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Wednesday, 11 January 2012
Group vocal improv exercises
Over the last few months we at the London Vocal Improv Collective have found, collated, created and collected these ways of approaching vocal improvisation in a group of about 6 - 12 people.
1. Talking nonsense
Start by having conversations in nonsense. Before long, patterns start to arise from the nonsense - hear a phrase you like and start to repeat it. Little loops arrive, and from them music grows...
A good warm up for this is the Bobby M exercise where you go through the alphabet doing a bit of nonsense with each letter of it as the starting letter in turn.
2. Twisted karaoke
One person thinks of a song and keeps it secret. The rest of the group starts a groove (using, if needed, exercise 4). Then the soloist has to put their song over the group's groove, keeping as faithfully as possible to the song yet putting it within the tempo, time and key signature of the groove. Especially good with traditional songs in your mother tongue :)
3. You sing we follow
One person starts singing. It can be a song or an improvisation. The rest of the group brings in sound to support.
4. Motor, interlocker, counterpoint
Small version
Create a base with three roles.
The motor is a 1 - 4 bar repetitive riff. It has to have some space in it. Often you improvise your way into it, start singing whatever and wait for the loop to arise. The motor is also the conductor, and can lead key changes, endings, pauses, dynamic changes and so on.
The interlocker is like the motor's partner. It lives in the spaces created by the motor and works with the motor to create a strong basket to hold the piece in.
The counterpoint is another loop, but now an entirely new kind of sound, to create a fresh contrast to the motor-interlocker partnership. So, if they are very staccato, the counterpoint might be very flowing. If they are cute, it might be harsh. If they descend slowly, the counterpoint might ascend quickly. You get the idea.
Bigger version
Several other parts can layer upon the three part basis. Each of the primary three parts can have harmonies from other singers. In addition, there is base, rhythm (can be two or more people) and a soloist.
5. Whale song
Apparently, communities of whales know who's in their community because they all share the same song. They swim around the sea singing it. Often little variations come in. When a whale hears a community member singing a variation they like, they pick it up. In that way, by the end of a season often a whole community will be singing an entirely different song to the song they started with, but they will all still be singing the same song as one another.
Here's how whale song works.
One person is the conductor. They divide singers into parts and make up a part for each part group.
Once you've been given your part, you can stick to it, you can copy someone else, or you can sing something entirely different. The only idea really is to keep what you're doing in fitting with the whole sound. (It can be fitting to take it somewhere new).
In that way, once you've all got into the car, so to speak, you can take the car anywhere together. The piece finishes itself. When it's over, it's over.
6. Conductor soloist
This is a bit like whale song but more power remains with the initial conductor. The conductor can keep tweaking the piece once it's live, changing parts, influencing dynamics and generally doing whatever they want.
The conductor can pick a soloist, or different soloists in turn. If you're picked you come into the middle and solo over the group. It doesn't matter how scared you are. You'll relax before long. It's important that the group supports the soloist with their volume, being quiet enough to hear the soloist and matching the soloists energy when they get loud and strong.
The conductor can be the soloist, and can play with the parts, for example cutting a part for half of it and singing in the space created like a call and response. You can silence parts entirely, move part volumes up and down, get everyone singing the same part, create more and more sub parts, and solo in a way that supports and serves the sound - anything that sounds and feels good!
6. Bubble up from silence
Here you just start from silence, with closed eyes, and let sound bubble up, live and die. What I find really delightful here is the mix between more and less musical noise. It can start from breath, rhythm can emerge, strange noises, animal or machinery noises, then some notes might flower like petals, stretch and harmonise, fly a little together, then sink back into atonal sounds.
7. Scene setting
This is a bit like bubbling up from silence, but you start by deciding on a scene. It can be, 'sunrise in Mumbai', or, 'a swamp', or, '2am soho' etc. Again you start from silence, the scene rises, lives out a kind of story, and then dies back into silence.
Do you have any more?
1. Talking nonsense
Start by having conversations in nonsense. Before long, patterns start to arise from the nonsense - hear a phrase you like and start to repeat it. Little loops arrive, and from them music grows...
A good warm up for this is the Bobby M exercise where you go through the alphabet doing a bit of nonsense with each letter of it as the starting letter in turn.
