Improvisation

It’s always scary to step on stage without pre-written material.

A few Fridays ago, myself and four other musicians played a small concert for a friend’s birthday. We had nothing going through our minds and we weren’t thinking about what we were going to play. We arrived, set up, and improvised. With the worn slates of the stage shaking beneath me, there was no place I would rather be than along side my four friends, making music that has never been heard before.

To summarize that last overly flowery paragraph: the concert was fun. The idea of jamming with people has a weird, hippie-esque connotation to it—yeah man, let’s jam! —but really, it’s one of the most expressive outlets of creative energy available.

Some philosophers say we think too much about the past or future and not enough about the now, but with free improvisation, if you’re not in the present, if you’re not tuned in, if you’re thinking ahead or thinking about the note you nailed a few measures ago, it becomes foolish—trite—boring. To jam, I have to click in with four other people and make our minds as one, like the Power Rangers, coming together to battle the forces of evil. But unlike the Power Rangers, when improvising, we don’t battle anything; we embrace the moment, we embrace each other. We grasp the art of music to a degree that I think is unparalleled.

When improvising, almost like I’m meditating, my mind has to empty. I can’t think about the music as it’s happening. I can’t be conscious of the music or I’ll become panicked or self-conscious or think thoughts like “Wow, I could really go for a cheeseburger”. No. These things cannot happen.

The actual experience of playing in front of people is a rush for me. The music I played with my friends at the party was weird, I guess. A healthy mix of funk, techno, jazz, electronica, reggae, rock, metal, and power-pop and it was all true improvisation, sans starting out our second set with “Robot Rock” by Daft Punk. I feel like I can do anything after playing a concert with no musical limitations. I can run a thousand miles, swim to Paris, or clear the Grand Canyon in a single bound. Playing an amazingly fun concert like that is a shot of pure adrenaline to the prefrontal cortex. The fact that people are actually listening to what I have to say in a musical way is something that gets me going and makes me feel like I can connect with other people. And isn’t that what music is all about—bringing people together through an art form thousands of years old? That connection with not just other musicians but the audience as well makes improvising something special.

I could bore you with the intricacies of chords, tonalities, harmonies, the effect pedals I used, and the kinds of equipment we had but really—I’m not a sophomore at Berklee who plays a five-stringed bass in an experimental-prog rock band; that’s not what I’m here for. Free jamming, especially for an audience, is an experience invaluable for all musicians and for all fans of music. I know that for me, jazz and improv-rock concerts are scenes of unearthly beauty. I saw Chris Potter at the Regatta Bar (Boston) this fall and man, was my mind blown with his improvisational chops. As a listener, it’s a visceral, consuming experience, and at the end of the concert, I can feel the energy of the performers as if I was playing with them, as if I was them.

As a musician, getting together and throwing away chord changes for a jam session is incredibly valuable. There certainly is stigma against free jazz (“hard to listen to”) and jam bands (“hippie musical self-centeredness”), but when you’re grooving and you look over at the bass player and you just erupt into laughter because of how fun it is, you’ll know what I mean when I say that to jam is to self-liberate.

- Grant Patch

Image: Eric Waugh