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Improvisation and the ‘inner walls of Ego’

A short reminder on the dialectics of creativity,

freedom and the inner representations of power relations.

Vlatko Kučan

 

Summary

1. Introduction / Inner Walls
2. Improvisation / Three Modes
3. Improvisation / Improvisors Statements
4. In a nutshell – the Freudian concept of the unconscious
5.Observations from Improvisation classes
6. The inner walls
7. Epilogue / Loose Ends

Bibliography

 “From the idea that the self is not given to us, I think that there is only practical consequence, we have to create ourselves as a work of art.”

Michel Foucault

1. Introduction / Inner Walls

One could have the impression that we are finally living in great times for the art of improvisation – times where terms like creativity, mindfulness (emotional awareness) together with the postulate of individual self-expression are omnipresent not only in the field of the arts but even more in contexts of education, business and all walks of everyday life. Improvisation is no longer seen as a rather obscure artistic practice with an ambiguous and shady reputation but suddenly as a dazzling universal method of human creativity that at the same time creates ‘one of the most vital academic discourses of our time’ (Lewis 2016).

One may get the elated impression, that all one has to do now is to spread the new gospel and act accordingly and all will be good at the end – as the longstanding walls of narrowminded skepticism against Improvisation are finally crumbling into pieces by this long overdue shift of awareness.

And while I could not be happier about the increasing interest in Improvisation and the resulting developments – I am very skeptical in the regard that positive connotation and purely positivistic practice and reflection of the subject can work the charm of releasing everyone’s creative potentials.[1] Therefore and to avoid such rather naïve promises of salvation the discourse on Improvisation needs to be approached dialectically in order to gain some more plausible insights and arguments.

This appears all the more true as the practice of Improvisation itself necessarily seems to include and reveal certain obstacles and resistances which (for the sake of the given questions) can be viewed as inner representations of ‘walls’ – ergo of solid structures that have the function to separate, keep apart and hinder permeability. As the rather flashy title and sarcastic introduction imply I will try to carry this metaphor through my short argument and through the territories of Freudian terminology towards the realms of Critical Theory.

 

2. Improvisation / Three Modes

Let’s have a look at the most common setting in so called free music improvisation: a group of performers that is attempting to collectively create music without preceding agreements. There might or might not be an audience present. When we ask or interview improvising performers about their work and practice, the answers we get are mostly focused on the following aspects: a) intention, self-expression, subjective experience; b) the interaction in the group; c) the music itself; d) the reaction / feedback from the audience.

These topics of structural organization in the improvisors retrospective reflections might give us a good clue where to focus our attention, as the actual process of Improvisation itself can be looked at in these terms of:

1. subjectivity, self-awareness, individual psychodynamics
2. group-dynamics, interaction, communication
3. production of material, language, idiom

And viewed from the subjective perspective of the performer we could say that in the moment of improvisation the improvisor needs to be able to establish and maintain these same three basic relationships or ‘connections’ that seem vital for the practice of Improvisation:

1. the connection to her-/himself (this is the most complex one and it will be in the main focus of my argument)
2. the connection to the other performers (and the audience if present – which might also be viewed as a separate connection)
3. the connection to the music (or the musical material)

These three different viewing angles will hopefully also proof itself useful for the discussion of the argument at hand.

 

3. Improvisation / Improvisors Statements

Let’s take a short excursus and see how three of the most respected improvisors in (Jazz-) music describe their inner stance in regard to Improvisation.

a) Charlie Parker

You’ve got to learn your instrument. Then, you practice, practice, practice. And then, when you finally get up there on the bandstand, forget all that and just wail. (Parker)

b) Sonny Rollins

(…) When I am practicing at home I am practicing so that I can get in to my subconscious when I am performing for people. But in the process of improvising you’re always in your subconscious, you’re always going towards your subconscious. That is where you want to be at, that is the music you want to create, things that are deep inside of you, that is what you want to come out.
I start out playing things that I know, sort of to get the blood going. Those things can be described often as clichés, so you begin with the clichés so that you can get the process in motion. Once the process is in motion, then I am not thinking about anything, thinking is over. You can’t play and think, cannot do that. So the clichés are just when you get up and once you get it going, it’s over, then you’re playing. (…) Your subconscious, or whatever your pipeline is to the celestial music world. Then you’ll get out of the way, let that happen. (Rollins)