2. Twisted karaoke
One person thinks of a song and keeps it secret. The rest of the group starts a groove (using, if needed, exercise 4). Then the soloist has to put their song over the group's groove, keeping as faithfully as possible to the song yet putting it within the tempo, time and key signature of the groove. Especially good with traditional songs in your mother tongue :)
3. You sing we follow
One person starts singing. It can be a song or an improvisation. The rest of the group brings in sound to support.
4. Motor, interlocker, counterpoint
Small version
Create a base with three roles.
The motor is a 1 - 4 bar repetitive riff. It has to have some space in it. Often you improvise your way into it, start singing whatever and wait for the loop to arise. The motor is also the conductor, and can lead key changes, endings, pauses, dynamic changes and so on.
The interlocker is like the motor's partner. It lives in the spaces created by the motor and works with the motor to create a strong basket to hold the piece in.
The counterpoint is another loop, but now an entirely new kind of sound, to create a fresh contrast to the motor-interlocker partnership. So, if they are very staccato, the counterpoint might be very flowing. If they are cute, it might be harsh. If they descend slowly, the counterpoint might ascend quickly. You get the idea.
Bigger version
Several other parts can layer upon the three part basis. Each of the primary three parts can have harmonies from other singers. In addition, there is base, rhythm (can be two or more people) and a soloist.
5. Whale song
Apparently, communities of whales know who's in their community because they all share the same song. They swim around the sea singing it. Often little variations come in. When a whale hears a community member singing a variation they like, they pick it up. In that way, by the end of a season often a whole community will be singing an entirely different song to the song they started with, but they will all still be singing the same song as one another.
Here's how whale song works.
One person is the conductor. They divide singers into parts and make up a part for each part group.
Once you've been given your part, you can stick to it, you can copy someone else, or you can sing something entirely different. The only idea really is to keep what you're doing in fitting with the whole sound. (It can be fitting to take it somewhere new).
In that way, once you've all got into the car, so to speak, you can take the car anywhere together. The piece finishes itself. When it's over, it's over.
6. Conductor soloist
This is a bit like whale song but more power remains with the initial conductor. The conductor can keep tweaking the piece once it's live, changing parts, influencing dynamics and generally doing whatever they want.
The conductor can pick a soloist, or different soloists in turn. If you're picked you come into the middle and solo over the group. It doesn't matter how scared you are. You'll relax before long. It's important that the group supports the soloist with their volume, being quiet enough to hear the soloist and matching the soloists energy when they get loud and strong.
The conductor can be the soloist, and can play with the parts, for example cutting a part for half of it and singing in the space created like a call and response. You can silence parts entirely, move part volumes up and down, get everyone singing the same part, create more and more sub parts, and solo in a way that supports and serves the sound - anything that sounds and feels good!
6. Bubble up from silence
Here you just start from silence, with closed eyes, and let sound bubble up, live and die. What I find really delightful here is the mix between more and less musical noise. It can start from breath, rhythm can emerge, strange noises, animal or machinery noises, then some notes might flower like petals, stretch and harmonise, fly a little together, then sink back into atonal sounds.
7. Scene setting
This is a bit like bubbling up from silence, but you start by deciding on a scene. It can be, 'sunrise in Mumbai', or, 'a swamp', or, '2am soho' etc. Again you start from silence, the scene rises, lives out a kind of story, and then dies back into silence.
Do you have any more?
Friday, 23 September 2011
Lovely lullabies
Coorie Doon is beautiful
Irene Watt is an ethnomusicologist in Scotland who teaches lullabies to mothers and all their babies fall asleep in the classes.
Irene Watt is an ethnomusicologist in Scotland who teaches lullabies to mothers and all their babies fall asleep in the classes.
Monday, 29 August 2011
Bobby McFerrin Workshop!
Totally high. I’m at the Omega Institute in New York State, just after the first night of a workshop with Bobby McFerrin. The Master
thanks to pitch, rhythm and God for the picture. Oo. Pitch rhythm and God?
Circle songs
He creates them quickly. No premeditation. He gets a feeling, starts singing something, turns it into a loop, looks around for which voice it is, assigns it appropriately. Creates another, off he goes.
