Jazz improvisation as an expression of the self: Exploring Coltrane’s identity in the album: A Love Supreme
Introduction
- -What is improvisation?
-What role does it play in music performance? – Generation of new musical ideas and discovery of unique ways to express existing ones
Musical improvisation has been defined in literature on creativity as the process by which a work is realized “in the course of performance” due to compositional decisions made in real-time. [1] Unlike composition, however, improvisation involves the conception and execution of musical ideas within a considerably short period. The activity takes place in the moment and, because it is spontaneous, arguably presents the least edited version of how the performer thinks, encoded in behavior.[2] It directly reflects the immediate emotions, ideas and sensations of the improviser. Since these are ever-changing, the improvising musician can hardly be confined to a specific way of executing a particular piece of Music.[3] As documented by ethnomusicologists, improvisation is the norm rather than the exception where musical traditions are transmitted orally. In many cases, this is attributed to the absence of a written source indicating the specific notes and rhythms to be played and the sequence in which they are to be executed throughout the entire performance, which naturally encourages creativity.[4] Yet, despite earlier discourses often failing to recognise the level of discipline associated with the practice, recent studies indicate that improvisation takes place within strict established boundaries.[5] For example, Paul Berliner discusses jazz improvisation as a highly structured form of creativity, which requires an understanding of the models for solo formulation.[6] In a discussion with North Indian musician Ram Narayan, Sorrell finds that whatever improvisation there is in traditional Indian Music occurs within the narrow limitations of a strict discipline and that the excellent improviser can find the greatest freedom within these.[7] Since this allows for exploring the range of harmonic and rhythmic possibilities of a piece of Music, one can argue that improvisation contributes towards both the generation of new musical ideas and the discovery of unique ways of expressing existing ones. In this way, Derek Baily notes that improvisation has played a vital role in developing various Music throughout history and worldwide. [8]
- In Jazz the role of Improv is particularly important as it is integral to the jazz idiom.
Evidence Point 1: The genre has its origins in African Music and the blues, which involves great improvisation. The Music was learned by ear and through apprenticeship. Many of its participating musicians were African American, who were denied access to printing services and often had no formal music education. African Music’s influence on Jazz is quite significant. The unarguable characteristics of black African music form the very core of Jazz. Things such as the use of instrumentalists to imitate voice the primate rhythms are some of the inherent core attributes of jazz music. Famous jazz musicians such as Louis Armstrong used the call and response techniques in their compositions. Louis Armstrong was mainly known for his use of conversational-like arrangements in which sometimes he would even have interjections within the song.
African Music is built on improvisation. A lot of African folk music was composed on the go as they sang. These African improv influences are what Jazz is built on. The freedom to build on a few melodic lines and then make variations in rhythm and articulation to give it a personal touch best describes Jazz. Earlier on, during the slave days when the slaves were free on Sundays, they would meet and play drums. One drummer would play a huge drum; he would play a repeated beat. A second would then join in and play short staccato beats, after which a third would join in with a fiddle. There would then be voices joining in. What would appear as random and informal was ritualized and precise. A dense crowd would then appear and join in dancing in circles.
This musical performance would happen in New Orleans, in a place called congo square, the very place Louis Armstrong would then stand performing.
Evidence Point 2: Improv is a big part of jazz performance, as it exemplified the concept of freedom of expression, which resonated with the African American response to the political atmosphere surrounding twentieth century America, as well as their opinions towards race and class. (Civil rights movement, oppression, etc)
The influence that Jazz had on the civil rights movement is quite big. Martin Luther King said that Jazz was the soundtrack of the movement. Jazz is built on the concept of freedom in performance; more often than not as seen in Caltrones composition, the performer gets the freedom to express themselves.
Jazz was born from work songs of the enslaved when self-expression was vital. Hundreds of years later, when the government attempted to silence the black community, Jazz was used as a medium to express themselves. Songs such as strange fruit, which is now the first protest song, describe the plight of the African American man during the jim-crow era.
Through the Southern Christian Leadership Conference’s Operation Breadbasket Orchestra, Ben Branch performed at benefits and rallies fighting for civil rights. At this time, Jazz musicians had become very outspoken and often wrote songs about civil rights. The music, Mississipi Goddamn, was composed in response to the murder of Medgar Evers, the activist.
Therefore one cannot speak of Jazz and not talk of the civil rights movement at the time. Jazz is built on the values that the civil rights movement was fighting for, freedom. The earliest jazz musicians were African American; they identified with the struggle in existence back then. This, therefore, influenced their composition and Jazz as we know it.
- How Improv plays an important role in jazz performance:
- (The communicative function) Many jazz musicians also use the metaphor of conversation to describe the performance in Jazz and improvisation. In Berlinas monumental Thinking in Jazz (1994) there is a massive comparison between jazz music and language. Jazz music is a musical language, improvisation a conversation and good improvisation to send a message. Good Improv is when a musician can express themselves and portray their unique character truly. The structure of Music in Jazz tends to follow the basic everyday language rules in the world.
