Why Classical Musicians Can't Improvise - Part I

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Dr. John Mortensen's lecture on improvisation. Los Angeles, 2021.

[@ContraereaSerba]

Imagine sitting at a piano and only being able to play repertoire pieces you memorized

[@manu-singh]

This is the case with me as i never learned to read music

[@beanmommy2]

Sadly, that's pretty close to what it's like to be a piano major in college.

[@LeRossignol.]

I never understood the whole "composer's intention" thing. I doubt the way we play now is near to how the composers played their music. For instance, if you played Rachmaninoff the way Rachmaninoff played (in his recordings) you would likely be told you're playing it wrong! and that's only 80 years ago, compare that to 200 years or more...

[@frankeisele383]

Yes, and I highly doubt that any of these composers played their own pieces the very same way - and exactly as they once notated them - every time they played them themselves. In fact I would expect that there always was a certain improvisatory element to how they played them.

[@definitelynotofficial7350]

Yeah well what if the composer's intention was to improvise a bit lol (which actually happened a lot more than people realize today).

[@LeRossignol.]

Yeah true, I somehow did not think of that! It also reminds me of the stories of Liszt improvising whilst playing other people's music (and Chopin getting jealous or something). Lots of Liszt's early music is very improvisatory too.

[@quadricode]

The idea is very simple. The composer wrote something down. What do we interpret it to mean? Answering that question is often a question of seeking intention, and is a perfectly reasonable goal. Where we as classical musicians go astray is to think classical music is *only* about reciting some canonical understanding of a composer’s work.

[@stevencarr4002]

To take an example from pop music, Steely Dan often varied songs when they played them live , but most Steely Dan tribute acts try to sound exactly like the original record.

[@adahmusic]

I love improvisation and improving in general. I had to learn improvisation as early as my 2nd year of violin playing because I played with rock and church bands more than orchestra.

[@edwardwilliamson1863]

I very much enjoyed your lecture, Professor Mortensen. There was once extensive improvisation by concert pianists, and Schools of Music used to require courses in this skill. European pianists, particularly French and English pianist improvise well. I know it is required study and much emphasis is put on improvisation for those studying and majoring in organ performance. For organists, at least ones that work for large churches and are recitalists improvisation, is a necessity. In France, the organist is usually tasked with improvising on the theme of a catachism, most of the time on the spot. The best improvisors, in my opinion, are the French and English titulaire/ Cathedral organists. In my opinion, the best improvisor in the classical music world is Daniel Roth, the Titular Organist of Eglise Saint -Sulpice in Paris. Olivier Latry of The Cathedral of Notre Dame is also a very skilled improvisor. There is a performance of Daniel Roth improvising on a the hymn "Praise to the Lord" that is almost 10 minutes long. He skillfully constructs this gorgeous improvisation on the big Cavaille-Coll; just masterful and so inspirational. He is actually rather skilled at piano improvisation as well. Anyway, this is more about piano. In my opinion, the best improvisor on piano, and she is supremely talented, is Gabriela Montero.

[@PeterJ42a]

Listening and watching a Dr. Mortensen video is always time well spent.

[@Gilloringsend]

Yes regardless of if you are into piano or not. He has a nice life balance to him.

[@utubejmk1]

Wow! Explains me inside and out. Thanks for speaking about this. I’ve always just connected dots on a page to a push of a key. Improvising to me was like sitting in a dark room. I had no idea what to do. I’m starting to correct that now with an instructor who’s forcing me to improvise. It’s tough, but its what I need.

[@JaySuryavanshiMusic]

You are so right

[@joebustos6413]

Being able call out of thin air a musical composition and play it demonstrates the difference between a copy cat and a creator .

[@adamcolbertmusic]

"Recital" is a euphemism for "regurgitation". Like if you agree ;)

[@michaelmao2171]

😂😂😂

[@definitelynotofficial7350]

The really great thing about the way you teach is that you always sound very convincing. I've been told a lot of the things I hear from you in the past as well, but I brushed off some of them. However when YOU say them, the way you explain it it just feels like it's just stupid to not do these things.