He creates parts which he can break into chunks. It’s like a dolls house that you can take parts off. You can take off the whole roof, or this or that chimney, or all chimneys leaving the roof, or the whole roof again. By which I mean, he’ll give three voices the same part in harmony, and the part can be split in two. Then he plays call and response. Sometimes with one voice, silencing it one round while he sings in the gap that creates, bringing it back in again one round while he stops singing, silencing it again and singing back. Or he’ll do that with half the part – silencing it for the first half of the loop and singing, bringing it back for the second half. Sometimes he’ll do that with one voice, the top voice, say, keeping the lower two voices of that part, sometimes he’ll do that with all three voices, just leaving, say, the bottom three voices keeping a different part of the sound going. Like sometimes peeling off the trees, and sometimes peeling off the trees and the earth showing the bare rock beneath.
The conductor in the middle plays solo. They’re not taking from the group sound, the group doesn’t subjugate to support them; they’re contributing. Giving whatever they can to raise the energy. Bits. Pieces. Artful little contributions. The energy raises. They alter the piece. Add something. A hey on an off beat. That gets gradually louder. An underlying beatbox. Something that gives.
It’s brilliant. It’s fucking brilliant.
Small group improv
Wowweeeeee I can’t say how delighted I was to see what they started with.
A group of five. Bobby got going with a loose little loop that sometimes stuck to the pattern and sometimes didn’t. Gradually each singer began to contribute something complementary. All voices relaxed and soft. Everything playful and delicious and musical. The piece meandered, grew, took a left, up a sharp hill, down a soft slope, suddenly in unison, now polyphonic again, Oh My God this is heaven and I want to jump in and I want to swim and swim and live in this.
The four singers accompanying him are the teachers. They are Rhiannon, Christiane Karam, Joey Blake and David Worm. They are humble and brilliant and beautiful and I want to sit at their feet and apprentice myself to them, to Rhiannon and Bobby in particular.
There is embodied grace, embodied humility, embodied excellence, a palpable spirituality that is about grounded authentic play, play with elegant beauty, play with beastly snarls, play with all that it is to be human, but all that so subtly, because above all it is music and it is very very musical. Sometimes I find, in myself and in others, that when the musical expertise is lacking an over-expressiveness can take over to compensate. These guys have the balance.
Here are some of the things that they said.
Someone voiced my question: what are you doing when you do that? They said things like this:
I’m thinking, co-operate, co-operate, co-operate. Blend in. Don’t do anything tricky.
Give away. Find out where you fit. Trust. We have each others’ backs. A lot of love. Being very quiet. Listening for what’s being given.
Everyone has a tone, sound and rhythm. Don’t be impatient. Take time to listen for what the person is doing.
Not really thinking. Anticipating what they might do (often wrongly), supporting and accompanying.
Practice informs and enriches your vocabulary. Listen listen listen to all manner of things. Among other activities that will develop your vocabulary.
It’s all jazz. Be loose, be free, don’t think too much about it, let the music come out.
Skill building. Become confident to jump in. At first it will be fearful, of course. “Anything worthwhile doing, if it’s new, you’ll be a little afraid of it.” (Bobby).
Watch the music come out. See where it goes.
Practice
Play with different sounds, the whole alphabet. Play with each consonant against each vowel. Quickly. Light and agile. Play your way through the whole alphabet in something like a minute.
Could be supported by an underlying slow groove circle song.
Someone can lead it. Calling things like chord number – singing the instructions. And say things like: Stop. Hold a silence. Then, Go.
Humm. What can I do, each week, little by gentle little, humble by playful humble, enjoyably, to expand my vocabulary?
Monday, 25 July 2011
Poor old Amy
I just heard the sad news about Amy Winehouse's death.
She was in a tough position.
In a great TED talk, Liz Gilbert muses on what a difficult position contemporary arts culture puts artists in.