Similarities in language accentuation, phrasing, and articulation as used in Music are observed. Musicians tend to use the fundamentals of their vocabulary and make slight changes to express themselves through their Music. In Louis Armstrong’s song”Lazy river,” he uses phrases such as “yeah” and “sure” in synchronization with the horns as if he is conversing with the horns. The ability of an instrumentalist to invoke speech-like tendencies in their Music is often a measure of how good they are. Phrases such as he can “talk” with his fiddle are often used to complement the very best instrumentalists. In everyday conversations, people use different non-verbal resources to express their intentions and attitudes toward something. Variation of pitch when talking show or call for different attention. Instrumentalists can use this when improvising to indicate what they are saying and their attitude towards it. The similarities between improvisation and licks are apparent; Licks are like common phrasal verbs. A lick is a melodic line that an improviser plays note for note when performing. Similarly, common phrasal verbs in language are a familiar combination of a verb and a preposition with a universally accepted meaning. The way we use Phrasal verbs when talking is really like improvising.
- (The expressive function) Jazz musicians’ perspectives on improvisation often highlight its strong association with self-expression through performance. In many cases, improvisers talk of playing something that was ‘honest’ or true to themselves and reflective of who they are, suggesting links between their sense of identity and the Music they perform. For instance, in the musical work Deep river, an expression of contestation on the many variations of cultural leadership, authenticity, the identity of African Americans, and their representation in society. This beloved work amplifies the wars in the Harlem renewal. These wars are then combined with the debate about global modernization, cultural evolution, and the troubles African American artists face. This shows the jazz improviser’s goal, besides the development of musical material, is to express the human experience through sound, in an intuitive manner, beyond the scope of verbal language. Indeed, Music can be reflective of identity. Billie Holiday’s song “Strange fruit,” for example, addressed matters regarding discrimination towards African-Americans, which cannot be detached from the performance of jazz music. The song was popularized by Holiday but was originally a poem that a Jewish teacher wrote. The poem was composed after a particular occurrence in which two men were lynched in Indiana. Haunted by this distasteful act, the teacher who doubled as a civil rights activist took pen to paper and wrote what has now become a true masterpiece. Holiday came across it after it was composed and pushed to a nightclub. When racial inequity was at its highest, Holiday was deeply touched by this and decided to perform it. Holiday says in her biography expressed that peforming it reminded her of her dad who was denied service in a hospital due to his race. The song expressed the harsh world a black person lived in at the time. Holiday said that it pained her to perform the song but felt that it had to be performed to express the distasteful racial society she lived in.
- What influences improvisatory choices?
- Outside the room influences: Consider Berliner’s findings, which demonstrate that jazz musicians are “guided not only by purely musical concepts but by wide-ranging experiences that shape the artist’s need for self-expression and infuse their creations with distinctive attributes,” in Thinking in Jazz
- Inside the room influences: Consider Duke Ellington’s words in Peter Gammond’s book on Duke’s life: Page 16 , Duke Ellington, His life and Music, “Our inspiration is derived from our lives, the lives of those about us, and those that went before us.” This brings to attention the impact of the band member’s influences on improvisatory choices. Improvisation is essentially a group activity, and so group dynamics (Roles as a leader, contributor, etc.) impact what the improvising musician chooses to play at the moment.
-Personal expressivity through jazz improvisation is understood as a presentation of the ever-changing self through the individuals’ musical ideas. From this perspective, the successful improvisor can integrate their personal lives and art to imbue their performance with a sense of uniqueness.
When using a sociology-based approach, we assume that there is a relationship between self-identity and society. People influence society by founding groups such as organizations and institutions. Reciprocally, society influences one using the shared language and meanings to take different roles, interact and reflect on themselves. This reflection forms the fundamental character of a person. Because of the association of the two, self and society, to fully understand oneself and their identity, one must understand the society in which the self is acting. To even further comprehend a person, you have to factor in the other people in this society. In trying to understand a person, one must always factor in the social context of their actions.
A person has several identities, all of which are tied to varying social structures. Depending on what position or relationship one holds in society, we tend to take on different identities. From social interaction, oneself emerges, the mind arises from social interaction and social interaction forms the core of the social structure. The mind does the thinking part of oneself, defined as giving and deriving meaning from objects. The ability to communicate this meaning to others is made possible by language. Language assigns symbols to meaning. When a person’s true self becomes apparent using symbols that show how they respond to themselves as objects as they interact with other symbols, their identity emerges. This identity is a result of reflexivity. People can look at themselves as objects and, in this regard, evaluate themselves. They can take account of themselves and plan appropriately to improve on themselves. This reflection allows one to understand themselves better, be conscious of their existence.
