How did music start? Why do we play music? What was the first music like? Was it invented by a child or an adult? Was it invented in daytime or nighttime? Was it improvised or composed? Why do we still improvise? Where is music going? Why are there so many different kinds of music?

I am not sure information is available for anyone to answer most, if any, of these questions. The process of thinking about the answers, however, is interesting. This is a mental exercise..

I suggest we call the birthday of music the day when someone decided to make a sound for the sake of hearing that sound. It is quite possible that sound may have been used before then for the purpose of repelling predators, or serve some other practical function. But I would like to consider that the moment that the switch was made to making sound without any practical end in mind as the birth moment of music.

Was it a child or a grownup that invented music? We can’t really tell, but we can take a guess. I would guess that it was a child. Perhaps it because grownups were too busy trying to hunt and gather, make and maintain shelter, and defend the group. More importantly, however. Children seem to have always had more of a license to play than adults. Was it invented in the daytime or nighttime? If we accept the guess that children invented it, then my guess for this question is daytime. Why? That’s probably when children played and grownups did grownup things like gather berries, and kill animals.

It may, on the face of it, seem simple to answer whether the first music was composed or improvised. One is tempted to answer that it was improvised because before there was music there certainly were no composers. Or were there? What if the child was imitating the sound of something else, like the rhythmic sound of someone crushing something. What if the first music wasn’t hitting wood against wood, but was dragging a branch on the ground. What if it was trying to imitate the sound of the wind or a creak. What if the first music was the creak? A child sat daily by the creak and listened to the sound of water against pebbles. It was music to his ears. What if the first musician was also a composer and it was water?

I now regret writing in my master’s thesis that the first music was improvised, because if there was no music before it then there certainly couldn’t have been composers. Did I leave that in the thesis or did I take it out? It could still be true. We’re only guessing.

If the first music was not played, but heard, and the first musician was not man but nature, and it was the second musician who was human. What was the first human music like? An imitation? How soon before the human musicians switched from trying to imitate to trying to produce new music? Was that some sort of a stone age avantgarde? Was it in the stone age or before? Or after? Was there a continuity in the musical heritage? When was the first musicologist born? Did people do concerts or was all music participatory in the beginning?

And what was the purpose of playing music? When and why did it turn from child’s play to something that eventually lead to Wagner, Umm Kulthoum and the Beatles?

Luckily, I have a guess here. At some point, a child or group of children were making sounds and some grownup was moved by it. That was the decisive moment. Someone was so moved by music, in fact, that they wanted to be able to experience it again.

But what happened next? Did the first music appreciator want to become a musician herself or did she just want to listen? Chopin etudes and two digit over two digit polyrhythms did not exist then, and it couldn’t have been that hard to get into conservatories. Everyone could have become a musician, but did they? Were there any music detractors? People who thought it a silly waste of time and perfectly good firewood. Was music invented before fire or after it?

When was the first orchestrator born. You know, the person who decided what the wood blocks would do, and what the branches would do, and what the shouters would do? Shouters? When did the human voice become an instrument and were the first singers difficult to deal with? When was the first diva born? When was the first time someone decided to stand before a performing crowd and waive his hand expecting that everyone would follow his directions? Did they follow his directions? Did they make fun of him? Did they hold rehearsals where he got mad and kicked people out of the his orchestra? Did he work with composers? Was he a composer himself? Did they all have fun? Who had more fun the musicians or the audience? Was there an audience or was everyone in the tribe performing?

These are serious questions. Useless. But serious. When was the first useless question about music asked? Was asked by a musicologist, a critic, or a philosopher? When was the first un-appreciated composer born? You know, the first one who was a genius but no body knew it? Did they know it after his death, or did he compose and die without anyone taking notice?

Before music paid enough, did all musicians have a day job?

Finally, a question I can answer. The answer, of course, is maybe. Maybe some of them where married to someone else who put the food on the table.

