Overtures, an Artist, and the Good Shepherd

This week, all three of the hymns that we sang were magnificent tunes and I would have been happy to improvise on any one of them. So I decided to include all three, one after the other, followed by a bit of development and a recapitulation of sorts.

One of the best models for a church prelude improvisation is the Overture. Often, such a work quotes several tunes from what is to come, one after another. Such overtures have been cranked out by the hundreds, from the earliest days of Italian opera right up to modern Broadway musicals and Hollywood motion pictures. Many of them are hackwork.

But it is possible to do this sort of thing extremely well:
Rossini: Overture to “William Tell”

Or from a later composer: Beethoven: Overture to “Fidelio”

Most would acknowledge Wagner to be the master of this form: Overture to “Tannhauser”

That gives us some worthy models to emulate on Sunday mornings....
This is as impossible as trying to imitate Bach!

Gerre Hancock used to say something like this: “When you improvise, there are no wrong notes.” He is right; whatever you play is the definitive version of the piece. That does not mean that the choice to go in one direction rather than another results in a better composition, for of course the possibility is present for Good Music or Bad Music whenever one plays – whether it is a piece from the repertoire by a Real Composer, or music of one's own.

Still, “there are no wrong notes.” Part of what Hancock meant is that very often an “unexpected” note, one that you did not intend to play, leads in a direction that is more interesting than what you had in mind. This happens every time I play and I think it is true of everyone who improvises.

This week's improvisation provides an example. At 2'24” into the file, I have completed the first section: St. Columba (“My Shepherd will supply my need”) in B flat. I am ready to move into the second section: Land of Rest (“I come with joy to meet my Lord”) in F. I make a transition, which is not especially well done but it gets me there. But at 2'44” I play an E flat in the accompaniment (at the top of the texture) which throws it right back toward B flat major – by 2'47” I have lost control of the tune and landed very firmly in B flat. I must then stay with it on through the tune (to 3'7”) where I then yank it kicking and screaming into F with a V-I cadence (finally!) at 3'26.

A full minute, out of a ten minute piece, doing something I had not intended. I wish it had not happened and I think upon repeated listening that it weakens the form. At the time, I considered it a disaster.

But the important part is where the player then takes it. Because of this little excursion, I make some other excursions out of the key during the course of the tunes. The first is at the transition between Land of Rest and the third section: Old Hundredth (“All people that on earth do dwell”) at 4'26”. I sequence through a couple of keys to get to my goal of G major (4'47”), and I probably would not have done it that way had I not played that E flat at 2'44”.

After some time with Old Hundredth, I had intended a development section based on St. Columba in Mode III (Phrygian, the mode whose keynote is “Mi”). In my preparations, I started by playing around with the tune in minor, but found Mode III (which differs only by one note, the second scale degree) more unstable and very interesting. I intentionally let it slip out of the key halfway through the tune (5'57”) on its way to the parallel major (E major, that is: 6'30”) and using the relationship of a third, to C major (6'40”). The key of E Phrygian is about as far from B flat Major as possible; we are on our way home, and we get there at 6'48” with yet another jump out of the key in the middle of the tune – again, I would not have done it this way without that E flat at 2'44”.

At 7'14” begins the transition into Old Hundredth for what amounts to a recapitulation, in the home key of B flat, to which we arrive at 7'34”. But right away, another mistake; I lose the tune at 7'40”. This one is repaired more gracefully than 2'44”; I simply stop and begin the tune anew, staying safely home in B flat. Once through the tune, and it is time for a coda (8'35”), mostly based on the final phrase of the tune and lots of IV-I cadential activity, one and a half minutes of it. This was entirely unplanned and would not have been needed but for the harmonic instability earlier – and I think it proved to be a good ending, much better than what I had intended.

The important thing is that most of these decisions were by instinct, by feel. In the middle of an improvisation, one cannot reason through it logically. But one can – and must – go where the music has led, mistakes and all. Sometimes it does not work so well; sometimes it is, by grace, much better than it would have been.

This is one reason why we must Know the Tune and be able to play it in pretty much any key. You might plan on a certain sequence of keys, as I did, but a “wrong” note or two might lead you into areas you had not intended to visit. You had best be able to play the tune once you get there.

And this is an important way in which improvisation differs from Real Composition. When you are writing it down, you can (and should) throw out things that don't work, and stay with the compositional process until the result is as perfect as you can make it. When you improvise, you cannot throw anything out; you must go on as best you can with the song as you have played it so far. In this, improvisation imitates Real Life.

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In order to post these clips to YouTube, I must convert my sound file into a MP4 file, with video. That caused me to discover www.WikiArt.org which has become one of my favorite sites on the Net.

Today's clip introduced me to a new (for me) artist: Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859-1937). He was the first African-American artist to achieve a degree of international fame; you can read about him in Wikipedia here. The only black student at the Philadelphia Academy of the Fine Arts, he was a victim of racism. He wrote:

I was extremely timid, and to be made to feel that I was not wanted, although in a place where I had every right to be, even months afterwards caused me sometimes weeks of pain. Every time any one of these disagreeable incidents came into my mind, my heart sank, and I was anew tortured by the thought of what I had endured, almost as much as the incident itself.

After his studies, he left the United States to escape the racism, ending up in France. There, he was accepted into the artistic community without regard to his race.

Many of his paintings are religious, such as the impressionistic one that I have used for the YouTube clip, “The Good Shepherd.” I love the moonlit night into whose shadowy darkness the Shepherd goes, seeking a lost sheep.

One of his other paintings that I discovered today and to which I will return is “The Banjo Lesson,” in which an old man teaches his grandson to play the banjo. It captures a moment that has been repeated countless times throughout the history of folk music. We pass what is precious to us on to the next generations, and so the Song continues.

While in Philadelphia at the school, Tanner became close friends with Robert Henri, who is another artist who has become important to me, mostly through his book “The Art Spirit.” I learned of this book from a novel: “My Name is Asher Lev” by Chaim Potok, and I must write about it sometime. In the meantime, I recommend both books to you.
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I would like to say more, but it is almost 11:30 at night, and it has been a long day.
May God's blessings be with you this night and always.