Naomi Krajden

Improvisation is content being created without preparation or planning. Improvisation focuses more on process and less on the final product. The point of this art is to have the process and the performance occur simultaneously. Improvisation cannot be edited, or, for that matter, reproduced. There can be group and solo improvisation with interaction among the group, with the audience or with the environment. Creativity is crucial.

Pure improvisation: in a performance setting (including sound recording, film and video without an audience).

Applied improvisation: in a private setting.

An example of applied improvisation is a process called “work-shopping”. Many theatrical pieces stem from this creative process. An act will be fully established by the time it is ready to be performed publicly.

Although computerized improvisation is not created and performed simultaneously, it is being considered improvisation because it is interactive and it is not entirely repeatable.

Improvisation is often generated with elements of previously existing material or structure. It is ideally a balance between new and old. Here we see referent and non-referent improvisation. Referent improvisation is fostered on structure, theme or objective. It uses a “blueprint”. Non-referent improvisation, on the other hand, has no backbone to rely on. Similarly, an improviser might be a sensory or non-sensory performer. A sensory performer integrates materials from the improvisation into his/her performance. A non-sensory performer would ignore such materials or simply not respond to them.

Smith and Roger use ideas from Frost and Yarrow’s book Improvisation in Drama numerous times in this reading. Improvisation, according to Frost and Yarrow, is about not striving for a specific result but rather exploring the process and not minding failure.

It would seem that the creation of “free jazz” in the US in the 1960s was not necessarily a result of black musicians expressing the social issues of the time. Rather, the music is just associated, by the audience and performers, with the social struggle. Therefore, the music produced was viewed as a sort of revolt.

After this reading this article, I wondered, can improvisation really be considered its own art form? It is not an example of merged disciplines (hybrid). And nearly every discipline is capable of being improvised. Is it simply a spontaneous use of each discipline? Or is it something more distinctly defined?

Celia Saroya

• Improvisation is a social act which involves relating to the world around you, and commenting on it in critical and often political ways

• It is a process which contrary to popular belief involves skill and practice—it is not 100% spontaneous and unplanned

• Thesis: “We wish to connect the process of creativity in improvisation with the work created and its reception: and the emphasis exactly the process-product interchanges which have been neglected by critics (Smith, 29).”

• In other words, the authors want to make clear that contrary to popular belief, the act of improvisation is a measure of the process and skill involved, not simply of the product as is the case of conventional “composition” pieces

• Pure Improv – the performer makes a series of choices which cannot be erased, and thus must be incorporated into the finished product. For example, improvisation performances in which the performers are given a subject and are asked to “improvise” a skit

• Applied Improv — “a step towards producing a work which will be eventually displayed to audiences (Smith, 27).” For example, stream of consciousness is a form of writing which involves sitting and writing anything that comes to ones mind. The product could then be used in producing a script to a play.

• My understanding is that there is no direct opposition between improv and composition pieces, aside from the fact that the processes are different. Improv arises from skill and practicing, and relating to the environment (whether that environment is the audience, or the set – the performer feeds off of it) and the final product is unknown while composition pieces involve a set goal which is determined from the beginning

• Examples of Improvisation in the arts include: jazz, rap, contact improv (a form of dance) and oral traditions of story telling (before fixed text was widely used)

• Improv has often been rejected by “the establishment” because it does not have a finished script which can be approved by censors (Smith, 40) I think this is part of the brilliance of improvisation: it breaks free of cultural norms and is able to produce new and creative ways of thinking, thoughts which may be oppressed by the establishment, and thus not able to make it into the mainstream otherwise

• Discussion Questions: What, if anything, does improvisation contribute to popular culture that could not be accomplished by traditional composition pieces? How were your preconceived notions about improv changed after reading this chapter?

Yunhong Wang

The text wrote by Hazel Smith & Dean Roger in 1997. Haze works in the areas of poetry, experimental writing, performance and multi-media. She has written books such as:

1997. Improvisation, Hypermedia and the Arts Since 1945, London and New York, Harwood Academic.

2000. Hyperscapes in the Poetry of Frank O'Hara: difference, homosexuality, topography, Liverpool, Liverpool University Press. Smith, Hazel. 2005. The Writing Experiment: strategies for innovative creative writing, Allen and Unwin, Sydney

What is Improvisation?

Begin of this text; Hazel gives her position with improvisation. First, the improvisation is concerned with processes rather than products; it is social rather than solipsistic. There is no single definition of improvisation cab be satisfactory for many different kinds of improvisation. Also there is no absolute opposition between improvisation and composition. Second, Pure improvisation, involves the simultaneous conception and performance of an artwork. Two consequences of pure improvisation takes place of performance and creativity: 1.takes place within a defined time frame. 2. It occurs continuously through time, at speed, and does not involve revision. Three types performance time frame in improvisation: event time, set time, and symbolic time. The length of the pieces is self –generating that is a consequence of the structure of the improvisation itself. Third, computerisation is altering our definition of improvisation quite radically.

The Process of Improvising

An element in improvising is the balance between using procedural formulae and pre-existent, and creating new material, new combinations and new procedures. The improviser is usually willing to use materials are available.

Another useful distinction of improvisation is between referent and non-referent work. The referent improvisation is based on a ore-arranged structure, procedure, theme and objective. None-referent work is no pre-arranged organisation or concept existed specific to that work.

From audience and performer, the process of improvisation in private and in public need not direr much.