c) Keith Jarret

Music is not something you can use words to describe. Music is either in the air – and you find it, or it is in the air – and you don’t find it, but you just don’t try hard enough. You can be educated to play the piano, you can be educated about chords, you can be educated about scales, you can be educated about everything there is to do with music – and you are still zeroed – until you let go of what holds you back. And all of us could possibly not be held back. But most of us don’t let it happen. My job in my opinion is to let it out. But I don’t believe that there is any rules. There are no rules. (…) I did not realize that for a long time. (…) Education is one thing – I don’t believe there are masters, I believe there are students – some students work harder than others. In Jazz the narrative is – what carries the music forward – and the narrative is the players playing. (…) If you hear something and it changes you – it’s because what you heard was someone who became an innovator, and they became an innovator by hard work on themselves. Not so much work on the instrument. (…)(Jarret)

The key points of these statements are the following:

1. The improviser needs to acquire both a high degree of practical skill on their instruments and a profound knowledge of the given idiom and artform.
2. When involved in the creative process the improvisor needs to ‘give up’ all knowledge and control in order to be able to improvise.
3. The music originates in the performers ‘subconscious’ and is to be found ‘in the air’.

While C. Parker’s choice of term ‘wailing’ can be read in its common meaning as a lamenting expression or in its slang meaning of ‘playing an instrument well’ – both interpretations include an affective expression of the subject. I am aware that some readers will be tempted to strongly reject this argument as it may seem to promote a ‘romantic’ – or to speak in Marxian terms: a ‘bourgeois’ – understanding and narrative of expression and the nature of art. I would ask those readers for a little patience since I hope that we can keep that most inevitable discussion in our attention as we proceed with the present argument. For the time being I would like to quote Herbert Marcuse on this matter:

“(…)even in bourgeois society, insistence on the truth and right of inwardness is not really a bourgeois value. With the affirmation of the inwardness of subjectivity, the individual steps out of the network of exchange relationships and exchange values, withdraws from the reality of bourgeois society, and enters another dimension of existence. Indeed, this escape from reality led to an experience which could (and did) become a powerful force in invalidating the actually prevailing bourgeois values, namely, by shifting the locus of the individual’s realization from the domain of the performance principle and the profit motive to that of the inner resources of the human being: passion, imagination, conscience. (Marcuse, location 84)

What can we learn about such an affective expression of the subject from Mr. Rollins? In his statement S. Rollins uses the term ‘subconscious’ as a central resource or concept of improvisation. In its popular meaning ‘subconscious’ describes everything that is not in the focal awareness of the subject. In social sciences the term is used for describing a motivation “without intention, awareness and conscious guidance.” (Stajkovic, p. 1172)

The last and perhaps most peculiar aspect found in the artists statements speaks about the necessity of the subject to ‘forget’ everything they have learned and practiced (C. Parker), ‘get out of the way’ and ‘let the music happen’ (S. Rollins) while hoping to ‘find the music in the air’ (K. Jarret). These phrases seem to imply that the music has some sort of de-subjectified nature or autonomy of its own.

We shall investigate if the consideration of the concept of the ‘unconscious’ as introduced by Sigmund Freud and developed within Psychoanalysis holds any insights for our attempt to understand Improvisation and if it throws some light on what seems to be a paradoxical dichotomy between subjective expression and an inherent objectivity in art.

 

4. In a nutshell – the Freudian concept of the unconscious

While this short article can by no means attempt to give a satisfying introduction to the Psychoanalytic discourse on the subject of the unconscious, I do hope that the employment of some basic and in the context of cultural theory not uncommon Freudian terms will become plausible and perhaps also useful in the present context. Readers familiar with the Freudian basics may skip the following (lengthy) quotes that serve mainly the function of a quick introduction to the matter.

The term ‘subconscious’ was introduced in 1900 by Sigmund Freud alongside the terms ‘pre-conscious’ and ‘conscious’ as an integral part in his first topographical concept of the human psyche.[2]

The Freudian unconscious is primarily – and indissolubly – a topographical and dynamic notion formed on the basis of the experience of treatment. This experience showed that the psyche cannot be reduced to the conscious domain and that certain ‘contents’ only become accessible to consciousness once resistances have been overcome; it revealed that mental life is ‘full of active yet unconscious ideas’ and that ‘symptoms proceed from such ideas’; and it led to the postulation of the existence of ‘separate psychical groups’, and more generally to the recognition of the unconscious as a particular ‘psychical locality’ that must be pictured not as a second consciousness but as a system with its own contents, mechanisms and – perhaps – a specific ‘energy’. (…) From 1920 onwards Freud worked out another conception of the personality – often given the concise title of ‘the second topography’. (…) In its schematic form, this second theory involves three ‘agencies’: the id, instinctual pole of the personality; the ego, which puts itself forward as representative of the whole person, and which, as such, is cathected by narcissistic libido; and the super-ego or agency of judgement and criticism, constituted by the internalisation of parental demands and prohibitions.  (Laplanche, Unconscious, location 14127)