Back in the day, she said, artistic inspiration was understood to be about more than the individual. The creative at work was inspired, in-spired; spirit was in the house. The creative was a channel. Upon her shoulder sat a 'genie' - etymological origin of 'genius' - some small creature who would pour the ideas into the creative, who would then pour them into the work. If the musician was fabulous, they were lucky to have a great genie. It wasn't all about them. If they were having a fallow period, bad old genie wasn't showing up for work. The ego was protected from taking direct responsibility for the inevitable peaks and troughs in creative productivity.
Not so these days with our secular ideas: the individual is responsible for the greatness when the work is great, and has lost it, fallen from grace, when the work lacks spark.
It puts the ego in a difficult place. Especially for someone as talented as Amy. Huge inflation from the huge audiences, deals, money, fame. Huge crashes when her identity struggles to healthily accommodate these bloated notions.
She would have struggled too, I imagine, with the absence of a grounding humility in the idea of the role of the musician.
I once sung with some Kora players from Mali and was struck by their humble, generous, relaxed and playful attitude towards making and sharing music. The Kora player in Mali plays a cultural service, they explained to me, with three main roles. Firstly, to hold the values of the culture that are embedded in the traditional songs. Their role is to learn the songs, know the songs, teach the songs and sing the songs so that the people remember who they are and what they value. (The Shona songs from Zimbabwe that I sing with Chartwell play a similar role in carrying values. "Where will I be when the problem comes? I will be with my father" are the lyrics to one entire song. It tells a lot about the role of a father. "Don't make the children wear patchwork: patchwork clothes are only for adults," sings another. Patchwork fabric is a sign of poverty. If there is poverty, the priority is to protect the children from feeling poor, the song instructs.)
Two more roles for the Kora player from Mali: to create a party atmosphere for weddings and celebrations, and to keep the peace. The kora is wonderfully soothing - you've heard Toumani Diabate right? So, if you argue with, say, your partner, someone will go and fetch the nearest kora player to come and sit nearby and play the kora while you argue. And when he does, you will not be able to help but soften. You will soften into a way of communicating that is less violent, and as a result, face a better chance of hearing and being heard, and finding a resolution to your conflict.
How cool is that?
I think we need these ideas as musicians, of service, of embedded social role, of being a channel for 'god' rather than 'god' itself.
Malidoma Some agrees. He says:
"[Artistic] talents are widely recognised in indigenous communities because indigenous people assume that the artist is a priest or a priestess through whom the Other World finds an entrance into this world. If the priest or the priestess regards with reverence and humility the world where his or her art originates, then the work done becomes lasting and impressive. If not, the artist does not last very long." - The Healing Wisdom of Africa
I bet a lot of people helped Amy to package herself - her sound, her appearance, her songs, her stage presence, her CDs, her financial management.
I wonder if anybody helped Amy to see the enormous talent she had been given in this way.
Somehow I doubt it. These ideas are not prevalent in our culture.
Poor Amy.
Sunday, 17 July 2011
Sauna songs
I've just come home from the wonderful Buddhafield festival.
I'd like to go back next year armed with songs and singing to share. I didn't this year because I didn't think about it or prepare.
Firstly, Sauna songs. I was a bit stumped by this.
Sauna songs should be easy to learn and easy to build upon. Good to have high and low energy songs up your sleeve.
First thoughts:
In that sweet by and by
Hold on just a little bit longer
Great mother / from singing in the wild
in the morning
Good morning grandmother
the best bit of all was when someone started a beat, people picked it up and added to it, the light mysteriously went out, people started to tone, tones turned into harmonies, harmonies into yodels, yodels into musical yells, claps into stamps, the whole thing went WILD - fantastic.
I'd like to go back next year armed with songs and singing to share. I didn't this year because I didn't think about it or prepare.
Firstly, Sauna songs. I was a bit stumped by this.
Sauna songs should be easy to learn and easy to build upon. Good to have high and low energy songs up your sleeve.
First thoughts:
In that sweet by and by
Hold on just a little bit longer
Great mother / from singing in the wild
in the morning
Good morning grandmother
the best bit of all was when someone started a beat, people picked it up and added to it, the light mysteriously went out, people started to tone, tones turned into harmonies, harmonies into yodels, yodels into musical yells, claps into stamps, the whole thing went WILD - fantastic.
Wednesday, 13 July 2011
Gaudete
This is one of my favourite Christmas songs.
