording is one level removed in the direction of static-ness, and the written element is yet another level away from the experience itself as it must be interpreted to enter the sonic realm.
Listening as a co-creative process can be visualized and understood as a nested series of listenings at which the musician who is participating in the physical aspect of the music is at the center. The musicians’ playing can be seen as the stone hitting the water and their listening as the first ripple, and the audience aspect represents the next ripple in the expanding circles that dissipate into stillness in the same way sound merges into silence. This image works as well in visualizing the approach of musicians to understand their place in the ensemble, as individual voices with autonomy as well as musical repercussions. Indeed, improvisational music “…insists on both freedom for its individual voices and the reality of their interdependence…all players are simultaneously independent and connected, free and responsible, expressing their self awareness and their relationship to the ensemble/family/community” (Lock, 144).
At any given time, musicians hone in on their musical voice in a way that goes inside to focus on their own musical process without regard for external factors, or they might hear themselves in a completely detached manner as a member of the group or ensemble sound. In between these two extremes of listening focus are infinite shades of gray that fill out the spectrum of listening position.
Note: when the musical ensemble is discussed, I believe it must refer to any and all sonic surroundings. A solo artist interacts with the ensemble of silence in a concert hall, a street musician interacts with the ensemble of traffic noise, and a musician in a quartet must interact with the other musicians in a way that hears their own voice as a part of their ensemble.
In a group setting such as this, the individual voice is a changing entity that is sometimes receptive and detached, and at other times active and propelling. Just as it is said that you can’t bathe in the same river twice as the water is constantly moving, in the realm of improvisation you can’t bathe in the same song twice – although certain properties remain the same, the current always flows with a different energy and subtly different interactions.
Facility of improvisation for musicians, combined with their physical-technical capacity, is largely the result of their ability to adapt, "...not just to things as they are, but as they are coming to be" (Ibid, 85). While pre-composed music that strictly follows a written score has the range of music already defined and the amount of musical change predetermined, in improvised or spontaneously composed music change is the heart of the musical experience.
Pre-composed music finds value in structuring the musical experience and fine tuning the parameters in order to produce a specific result in the combination, while in improvised music value "...is not found apart from change or in the attempt to avoid change or in the positing of some permanent realm aloof from change. It is found rather in the way one incorporates and learns from change, "riding" it the way a surfer rides the wave" (Ibid, 86).
This might be the last installment in the series for a while. At least I don't have a plan for the next part, as I did for the first four parts which were already mapped out in some previous writing I had done on the subject. I hope you've found them interesting, and I will write more on the subject if and when inspiration strikes.
Comments, rebuttals and disagreements encouraged.
Lock, Graham. Forces in Motion. New York: Da Capo Press, 1988.
Macy, Joanna. Mutual Causality in Buddhism and General Systems Theory: The Dharma of Natural Systems. Albany : State University of New York Press, c1991.
This is part three in an ongoing series on the topic of listening. Part One and Part Two are also available for your perusal.
In this installment in the series I'd like to not only talk about listening, but also listening as part and parcel of the act of improvisation, and indeed place the emphasis on the latter half of the equation. I'm going to discuss the acts of listening and improvisation as two parts of a co-creative or mutually causative process. These co-creative processes are the result of numerable complex interactions on the aural processing and active music making levels. In this post I'm going to focus on General Systems Theory as a conceptual framework, and then in Part Four I am going to tie this into the Buddhist concept of pattica sammupada.
Due to the nature of these interactions, a linear approach to understanding them is lacking, and a more dynamic understanding is offered by the study of General Systems Theory. These concepts will offer us the conceptual and analytical tools necessary to frame the discussion in a meaningful manner.
General systems theory states that a system is less a thing than a pattern, “a dynamic flow of interactions…that maintains and organizes itself by exchanging matter, energy, and information with its environment. These flow through the system and are transformed by it” (Macy, 69, 73).
Applying these ideas to improvising musicians is particularly interesting, as musicians are not only passive parts of a system that are being transformed through its processes, but they are also active participants in that system. At times they are passive and at times they are very active in its processes; that is to say, not only do they ride the wave, but they also participate in the creation of the wave they are riding. The ways in which musicians step in and out of these roles in the context of the group determines the way the system functions, and the totality of their actions results in the music made.