While the ‘unconscious’ is by definition exactly what the name implies: not accessible by the conscious mind, it is also the home of the ‘primary process’ where

(…)psychical energy flows freely, passing unhindered, by means of the mechanisms of condensation and displacement, from one idea to another and tending to completely recathect the ideas attached to those satisfying experiences which are at the root of unconscious wishes (primitive hallucination). (Ibid., location 10155)

The ‘pre-conscious’ on the other hand is an intermediate realm between the ‘unconscious’ and the ‘conscious’:

From the metapsychological point of view, the preconscious system is governed by the secondary process. It is separated from the unconscious system by the censorship, which does not permit unconscious contents and processes to pass into the preconscious without their undergoing transformations. In the context of the second topography the term ‘preconscious’ is used above all adjectivally, to describe what escapes immediate consciousness without being unconscious in the strict sense of the word. As far as systems are concerned, the term qualifies contents and processes associated, mainly, with the ego—but also, to some extent, with the super-ego. (…) In the case of the secondary process, the energy is bound at first and then it flows in a controlled manner: ideas are cathected in a more stable fashion while satisfaction is postponed, so allowing for mental experiments which test out the various possible paths leading to satisfaction. The opposition between the primary process and the secondary process corresponds to that between the pleasure principle and the reality principle. (Ibid., Preconscious, Location 9744)

To return to the matter of Improvisation and our quoted master improvisors: if we try to put our psychoanalytic terms into work, we can attempt to substitute Mr. Rollins’ term ‘sub-conscious’ with the concept of the Freudian ‘pre-conscious’. It is interesting to note, that in another place,

Freud describes the preconscious system as ‘conscious knowledge’ (bewusste Kenntnis). The choice of terms here is significant in that it stresses distinctiveness from the unconscious: ‘knowledge’ implies a certain cognisance regarding the subject and his personal world, while ‘conscious’ points up the fact that the contents and processes in question, though non-conscious, are attached to the conscious from a topographical point of view (Ibid., Location 9785)

This description resonates well with the idea of the ‘forgotten knowledge’ postulated by our quoted sources.

This leaves us with the still unanswered question of the artist that ‘steps out of the way’ and ‘lets things happen’. It is obvious that these phrases describe what we would call a dynamic situation or process. The subject needs to give up control, get out of the way, let go – it needs to not to try to hinder or resist the other force at play – the music. But what is the force of music and where does it come from? And what is the resistance?

Perhaps here Mr. Jarret’s indication about the ‘hard work on themselves’ (rather than the instruments) gives us a valuable hint.

 

5. Observations from Improvisation classes

Let us leave the intriguing but also potentially slippery terrain of theory behind for a moment and once again look at the practice of Improvisation – or to be more specific: to the particular stage of learning how to improvise.[3]

One of the fields of my pedagogical practice is teaching so called Free Improvisation to Jazz students. At this point the term ‘free’ indicates nothing more than Improvisation ‘freed from’ predefined formal, tonal or other structural or musical parameters. While mostly being well trained and experienced in Jazz Improvisation most of these students have no or very little experience with such an open setting. Starting from a situation of ‘supposed nothingness’ makes it very clear for everyone that all that follows is a creation by the group and its individuals.

Despite the initial high hopes for exciting new creations the very first group improvisations that a new ensemble creates are mostly very uniform and monochromatic. Not to say that affective excitement is not present – but it does not show itself in the music in a way one would perhaps expect.

Here the repeated and accompanying conversations, analysis of material, reflections and the sharing of individual perceptions and experiences gradually reveal a clearer picture of the underlaying and immanent obstacles. These obstacles are responsible for turning what appears to be an opportunity for free creation and expression into something that feels and sounds quite the opposite.