I like this youtube comment from one of the choir members:
Mainly they are people who work on the fields (agriculture) whom don't even speak a foreign language besides myself 2 or 3 others among teenagers. The conductor (he is a music teacher) intended to do so... fast and joyfully. He meant to and we did it :)
1 year ago
I really like the Steeleye Span version.
Its author says:
I like this youtube comment from one of the choir members:
Mainly they are people who work on the fields (agriculture) whom don't even speak a foreign language besides myself 2 or 3 others among teenagers. The conductor (he is a music teacher) intended to do so... fast and joyfully. He meant to and we did it :)
1 year ago
I really like the Steeleye Span version.
Its author says:
Uploaded by viggojaredcoreymatt on May 1, 2009
I love the way this song sounds, I couldn't find the lyrics anywhere on YouTube so I made this video. I also wondered what it meant so I found a translation - I did not translate it myself!
Wednesday, 6 July 2011
Bangdiza 2 from Chartwell
Thanks to Emily for the words:
Mhuka inoruma vakomana
Mhuka inoruma
Mhuka inoruma vakomanaMudeve mune tsanga
"Vakomana" means 'brothers'
The song means 'Hey guys this animal bites' or something like that...:)
Karimugamba
Hurendende iya wayene x3
nyama musango (in the middle of the bush)
huchi munodya mega
ndiyah wamora
it means
bring the honey!
Getting the honey is an act of daring. You have to climb tall trees and take honey from wild aggressive bees. Sugars don't come easy in the jungle :)
Tuesday, 5 July 2011
Nyangara Chena from Fred
Sorry about the wobbly videos. I'll edit them at some point. In the mean time here they are.
Words
Nyangara Chena (repeat)
Nai way Nyangara way
Ta zoku ona Nyangara
Nai way Nyangara way
Mambo wedu wofa Nyangara
Meaning
Nyangara is python-healer. The song says, Python healer, come out (chena). We need your help (ta zoku ona). Our chief is dying (mambo wedu wofa).
Words
Nyangara Chena (repeat)
Nai way Nyangara way
Ta zoku ona Nyangara
Nai way Nyangara way
Mambo wedu wofa Nyangara
Meaning
Nyangara is python-healer. The song says, Python healer, come out (chena). We need your help (ta zoku ona). Our chief is dying (mambo wedu wofa).
Tuesday, 28 June 2011
The learning process. And 'genies'...
When I began to focus more on vocal improvisation, I found I often heard a little voice inside of me. My job as an improviser was simply to follow it. It always seemed to come up with beauty. To follow it was a smooth pleasure.
Now I have been studying vocal improvisation for a year, with David Eskenazy. I don't hear that little voice any more. I haven't for a while. My hunch about why this is has been pretty much the same as Jo's, but she explains it very nicely...
"We never got back to talking about how your voice connection to the 'genies' has gone. My take on this is that while you are learning a new skill the genies go away. This is so that they don't interrupt the dialogue that you brain is having with your body. Once you reach your new desired skill level and feel confident in it the brain will be able to go back onto autopilot and the genies will come back. PROMISE!
"It's all about the progression from unconsciously incompetent to unconsciously competent. The steps in development are:
1) Unconscious incompetence (or old skill level)
2) Conscious incompetence
3) Conscious competence (new skill level)
4) Unconscious competence
The genies can only speak when the action is so well established that it can be performed unconsciously."
Now I have been studying vocal improvisation for a year, with David Eskenazy. I don't hear that little voice any more. I haven't for a while. My hunch about why this is has been pretty much the same as Jo's, but she explains it very nicely...
"We never got back to talking about how your voice connection to the 'genies' has gone. My take on this is that while you are learning a new skill the genies go away. This is so that they don't interrupt the dialogue that you brain is having with your body. Once you reach your new desired skill level and feel confident in it the brain will be able to go back onto autopilot and the genies will come back. PROMISE!
"It's all about the progression from unconsciously incompetent to unconsciously competent. The steps in development are:
1) Unconscious incompetence (or old skill level)
2) Conscious incompetence
3) Conscious competence (new skill level)
4) Unconscious competence
The genies can only speak when the action is so well established that it can be performed unconsciously."
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