[@luigi95-]

Yes its true i always felt this

[@stevencarr4002]

Recite works from the repertoire? Is that why they are called 'recitals'?

[@NikhilHoganShow]

👏👏👏

[@tedb.5707]

The modern pianist; a Human piano roll.

[@elias7748]

kind of yeah

[@southpark4151]

Statistics is always involved. In the human population, now, and in history - there's always going to be some people that can actually improvise, as well as be classical musicians, as well as being other sorts of musicians. Pure improvisation is not holy grail for me though. For my goals, holy grail is to use and take advantage of our own improvisation by listening to our improvisations, and pick/choose the 'gems' and wonderful bits - for which we can use to refine (evolve) our piece of music, or somebody else's piece of music. Pure improvisation - except for some special in-the-zone cases - is often a 'hodge podge' of music, which I'm not a fan of. I'm a fan of refinement. Not necessarily refine into a single piece of music - because refining can lead to various versions of music. And refining can also be 'broad' - as in evolving and refining by iterative steps. Design steps. Involving strategy, thought, intelligence, experience, etc, and making the music sound interesting.

[@Harriet-Jesamine]

I Totally Agree with this statement.

[@man0sticks]

Why are actors unable to write plays?

[@cedarvillemusic]

A better analogy might be that of actors who could recite the lines of a play but not carry on a spontaneous conversation without a script.

[@johnrothfield6126]

Shakespeare was an actor. Generally untrue.

[@KingstonCzajkowski]

This is about improvisation, not composition.

[@ChanningWalton]

I can’t improvise because my benchmark is Bach and Chopin. I know that’s a stupidly impossible standard to reach 😅

[@ulugozkan9502]

When you achive the level of playing the most important pieces from the list of most difficult pieces which are composed for your instrument, either you accept repeating same pieces during all your life with a stupborn + obsessive behaviour or you stop playing them and go for jazz. For example ; If you are a pianist who can play accurately the most difficult sequences from Goldberg Variations, Hammerklavier, Liszt Sonate in B Minor, Islamey, Gaspard Of Night, 20 Regards For Child Jesus, Opus Clavicembalisticum etc, you have nothing more to do in the world of classical music if you do not want to repeat playing same pieces over and over and play the compositions colder than the icebergs of Arctica from the composers of today. Same for the guitarists who can play the classical compositions contains very large intervals and jumps those must have 3 hands for playing them on piano. Of course if you are not talented for jazz you`d better remain in the planet classical music.

[@prabathwijesinghe7379]

Improvise like Paco de Lucia on the guitar....always different, it can be done when you capture the soul of the instrument.

[@secretmission7607]

They can't improvise because they don't improvise. They haven't walked the path of discovery that is improvisation. Often not at all, sadly.

[@Harriet-Jesamine]

It's all very well pointing this out, but I am the complete reverse of this, I can improvise to kingdom come, I can learn most things from Record and by Ear, but I wouldn't be able to play twinkle twinkle little star from a score, my brain just won't go there, it's like a notation dyslexia, my primary learning function is Audio & kinesthetic. If I was blind, I wouldn't have to try amd force myself to learn sheete music in order to prove to myself that I am actually a Musician.😢 I yearn to be able to understand sheete music.

[@astralresonance9951]

To be a musician doesnt mean to be creative, improvisation need creativity. Piano skills helps you to reach better the creativity you want but piano skill dont necessary make creativity alive. Creativity its a freguency you born with it. A lot of musicians are skilled really few are sensitive and creative

[@johnrothfield6126]

I disagree. You have to work on improvisation just like technique. Eventually it comes. It helps to be immersed in a musical culture that values improvisation.