These obstructions can be organized around the previously mentioned three groups:

1. subjectivity, self-awareness, individual psycho-dynamics
2. group-dynamics, interaction, communication
3. production of material, language, idiom

Over time the individuals need to acquire a knowledge of material and the skills of its production. They need to undergo a group process, that will hopefully result in the constitution of a protected and friendly enough space for their interaction. If Mr. Jarret is right by pointing out: ‘there are no rules’ in the sense that there are no predefined rules – then the rules need to be developed and negotiated by the individuals in the collective. As there is no doubt that improvisation is always also a social practice the improvising group becomes a ‘micro society’ – with all the consequences that this implies.

And last-but-not-least each individual will have to undergo a process of self-experience and self-reflection through the practice of Improvisation. The sources and necessities for this are manifold: the experience of social interaction and the mirroring by the group members[4], the encounter with the self-produced material, the experience of the improvisational actions, the affective sensations etc.

While this in many ways can also be seen as a developmental process (even in a therapeutic sense) – there is a very important distinction between pure self-experience and the artistic production. The latter is the result of a process at the end of which an “aesthetic form” is created. Marcuse defines this as such:

We can tentatively define “aesthetic form” as the result of the transformation of a given content (actual or historical, personal or social fact) into a self-contained whole: a poem, play, novel, etc. The work is thus “taken out” of the constant process of reality and assumes a significance and truth of its own. The aesthetic transformation is achieved through a reshaping of language, perception, and understanding so that they reveal the essence of reality in its appearance: the repressed potentialities of man and nature. (Marcuse, Chapter I, Location 113)

The ‘aesthetic form’ or symbolic productions of art are being formulated in a determined cultural and historic context and tension field that is being represented by what we can call a given ‘state of the art’.

In this process of artistic creation, the subjective expression of the artist is not the sole end in itself but rather a necessary condition. Despite the fact that subjective expression is never just purely subjective – as it always carries its social and cultural inscriptions and determinations – it needs to undergo a transformation towards the given prerequisites of an ‘aesthetic form’ and the standards of the ‘state of the art’.[5] Viewed from a subjective perspective of the performer it is exactly in that sense that the subject has to ‘get out of the way’ (S. Rollins) in order to allow another kind of ‘pipeline’ of communication.

And thus by ‘working on him/herself’ (K. Jarret) towards the ‘state of the art’ the improviser transforms and transcends his or her subjectivity – and more ever it seems that the ‘royal road’ to objectivity leads through subjectivity – which further manifests our peculiar paradox.

 

6. The inner walls

But what about the promised walls? We have had a peek at the Freudian structural model of the psyche which gave us a clue for a different reading and interpretation of our master improvisers statements. We defined three realms or vital ‘connections’ that need to be established, developed and maintained by the improvisor. And we had a very brief look at the immanent obstacles that seem to show in the process of developing improvisational practice. We also made the bold claim that subjective ‘truth’ is not a dead-end-street but rather a necessary gateway towards a more universal narrative.

That points towards the last piece of this short argument: the notion of inner representations of power relations. This subject appears disguised as another ‘dusty old hat’ that seems to have been misplaced for a long time. To pick up the polemic tone of my introduction: as we seem to be living in a time of bold  – and often bald ideas, let’s try it on![6]

Whether we look through the perspectives of Marxist or Freudian theory or the subsequent developments of Critical Theory by the protagonists of the Frankfurt School – there seems to be very little doubt about the notion, that social reality, family structures and their power relations are inscribed and represented in the subjects and their individual psychological and physical structured second nature. These inscriptions constitute the ‘inner representations of power’ – and thus our metaphoric ‘walls’ that are built from both conscious and unconscious materials.

It was the groundbreaking achievement of Freud as a true “initiator of discursive practice”(Foucault, 1969 ) to formulate a theory that described the individual development of the subject in relationship to the given socio-cultural conditions. As Freud’s successors Alfred Lorenzer and Jaques Lacan – to name just the two most important German and French Psychoanalyst theoreticians – have further developed Freuds theory to a level of complexity that is beyond the scope of this text, I will therefore stick to the simplifying metaphor of the ‘inner walls’. In their effect on the subject these ‘walls’ not only in various ways narrow down the field of creative action (Spielraum), they also form the obstacles and structures of resistance for conscious emancipatory developments and ‘attacks’ from unconscious primary drives of the pleasure principle alike.

