Capturing the Ineffable

Rusch, René; Salley, Keith; Stover, Chris

doi:10.30535/mto.22.3.9

Cited by 6 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 19 publications

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“…Since I hope to demonstrate the relationship between Taylor's note choices and his physicality, watching Taylor "dance" at his instrument will form a crucial component of my subsequent analysis. (9) [2.3] As Peter Winkler (1997) and René Rusch, Keith Salley, and Chris Stover (2016) have argued, transcription is a highly subjective activity that unavoidably reflects the concerns and biases of the transcriber. As such, before embarking on my analysis, I want to be clear about what I hope to capture in my transcriptions and what I don't-especially given Taylor's stated dislike of Western notation.…”

Section: Western Notation Blocksmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sound Structures and Naked Fire Gestures in Cecil Taylor’s Solo Piano Music

Micchelli

2022

MTO

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Analyses of Cecil Taylor’s music are understandably scarce. Very few of his scores exist, and transcriptions are even harder to come by. The music itself is often blindingly fast, unremittingly dissonant, and rhythmically elusive, further discouraging attempts at comprehension. This article aims to fill this analytical void, demonstrating that Taylor’s music is not nearly as intimidating as it at first would seem. Using my own transcriptions of Taylor’s music as a guide, I argue that Taylor’s music is best understood not as abstract relationships between pitches (“sound structures”), but rather as the formal organization of physical movements (“naked fire gestures”). Such a hypothesis comports with Taylor’s own explanation of his music—“I try to imitate on the piano the leaps in space a dancer makes”—and thus demands that questions of physiology and physicality be considered under the umbrella of music theory. Furthermore, this movement-first analytical approach complicates traditional understandings of the autonomous musical “work”: while Taylor’s music could be understood as distinct, individual performances, it is also worthwhile to consider his overarching musical practice as an analytical object in and of itself. Finally, I trace the sounds and gestures of Taylor’s music back to their roots in blues and jazz, reinforcing Taylor’s own understanding of his music as a continuation of Black music traditions.

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Section: Western Notation Blocksmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sound Structures and Naked Fire Gestures in Cecil Taylor’s Solo Piano Music

Micchelli

2022

MTO

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Bins, Spans, and Tolerance: Three Theories of Microtiming Behavior

Danielsen,

Johansson,

Stover

2023

Music Theory Spectrum

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This study compares three recent theories of expressive microtiming in music. While each theory was originally designed to engage a particular musical genre—Anne Danielsen’s beat bins for funk, Neo-Soul, and other contemporary Black musical expressions, Chris Stover’s beat span for “timeline musics” from Africa and the African diaspora, and Mats Johansson’s rhythmic tolerance for Scandinavian fiddle music—we consider how they can productively coexist in a shared music-analytic space, each revealing aspects of musical structure and process in mutually reinforcing ways. In order to explore these possibilities, we bring all three theories to bear on a recording of Thelonious Monk’s “Monk’s Dream,” focusing on Monk’s piano gestures as well as the relationship between saxophonist Charlie Rouse’s improvised solo and Monk’s and bassist John Ore’s accompaniments.

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Four Studies of Charlie Parker's Compositional Processes

Martin

2018

MTO

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Charlie Parker has been much appreciated as an improviser, but he was also an important jazz composer, a topic yet to be studied in depth. Parker’s compositions offer insight into his total musicianship as well as provide a summary of early bebop style. Because he left no working manuscripts, we cannot examine his compositions evolving on paper. We do possess occasional single parts for trumpet or alto saxophone of pieces written for recording sessions and four Library of Congress lead sheets copied in his hand, and, as an introduction, I show examples of such manuscripts. The article continues by exploring what we can infer about Parker’s compositional processes from those instances where he made revisions to improve or create the final product. In particular, there is one instance of Parker revising a work already completed (“Ornithology”), one instance of Parker combining two pieces by another composer into one of his own (“My Little Suede Shoes”), and two instances of Parker composing in the studio where we can hear his revisions immediately (“Red Cross” and “Blues (Fast)”). The middle part of the paper explores Parker in these creative settings. Parker’s methods sometimes differ from traditional composition and suggest that we reconsider the usual distinction between improvisation and composition. I conclude with observations on Parker’s procedures, proposing refinements to ontological models of musical works to account for jazz compositions.

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Capturing the Ineffable

Cited by 6 publications

References 19 publications

Sound Structures and Naked Fire Gestures in Cecil Taylor’s Solo Piano Music

Sound Structures and Naked Fire Gestures in Cecil Taylor’s Solo Piano Music

Bins, Spans, and Tolerance: Three Theories of Microtiming Behavior

Four Studies of Charlie Parker's Compositional Processes

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