[@malcolmkogut]

For the most part, "classical" musicians are theoretically illiterate. They match dots to a key whereas some musicians take time to train their ears to recognize intervals and read by numbers. For example, Mary Had A Little Lamb might be written as EDCDEEE DDD EGG which is absolute. Numbers however, 3212333 222 355 can be anything. Start on the third of any key and poof you can sight transpose. Train your ear by numbers, combined with ear training, you'll be able to improvise play whatever your brain's ear can hear. Dot matching is nice, too. Ironically, jazz musicians know more about the 2,000 year old modes than "classical" musicians do. It is the same as learning to speak. We hear our parents and imitate them thus, training our ear. Then we learn the the alphabet, learning to read. Then if we so desire, we learn grammar, spelling rules, creative writing, Latin roots . . . Classical musicians reverse all that. It is possible to learn to speak but not read. Some musicians learn to read but not speak. Like the chicken that can play the piano by matching dots. I was once in a recording studio and the director wanted to lay down a track a third lower. All the classical musicians took out their pencils. The jazz guys took a coffee break.

[@richarddoan9172]

Classical musicians who get music degrees are not theoretically illiterate. They learn intervals, chords, progressions, voice leading, musical forms. They might even compose pieces. Improvising is a separate skill you have to practice.

[@kjarrij]

@@richarddoan9172 Exactly, that's what bothers me. Classical musicians go through the extremely difficult task of getting their degree in music, devoting pretty much their entire lives developing their skills in music theory along the way. They have the tools to improvise, both knowledge and technique, but the way they were brought up makes it so they don't use those tools because they're used to playing masterpieces, so the stuff they create sounds dull by comparison. Imagine being able to recite poetry by Shakespeare but unable to have a conversation with your mom. To me, it's sad in a way :/

[@KingstonCzajkowski]

You're being very general, and you're right that the situation is kind of sad, but there are many, many classical musicians who are perfectly comfortable improvising - maybe half of the dozens I know.

[@johnapple6646]

Not practicing playing by ear is definitely a hole in the education of many musicians trained in the classical tradition. Particularly the majors who devote their time to practicing high difficulty repertoire solo pieces. It's actually worse, that we take the great pain to learn theory and harmony, but have no avenue to use that knowledge

[@mfurman]

The language learning analogy does not always work perfectly. I am fully bilingual but I learned my second language by learning grammar, spelling and even pronunciation rules before I spoke the language. I am a stickler for proper grammar in my both languages. My son first read and wrote in English before even uttering any word in English. He is an accomplished mathematician, computer programmer and a businessman now. By the way, I cannot improvise when playing piano 😊

[@NylonStrings83]

Indian classical music is nothing but improvisation almost 99% of Indian music in existence is improvisation and 1 % is written. just listen to some sitar music of ravi Shankar

[@johnrothfield6126]

Actually, there are a ton of fixed pieces, but they tend not be performed as-is. I have a trunkful of compositions I learned from AAK. Sometimes I wish we would have recitals where his compositions were performed somewhat literally, as a long Raga recital can have a tendency to long-winded self indulgence.

[@leomiller2291]

@@johnrothfield6126 what does AAK stand for? Thanks.

[@tomtoss2463]

So, essentially you are a robot. If that is the case then why just not play records? Because back in the day there were no records, so classical musicians became human records. Classical musicians are well trained robots. Just give me the record. Real robots can replace you.

[@KingstonCzajkowski]

What about interpretation and spontaneity?

[@Harriet-Jesamine]

The arguments fails when we realize that 'The Record' is a PERSON, it's not my bag, but I appreciate the need for muscians who gravitate down that path, as a need for there to be people who can place on to further records a record of how a piece of music should sound, notwithstanding the arguments which can be had as to the diminishing need for this set-up as we move into the 21st Century when there are already umpteenth recordings and interpretatiins of the same composition made in the last 90 years by many different artists...but I would balk at the idea of going as far as to say that trained classical robotocism and realising into sound the most complex pieces of Sheet music is a redundant skill, I do not approach music like those people, yet I respect them very greatly.