The concept of the feedback mechanism in general systems theory is very helpful in examining the improvising musician and ensemble. There are two types of feedback mechanisms, positive and negative.
Negative feedbacks reduce deviation in the system, while positive feedbacks increase deviation, as well as reinforcing and amplifying existing deviations (Ibid, 73). In other words, "...the effects of any action are fed back into the organism, and by virtue of this feedback systems are indeterminative" (Ibid, 54).
Positive feedbacks in a musical context can be understood as playing by a musician that can be described as deviant or disharmonious in terms of the course of the music being made, causing the rest of the musical organism to react to those deviations.
Negative feedbacks can be understood as music making that follows the trajectory of the existing music being made and encouraging it along the same course. So at any given moment in the improvisatory context, musicians can act as negative or positive feedbacks in the group system of improvisation, either reducing or increasing deviation to the existing systematic sound. If a musician took the role of a positive feedback in the ensemble, it would imply a more active role in shaping the course of the music, while negative feedbacks would imply a more passive, receptive mode of music making.
You might also be able to posit that in a positive versus a negative feedback role, various types of listening are occurring. In order to embody the concept of the negative feedback, the focus of the individual's listening might very well be on the other members of the ensemble. In a positive feedback role the musician might be focusing more on their own voice within the ensemble. Both of these examples are oversimplifications of course, but you can see how the location of listening can really alter the way musicians act and interact in the ensemble.
Through explaining these various modes of interaction, a depiction emerges of the improvising ensemble: if causality is mutual, the ensemble is not the musician and the group which we conventionally posit, so much as a series of events, occurrences of playing and creating. Joanna Macy, author of Mutual Causality in Buddhism and General Systems Theory: The Dharma of Natural Systems, notes: "It has been likened, by both systems thinkers and early Buddhists, to a stream and to a flame, constantly flowing and undergoing transformation" (161). More on that later.
The structuring medium of the music, if there is an existing composition from which the music is being made, can be understood as an agreed upon territory to survey, or a starting point where the musicians begin their explorations. That the musical experience of the musicians and the audience relates to the entire piece of music both past and present rather than just the current notes being played can be explained through systems theory and feedbacks: "By virtue of feedback, past experience is accumulated, transformed, and internalized in the system's mental constructs and neural nets. Its structure at any given moment expresses its history" (Ibid, 168). In other words, the musicians' and audience’s cumulative musical experiences, both within the course of a song and their entire life determines and influences their present experience of the music being created.
And of course, no system is closed. All of these "systems" interact in the context of the larger system of life.
Another useful concept from the realm of systems theory in understanding the system of a group of improvising musicians is that of holons. A holon is "…an integral whole and a part within the larger whole. As open systems interact, be they atom or organism, they form larger self sustaining patterns, which in turn relate to build yet more inclusive and more varied forms. Each level is irreducible, and each whole is a holon – comprising subsystems, is itself a subsystem in a larger system, each level revealing greater diversity and improbability" (Ibid, 85). This can be visualized as a nested series of systems, or a nested series of listenings.
This can also be described as a “Self-organizing system” or SOS, which is “...a general term that describes a diverse range of systems that exhibit both complex and adaptive dynamics...They are most often comprised of numerous individual agents that are autonomous but also exhibit a high degree of interconnectivity” (Borgo, 126).
This nonlinear and adaptive aspect is central to the improvisational unit’s ability to change and evolve over time: “Due to their nonlinear dynamics, SOS’ are able to adapt to new stimuli and to internal changes...only nonlinear systems can evolve (in a biological sense) over time” (Ibid).
Okay, that's all I have the stamina for right now.
So this all begs the question: who cares?
I think this is always an important question to ask when getting mired in theory and concepts to discuss an act or phenomenon that exists just fine on its own without these frameworks.
In writing about these subjects, my primary goal is to help create a means of understanding the act of listening and improvisation in the hopes of both elevating their status as an act and an art. The secondary goal is to put down in writing the ideas that otherwise exist only in my head, where they can't be shared with others.
Take away what you find useful and leave the rest behind; thanks for reading.
Borgo, David. Sync or Swarm: Improvising Music in a Complex Age. New York: Continuum International, 2005.
Macy, Joanna. Mutual Causality in Buddhism and General Systems Theory: The Dharma of Natural Systems. Albany : State University of New York Press, c1991.
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