When was the first composition commissioned? What for? Who was the first person to become rich from music?

If we are to ever be able to tell the true and complete story of music we have to answer all those questions, and the questions that I haven’t thought of, and the questions that will arise from the answers, and the questions that will arise from those, etc..

But why is it important to know? Does it matter what music sounded like ten thousand years ago? Fifty?

What if it was great music? Better than anything we now know. Someone is going to roll their eyes at this one: Better than those magnificent orchestra hits? Better than the voice of Umm Kulthoum turning intervals into heartbeats. Better than the John Coltrane’s anguished saxophone prayers? Who knows? Maybe there was something better. It’s not as if the music of humanity only becomes better with time. One only needs to listen to Arabic pop music to exclaim that what was, arguably, the greatest century in the history of Arabic music was immediately followed by what is, arguably, the worst.

Was that really the greatest century in the history of Arabic music? And when was it that people started thinking of music against the passing of time? Time is always part of music. That’s rhythm. But does music have rhythm? Not within a composition, but bigger, higher rhythm. The rhythm of the life of music. Is music a living thing?

Each participant has to be aware of the overall sonic result and her part in it. This requires attentive listening. While listening is always crucial in performance, it tends to be a more complex activity in the case of performing fusion. The reason is that when playing within an idiom that one is trained in, the performer’s experience makes it possible to anticipate the overall sound without much effort. One is simply familiar with the different combinations of the instruments involved and how to influence them. Additionally, the traditional aesthetic of the idiom tends to define the role of each instrument and solutions to musical problems arising in an ensemble situation. There is no traditional roles, and no traditional aesthetic to fall back on in the case of fusion. Fresh solutions to these problems have to be invented. In the case of improvised fusion, these solutions have to be arrived at in real time. Listening, is more crucial and more difficult in the case of fusion than when playing within any particular idiom.

To reduce the complexity of the listening activity, the previous post proposed educating one’s self on the other idioms and the other participants which helps in providing assumptions about what to expect from the other players and making initial decisions that allow the performance to start well.

However, for the performance to evolve well, each participant must be testing and revising those decisions. The example in the previous post proposed one possible revision: leading the other performers to the discovery of characteristics of one’s own tradition. This, assumes that the other players are listening attentively to what you are playing. A performer should also invite the other participants to lead him into discovering things about their idioms that he can use. To do that, he must demonstrate that he is listening. How does one do that? Here are two fairly easy ways: restyling and reinterpreting. Restyling is taking a line from the other idiom and playing it in a style within your own idiom. Re-interpreting it as a melody characteristic to your idiom. The idea is very common in music. The western reader will probably be familiar with examples such as Miles Davis’ “Sketches of Spain” or Charlie Parker’s “Charlie Parker with Strings”. While neither of these works can be considered fusion, the idea of restyling and reinterpreting is prominent in both works. In fusion the same melody can be taken from one player to the next, exchanged and elaborated upon, perhaps played simultaneously etc..

Another possibility is to play responses to a phrase in another idiom, in ones own idiom. One thing that is already old over used is simple imitation. I would avoid trying to imitate another player, unless I use the phrase being imitated to take the piece in a new direction. In addition to creating confidence between players that everyone is listening, restyling, reinterpreting and responding also create relationships within the piece between the different voices. One of the first remarks in this series of posts was how common it is for fusion to sound cold and disjointed. One of the ways to avoid that is to create relationships between the different voices. That is another benefit of these three practices (restyling, reinterpreting, responding).

These are some thoughts on fusion that came up in my experience doing it. I would be excited to hear your ideas on the topic.

In my view, a series of decisions, mostly not musical, taken by each person early on, in the first seconds of the meeting or even before it, determine the outcome. The question is, how do we make fusion that works?

Before attempting to answer, I will just say that of my many attempts at fusion, the vast majority were not music I wanted to hear again. Some were fairly successful but, eh, not exactly great music. But there were a few, a really small number perhaps five or less, that were so rewarding that they kept my interest in fusion, both as a listener and as a player, alive.