Also, there are two extreme psychological stances the improviser: the sensory and the non-sensory.

The sensory and non-sensory axis is again continuous and not disjunctive. The sensory improviser may create material, which is primarily introverted or extroverted.

Another important in the improvising process is the use of associative or non-associative techniques.

Creativity, Orality, Textuality and Improvisation

The creativity idea as process includes that finding the artwork by an explorative process rather than working towards a pre-conceived goal. Creativity As process involves slowing the artwork to become self-generating. The improvisers usually exploit both orality and textuality.

Theories of Improvisation and Their Sociopolitical Basis

Improvisation can have implications both for self- development and for social organisation, and the process of improvisation has often been directed against artistic and social control. In this content, author gives the discussing that is Johnson’s argument with Jazz.

I have a question, what does post-modern avant-garde mean? (Page 16)

Victoria Wong

Through their writing, “Improv(is)ing the Definitions”, Hazel Smith and Dean Roger attempt to redefine the meaning of improvisation by rejecting the social misconceptions which regard “improvisation” simply as a “solitary, unrehearsed performance for the public”. In attempt to redefine the social meaning of improvisation, the authors first stress that, rather than placing an importance on the artistic product, improvisation is concerned about process and change. They further analyze the complex background of improvisation by breaking it down into different categories such as pure and applied, referent, and non-referent improvisation. They argue that the separate idea of “improvisation” is simply one—or a combination—of many improvisation styles used in certain arts; for example, jazz players may use both pure and thematic referent improvisation in their performance by starting the piece with a specific tune yet perform continuously transforming the flow of the music. Many arts have used pure or applied improvisation in the product. Although musical compositions and theatrical productions are the typical examples of “improvisation”, the authors insist that improvisation does not always include an audience. Whether in a solo or a group performance, improvisation is an art that helps extending oneself; it is an interactive process and a collaboration of choices between the performer and others. “The development of a separate concept “improvisation” is…the result of a social convergence in the discourse of language.” (Smith and Roger 1997, p. 36) Throughout many years, the meaning of “improvisation” has gone through big changes: gender politics, economic hardship, computerization, consumerist pressure are some influences on how people view improvisation today. These changes in history have especially portrayed an effect on jazz music since the 1950s; not only that the effects of these social changes contributed to the upbringing of the popular music genre, they have also affected the general idea of improvisation. Today, rap is a popular music genre which reflects on the change in our culture and in movement, especially in music and in improvisation.

“Improvisation is concerned with processes rather than products; it is social rather than solipsistic. The possibilities which improvisation offers for relating the world to others in a highly attentive and flexible way should not be underestimated.” (Smith and Roger 1997, p. 25)

Improvisation is a form of creativity, a way of thinking; it is an art, an application in art and life that requires much collaboration in order to exhibit the originality and creativity of performers. The idea of “originality”, however, has been questioned greatly in the field of arts throughout the history: similar ideas were seen evident in other “new” forms of art work. It has been said that the idea of “originality” has vanished. At the age where mass production is favoured, is the idea of originality truly vanished? If this is truly so, should the idea of “pure improvisation” be re-evaluated once again?

Jonathon Yule

The second chapter of the book Improvisation, Hypermedia and the Arts since 1945 by Hazel Smith and Dean Roger opens up with two statements which are then strung together with the notion that the act of improvisation is the art rather than what the improvisation produces. Smith and Roger then attempt to define improvisation on a more technical level by stating that there is no one “correct” definition of improvisation and that improvisation and composition are not separate but related. Smith and Roger then state that are two types of improvisation: pure and applied.

Pure improvisation is when both the idea and performance of the work of art is simultaneous. This form of improvisation either has a set time frame in which the work will occur or the work “occurs continuously through time, at speed, and does not involve revision”. Richard Schechner, editor of TDR:The Drama Review and professor, had previously defined three different types of performance time which are: event time1, set time­­2 and symbolic time3. Pure improvisation is also influenced by a wide range of factors including the audience and the space in which the performance occurs. Ultimately, the point is made that pure improvisation is limited to time and that “not all performance is improvisation”.

Applied improvisation is when improvisation is used to generate ideas for a composition and are used in a composition. It is important to note that recorded instances of pure improvisation without an audience is different from applied improvisations. An example of applied improvisation given in the text is the fact that many theatre productions are “workshopped” with applied improvisation in private which evolve over time but are, for the most part, entirely fixed by the time the public can view the play. Hypermedia is also mentioned which is the amalgamation of audio, video, graphics and text where the viewer can go through all of it with the use of hyperlinks and the classic example of hypermedia is the World Wide Web.

It is important to note that “improvisations are not entirely self-generating” and the fact that an improviser likely has a collection of “personal cliches” that they can use , recombine and modify during a performance. On the contrary there are some improvisers who will use any aspect of their environment and they likely have no prior knowledge of the environment. Smith and Dean also make note of two different categories of improvisation: referent and non-referent.

Referent improvisation is “based on a pre-arranged structure, procedure, theme or objective” while a non-referent improvisation would have “no pre-arranged organization or concept existed specific to that work”. Noted is the fact that these two categories are akin to the idea that improvisation and composition are not totally separate unless in extremely rare circumstances.

A note about group improvisation is the notion that each individuals improvisational output is influencing the other members and they are being influence themselves. Also, the performer (either individually or as a group) is reacting to the audience and the audience is reacting to the performers .