Introduction

We might assume there was music before there was music notation. This seems logical from the fact that something should exist before it can be written down. Creation of music does not begin from notation, nor does it end there. It starts from imagination and results in sound. The road from imagination to sound may – but does not necessarily - involve notation.

Music did not derive from music notation, rather it is the other way around. We should therefore not be surprised too much that when in western music education an increasing amount of attention was drawn to notation, also growing numbers of musicians felt the need to start making music again on the basis of their own impulses. Many music education institutions nowadays have found or are finding new ways to structure education to meet this natural wish. Here, the art of inventing and performing (“improvising”) becomes a meeting place for students and teachers1. A great number of disciplines, skills and subjects become intertwined by doing this. Most often this is experienced as an advantage. Developing a meeting place like this requires a common understanding of definitions, communicative skills of teachers and students, an atmosphere open to ideas and documentation to enable reflection.

During and before the research I was (and still am) a teacher of music theory at two institutions: the Young Talent Department of the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague and the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln (Department Aachen). In the Conservatoire, I teach pupils of 9-18 years of age in the classical music department, who play all instruments. In Aachen, I teach music theory subjects to students doing their Bachelor and Master Studies. Years before I started doing this research, I had already started to turn the music theory classroom into a meeting place for improvisation every now and then. I did this for several reasons, including connecting creativity to knowledge, applying music theory in a practical manner, or showing the impact of thinking in sound very directly.

The research took place in three phases, which were: 1. Improvising in music theory classroom, 2. Creating an open form score for improvising musicians that was performed in public concerts, 3. Evaluating the findings from Phase 2, and using its conclusions to renew the approach in the classroom and to present results on a concert stage as well.


___________________

Examples are the Master Improvisation at the Hochschule für Musik Basel, the Impro Intensive Festival organized by the Royal Conservatoire The Hague and the improvisation workshops for teachers by the Netzwerk Musikhochschulen in 2017 and 2018.


 

 


Back