Artistic production where it succeeds realizes these obstacles – it transforms and transcends them into ‘aesthetic form’. Or as Herbert Marcuse puts it:

Art reflects this dynamic in its insistence on its own truth, which has its ground in social reality and is yet its “other.” Art breaks open a dimension inaccessible to other experience, a dimension in which human beings, nature, and things no longer stand under the law of the established reality principle. Subjects and objects encounter the appearance of that autonomy which is denied them in their society. The encounter with the truth of art happens in the estranging language and images which make perceptible, visible, and audible that which is no longer, or not yet, perceived, said, and heard in everyday life. (Marcuse, Conclusion, Location 688)

That is exactly the observation we have made in the process of pursuing artistic Improvisation: a long and sometimes painful – but also joyful and increasingly rewarding way towards a notion of freedom. A way through territories made of rules and prohibitions where the exploring subject / the improvisor is guided by well-behaved or opportunistic decisions, inappropriate or wild actions, silly or dangerous maneuvers, shy inactions, halfhearted decisions, brave escapades – you name it. Herbert Marcuse:

The autonomy of art reflects the unfreedom of individuals in the unfree society. If people were free, then art would be the form and expression of their freedom. Art remains marked by unfreedom; in contradicting it, art achieves its autonomy. The nomos which art obeys is not that of the established reality principle but of its negation. But mere negation would be abstract, the “bad” utopia. The utopia in great art is never the simple negation of the reality principle but its transcending preservation (Aufhebung) in which past and present cast their shadow on fulfillment. The authentic utopia is grounded in recollection. (Ibid., 702)

The obvious postulate to the improvisor to ‘detect’ these ‘walls’ and to take up the ‘fight’ seems to be a quite simple and profane appeal. But every attempt to ‘cross these borders’ and to ‘face the other side’ – every first step towards autonomy – is accompanied with Angst. Being able to recognize, accept and overcome (and eventually understand) these anxieties and fears is a necessary step. The journey is a long one – it usually takes a lifetime. At least one does not have to fight a lonely and desperate Don Quixotian fight since Improvisation is a social practice: the caring and sharing collective is so much stronger and wiser than the individual.[7]

And then there is the music…

 

7. Epilogue / Loose Ends

I am aware of the fact that the present text leaves some intriguing theoretical questions open. In particular it would be very rewarding to gain a better understanding of the creative process of musical group Improvisation in the context of more recent psychoanalytic concepts of object relations. While there has been a growing number of publications in recent years, these works mostly look at the creative process in visual arts or writing. The practice of musical Improvisation with its strong social implications and peculiar material is in many ways different from let’s say the production of a painting.

An important discussion would also be around the question, in what way the concept of embodiment as described by D. Sudnow in The ways of the hand relates to the narrative of this text.[8] I believe that Sudnow’s concept – while it clearly does not take affective, psychodynamic or social aspects into explicit account – does not contradict the notion of the ‘subconscious’. In order to define this relationship, one would have to discuss ‘embodiment’ in psychoanalytic terms – which is beyond the scope of the text at hand and therefore has to be postponed.

Another topic would be the question of relevance of the chosen quotes – as all are by Jazz musicians and therefore may imply and refer only to a specific improvisational practice. While I believe that my argument is not compromised by my choice of warrantors – there is certainly more to be found behind it, that I can only address very briefly at this point. It is my strong belief that the significance of the African-American artform called Jazz for twentieth century music is still widely underrated and misunderstood. In his article ‘Improvised Music after 1950: Afrological and Eurological Perspectives’,  George Lewis points out the very different historical and socio-cultural backgrounds of Jazz music (and its subsequent developments) and the Western or ‘pan-Europen’ art music tradition and discusses the resulting difficulties and resistances in a mediation at eye level. Lewis uncovers both – the Euro-centric blindness and the constitution of “Jazz as Epistomological Other” (Lewis 2002, p. 227) – as racialized power relations. Obviously I could not agree more.[9]

Another more general topic would be the question of relevance of the chosen theoretical references –  in particular that of Psychoanalysis itself, as some may argue that the present argument is overhauled and antiquated since the discourse on Marxism and Psychoanalysis was elevated to the ‘next level’ by the works of Deleuze and Guattari (1972, 1980) – just to name the most prominent contributors. While I would certainly agree to the latter, I still see the validity of my argument for two reasons: i) unlike Deleuze and Guattari I am obviously not ready to get rid of Psychoanalysis altogether; ii) my argument was derived from the musicians quotes that referenced some popular notions of Psychoanalytic theory.

Last but not least: the present text was not intended as a contribution to a strictly academic discourse but rather as a statement within a heterogeneous community outside of specialized academic or expert circles. It addresses my perception of a growing positivistic and uncritical notion of the creative process that in the long run can only result in a depreciation and trivialization of the artistic work.

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