What is fusion?

Fusion is combining elements from different musical idioms to create a new music that cannot be regarded as belonging to any of the original idioms, nor a natural extension of any of them. Fusion can be improvised or jointly composed by participants from the different idioms. Fusion is not a composer writing a part for a foreign instrument, then to be played by a performer that did not have say in the composition process. Fusion is not a composer taking elements from different idioms and including them in her composition (have any of those ever taken off from the ground of clichés?).

In this respect, fusion is not an idiom in the same way that, say, blues, Hindustani, or Arabic music is. If a rock electric guitar player and a native Australian digiridu player create music together, the sonic result is fundamentally different from the fusion music created a Hindustani sarod player and an Arab qanun player.

In my view, it is even superficial to call the first music, rock-Aborigine fusion and the other Hindustani-Arabic fusion. Why? Because the sonic result of the fusion depends not only on the original idioms, but also on the musical vision, knowledge, and the personalities of the players. In other words, a different rock guitarist and a different Aborigine dijiridu player would produce a different sounding idiom even though the original idioms are the same.

One may argue that no two rock guitarists sound the same either, and yet we do find it useful to talk of the rock idiom as an idiom. There is merit to the argument but, in my view, that merit is limited because practice tells us that there are different sub-idioms within rock because the sound can be so different between different rock pieces. Those differences are even more stark in fusion. So much so that the sonic result doesn’t justify making sweeping combinations such as Arabic-Hindustani or Rock-Aborigine fusion.

All those philosophical points aside, the question is, how can a rock guitarist and a Hindustani sarodist make good fusion music together? What should they do in preparation for the performance, and what should they do in the performance to make deep new music that is beautiful and transcendent?

Part 2 of this post discusses the necessary elements in a successful fusion.

Improvisation within compositions

Tahmila: A tahmila will typically start with a composed head played by the entire ensemble. The improvised sections then follow, which will be improvised to the beat. The unique thing about the tahmila is that each improvised solo has to end on a specific pitch, and in a specific part of the measure. When a solo ends, the ensemble plays a specific melody (a bridge) at the end of which the next improvised solo begins. Certain escalations are fairly common in Tahmilas. One such escalation is that the ending pitch of the solos and the maqam of the bridge changes. Notice that unlike taqasim, the improvisations in the tahmila form are rhythmic melody lines. The phrasing has to be crafted carefully so that the end is on the right beat in the measure and on the right pitch.

Other instrumental forms with place for improvisation do exist (dulabs, some dance music, to name two). Generally they can be seen as a special case of taqasim or tahmilat

Vocal compositions with room form improvisation can be divided into two categories. One category are songs that literally stop and a mawwal or layali or both are sung, after which the song resumes. In this category, the composer simply defines the stopping point, and the parameters of the mawwal or layali (typically starting maqam, ending maqam, and, in the case of mawwal, the lyrics for the mawwal). (see part 2 for definition of these terms)

The second category are songs where at a certain point in the piece, similar to tahmila, the soloist improvises the melody to a line of lyrics (or layali syllables) with the chorus responding with a composed line following each solo. Similar to tahmila, each such iteration is rhythmic, typically short and has to end on a specific pitch and beat in the measure. One form that includes such improvisations is the Dawr.

Finally, an Arabic singer or an instrumentalist will always modify the line they are performing, or variate on it. This includes adding ornaments (both diatonic and from outside the mode), changing the expression, dynamic, articulation, and /or rhythm. The greater the musical mastery and virtuosity cf the performer the greater the musical territory covered by these variations and ornaments.

Conclusion

In Arabic (as well as many other traditions) improvisation has little to do with whim. In order to be able to “improvise” within the idiom, the successful practitioner will need to have:

1. A solid grounding in the maqam system.
2. A solid sense of rhythm and phrasing
3. The ability to compose on the spot within the constraints of the style, form and mode system.
4. The technical ability to execute those compositions.