To better reflect on self, one has to look at oneself from an outside perspective. By doing this, we respond to things like others would and a shared meaning of self emerges. Given this in a somewhat paradoxical manner, the more self-conscious we become, the more we become like those we interact with. In using language, we can share meaning with ourselves and others. The self then becomes both individual and social.
The self is different from the physiological body, it doesn’t come at birth but is formed over time. The self emerges as we engage in social interaction. It is a result of one’s relations to the process of interaction and others as they interact.
- iv) Why Coltrane is relevant?
- Give a brief history of Coltrane, his spiritual upbringing his musical contribution to he development of Jazz through his improvisation.
John William Coltrane is considered one of the most influential, if not the most, jazz musicians to ever grace us. However short-lived compared to other musicians, his career was, he was a pioneer of free Jazz. He was initially attracted to the bebop and hard bop nature of Jazz. This, however, changed as he took liberties in his compositions. He once compared his style to starting a sentence at one point and then going in both directions simultaneously.
Coltrane was born in 1926 in hamlet but later on, as a child, moved to Highpoint. Herewith given the religious father and grandfather nature, he was introduced to gospel music, which greatly influenced his career. After both his father and grandfather died, he sought comfort in his Music. He started playing the clarinet but switched to the saxophone while in high school.
In 1945 during the second world war chose to serve his country and was enlisted into the US navy. Here he served as an entertainer to the troops but given how much spending on the military had reduced he was discharged from the Navy. He moved back home in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. A vibrant jazz scene dominated this area, especially bebop which Coltrane embraced. He hereafter chose to take musical courses where he learned music theory and harmonic techniques. He was not content with just learning Music. He, therefore, becomes a freelance musician playing whenever he could.
Coltrane began to gain reputation locally and nationally, deservedly so given how good he was. His commitment to improving his craft paid off as he got national recognition by other prominent musicians of his time and became a national household name within no time. He was now a very highly paid musician but maintained his humility. Many described him as a down-to-earth, simple man by many. In interviews, he speaks a lot about his spirituality and how that influences his character. In his song, A love supreme, he shows his gratitude for his withdrawal from drug addiction and speaks of his spirituality.
With time Coltrane’s Music evolved; it was getting louder and more complex. He would play songs that lasted three to four hours with thirty-minute solos. Ascension and OM are some compositions that were described as challenging to listen to since they ignored all musical principles and gave musicians the freedom to play what they wanted in some sections.
Coltrane contributed vastly in the transformation of jazz music. Earlier jazz musicians insisted on playing as artistically as possible. Coltrane, however, emphasized playing the best and most challenging Music and hoped the audience would follow. Contrary to popular belief, his Music used novel harmonies and often used rhythm in an orderly manner. His unique take on Music that was hard and resonant yet warm and lyrical inspired countless musicians to follow his style. He used his Music to send a message of peace, dignity, and sometimes even violent outrage. The spiritual aspect of his Music inspired numerous jazz groups and was greatly loved.
- Why is A Love supreme relevant as an album in which to investigate Coltrane’s identity?
- Released in 1965, the album A Love Supreme is an embodiment of Coltrane’s interest in spiritual exploration in his later years. (Also, because it is recorded after the loss of two of his close bandmates, and some studies suggest that this also motivated his journey into spirituality) *
- This album is considered one of the most outstanding achievements of modern Music. It is a canonical album in jazz history as it is also a symbol for several ideological values and dualisms: improvisation versus composition, black Music versus white Music, commercial versus art music, live versus recorded Music, pure living versus drug abuse. As Tony Whytton notes, the album played a role in changing the way the 1960s addressed race, spirituality, and abstract art to address God.
References
Dinerstein, J. (2003). Music, Memory, and Cultural Identity in the Jazz Age. American Quarterly, 55(2), 303-313. Retrieved April 21, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/30041974
Honoring Jazz: An Early American Art Form. Civilrightsmuseum.org. (2021). Retrieved 21 April 2021, from https://www.civilrightsmuseum.org/from-the-vault/posts/honoring
John Coltrane: From World War II to Jazz Genius | The National WWII Museum | New Orleans. The National WWII Museum | New Orleans. (2021). Retrieved 21 April 2021, from https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/john-coltrane-world- war-ii-jazz.
University, B. (2021). Cultural identity and the jazz idiom | Research Connection. Brandonu.ca. Retrieved 21 April 2021, from https://www.brandonu.ca/research- connection/article/cultural-identity-and-the-jazz-idiom/.
[1] Nettl & Russel, 1998
[2] Jeff pressing, cognitive processes in improvisation, page 1
[4] Ethnomusicologists
[5] Nooshin 251
[6] Paul Berliner thinking in
Jazz
[7] Nooshin 251
[8] Derek bailey