Jammed in an Unknown Device

• David Toop
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1In 2005, in response to student interest and at the request of Cathy Lane, at that time course director of Sound Arts and Design at the London College of Communication, I began to run courses in improvisation for 2nd year undergraduates. The workshops are a core option for the BA, alongside other courses such as environmental sound recording, studio production and Max/MSP.

2In 2004 I had been awarded a three year practice based research fellowship by the AHRC (Arts and Humanities Research Council); my project was entitled Sound Body, an investigation into the impact of digital technology on improvised music performance and other forms of sonic art. For this reason, and because only a minority of Sound Arts and Design students perform on conventional musical instruments, the course was called Digital Improvisation. In practice, however, the sound sources used were a rich and sometimes comical mix of laptop computers, turntables, homemade analogue electronic devices, power drills, electronic keyboards and sampling devices, and even an acoustic violin, though this was processed through another student’s equipment. Responding to the unpredictability of the mix, I called the group Unknown Devices, though within the college it is known more generically as the Laptop Orchestra.

3The digital improvisation workshop has three main aims:

1. To encourage an awareness and understanding of musical, interpersonal and technical issues involved in sonic improvisation.
2. To nurture confidence and sensitivity in the playing of improvised music.
3. To develop a practical and professional approach to performing group improvisation.

4The sessions are held over six consecutive weeks and each may last from 90 minutes to 3 hours. Punctuality is stressed, partly to prepare those students who are unfamiliar with the practicalities of public performance, and partly to minimise the period of setting up that begins each class.

5The first session is devoted to a discussion in which students give their views on improvised music: what is it, how does it work, how does it relate to other forms of improvisation in the arts, and how might it connect with the improvisation of daily life? Many students begin with very limited ideas about improvisation. Some think of it as an excuse for ‘jamming’, which may seem an easy option for a Monday afternoon. For most of them this has connotations, either positive or negative depending on the student, of a self-indulgent free-for-all, an emotional outlet with little discipline and few boundaries. In order to refine these ideas, we begin to explore some of the hidden rules of improvisation, such as the necessity for restraint, collective discipline, self-control, self-criticism, close listening, dynamic group analysis, and a willingness to balance personal aims, desires and skills (or the lack of them) with the needs of the group.

6Though discussed from the outset, the concept of jamming remains as a grey eminence throughout. For some students it is hard to dislodge this approach, and equally hard for me, as the director of each session, to open up a path through which they can interact in more specific and considered ways. What is jamming, the question is asked, and the answer is that jamming is associated predominantly with a known form, the participants play in order to exercise their skill, even to the point of competitiveness, but also for the pleasure of interaction without the need for perfection. Perhaps this is why recorded jam sessions can be disappointing. Two examples from my own record collection – Charlie Christian experimenting with the new bebop at Minton’s Playhouse, and John McLaughlin with Jimi Hendrix – are both interesting as historic documents but pale beside the more finished work of all these artists.

7Improvisation demands a closer awareness of the group. During the first session, we consider some of the qualities that are needed to create improvisations that are satisfying both for the participant and for the listener. Students are given a worksheet, drawn from my own experience as an improviser, which lists examples of these qualities. From a list of 38, this is a selection:

1. The urge to play.
2. An aptitude for reacting quickly to unexpected, sometimes unwelcome developments.
3. Being able to produce ideas and techniques that allow a variety of responses, both to individuals, and to the overall group sound.
4. A sense of form.
5. An acute awareness of time.
6. The ability to identify the nature of a sound and produce an engaging response (this means being able to work with pitch relationships, rhythmic elements, or the complexity of individual sounds).
7. Silence and stillness.
8. A knowledge of your instrument, and confidence in using it.
9. Patience.
10. The ability to think and act at microscopic and macroscopic levels simultaneously.
11. Experience in scanning and evaluating complex situations from moment to moment, yet maintaining personal focus.
12. Tolerance.
13. The strength to fight for space.
14. The ability to turn any of the above qualities on their head.
15. The strength to be quiet.

8Exercises in playing, listening, and mutual criticism are used to develop these qualities during the course of the six weeks. The class may be divided into two sections. One group performs an exercise; the other group listens and then gives a critique of the performance based on its success in achieving its aims. The worksheet includes observations which are analysed either in specific points of development during a class, or applied throughout the six sessions. From a list of 32, here are 6 examples:

1. Learn to maintain intensity, concentration, and relaxation simultaneously.
2. Consider the layout and appearance of whatever you’re playing. Is it set up so that you’re going to trip over a cable, or so that you can’t reach something quickly? Does it look like a pile of junk to the audience? Is that the effect you want to achieve? Are you invisible to the audience? Do you want that?
3. Learn how to change a situation when it’s stuck.
4. Learn how to be supportive, and how to be disruptive.
5. Don’t try to be liked: don’t go out of your way to be disliked.
6. Don’t be afraid to stay in one spot; don’t be afraid to move on.

9Some students have professional experience of performing and highly developed instrumental abilities. Others may have no experience of making live music or using any kind of instrument. Conflicts can arise in situations in which one person’s confidence may be excessive, their self-absorption effectively preventing them from listening or responding to the group, whereas another person may be so timid that their ability to participate is seriously impaired. Musical and aesthetic tastes and theories are also an issue, and clashes between incompatible styles are common. Such tensions may tap into conflicts and alliances that already exist at an interpersonal level, so a part of the development of the group will inevitably require a willingness to compromise and negotiate, and to find ways of resolving conflict through musical cooperation.

10I give them practical exercises during each class and certain of these exercises will be revisited over the 6 week period as a measure of progress. Four examples from the worksheet are given below:

11STILL: The group sits very quietly, listening to the sound of the room, identifying each component of the sound and placing it within the space. Each player is allowed one short contribution, which can be made after the stillness and the room sound has affected their ideas about what they might play. After making the one contribution, the player then sits quietly again. The piece ends when everybody has made their contribution.

12COMMUNITIES: The large group splits into three or four smaller groups. One group begins an improvisation; after five minutes, the second group joins in. The first group stops playing after a minute of overlap. Then the third group joins in after another five minutes, and the second group stops after a minute’s overlap.

13COMMUNITIES II: In a second version of this strategy, the groups decide when to make their own entries and exits. All groups may play at the same time, or stop at the same time, but they must stay aware of their role as a group within a group. Each group must find ways of starting together, and finishing together, without any verbal communication.

14CRESCENDO: beginning by listening closely to the room, the group moves from silence to loud noise at a similar pace, taking a few minutes to do so and adjusting volume to match volume levels as closely as possible. Everybody attempts to stop at the same time.

15DIMINUENDO: the group moves from loud noise down to silence over a three minute period, trying to match volume levels as closely as possible.

16At the end of the 6 week period, the group gives a public performance. This impending exposure to an audience is an important goal – a test of how far they have come and an incentive to resolve technical problems, focus on learning during each session, set aside conflicts, and even begin to self-organise. At the beginning of the course they are highly critical of their own capacity to work together as a group, and in some cases sceptical of the whole idea of improvisation. In all examples of the Orchestra giving a public performance, although individuals have expressed disappointment that certain pieces could have been played better, the overall feeling is a sense of pleasurable surprise that such a disparate group of people can avoid chaos or collapse to produce a sustained performance which gives them personal satisfaction, both as a participatory and listening experience.