Improvisation is present in three types of musical activities. The first is forms that are entirely improvised. The second is partially improvised forms and rhythmic improvisations inserted within a composed piece. Finally, there are the ornaments that a player introduces while playing a composed musical line.

Entirely Improvised Forms In Arabic Music

1. Taqsim (pl. Taqasim): The most highly regarded of instrumental improvisation in Arabic music. This is the art of non-metric modal improvisation. In taqasim, the aesthetic centers around creating lyrical melodic line, smoothly modulating between maqams (Arabic melodic modes), and demonstrating the capabilities of the instrument on which the taqsim is being played. The function of taqasim within the context of a larger performance was usually to establish the maqam of the next piece in the set in the ears of the listeners as well as the performers, give a break from the full ensemble sound, or create a modal transition (modulation) from the maqam of the preceding piece to the maqam of the piece following the taqsim. In modern day Arabic art music scene, there are performances that are predominantly made of taqasim, but that a fairly rare occurrence. This was even more rare in older times. Every serious practitioner of Arabic music must be able to play taqasim. Although taqasim are non-metric, a discernible sense of pulse and forward movement must be present in a successful taqsim.
2. Taqsim on the beat: A form of taqasim where there is a soft rhythmic accompaniment in the background while a musician is playing a taqsim in the foreground. The accompaniment can be on a percussion instrument, on melodic instruments playing an ostinato, or both.
3. Mawwal (pl. Mawawil): Similar to taqasim, mawawil are non-metric and modal with the aesthetics centering around lyricism of the melodic lines and smoothness of modulation among different maqams. For lyrics, mawawil use poetry, which could be in classical or spoken Arabic.
4. Layali: Similar to Mawwal in everything except that layali do not use lyrics. In-stead they use words and syllables that are common to the layali form such as (ya leil and aman). It is not un-common for a vocalist to start with layali, then sing a mawwal, then return to layali and so forth. In fact, most mawawil start with layali.

The four musical forms mentioned above are the only forms in Arabic music that are entirely improvised. The next post discusses forms that include both composed sections and improvised sections.

Last year, one of my students at UC asked to be excused from class so that he could prepare for his final piano recital. We began talking about his recital and I mentioned to him that over-practicing can kill the music; that his nervousness is probably not warranted and that music is not about playing perfectly but with life and passion. He looked at me with a knowing smile and said “but your music is different. It’s all improvised.” The student’s response reflects two stereotypes: 1) the music of some cultures is less sophisticated than classical music, is all improvised on the spot and has little or no structure, form or intentionality; 2) improvisation is less demanding to perform than composed music.

Whether or not improvisation is less demanding to perform than composed music will be answered in detail at a later post.

To understand the first stereo type which dismisses improvisation as whimsical lacking structure and intentionality let us start by remembering that the predominantly improvised western classical forms of cadenzas are rarely, if ever, improvised any more. This, of course, betrays the original intent of the composers who left their cadenzas intentionally uncomposed. They were perfectly capable of writing them out was that their vision for the music. After all, writing music was what they did.

The modern classical western scene likes hierarchy. The job of the player is to play, not worry herself about what to play. That is the job of the Composer and His agent on earth, the conductor. Modern scores are getting more and more cluttered with details. The performer’s every breath is dictated by the Composer.

The stereotype about the lack of sophistication and depth in music that employs improvisation needs to be regarded as a political term used to dismiss certain music and glorify another. The implication, of course, is that thoroughly composed music is more “serious”, sophisticated, and meaningful. As a result, the Composer, and His agent, the conductor, get to keep their position in the hierarchy above the performer.

The point of this post is to set the stage for a discussion of improvisation in Arabic music. The stereotypes about it are part of the collective musical consciousness of our times, but my feeling is that ignoring that they exist closes the door before any meaningful dialog about the music.