Jonathan Barahal Taylor

Subverting Expectations

Investigating Improvisational Instincts through Cross-Cultural Musical Dialogue

In May 2023 I spent 5 weeks in Varanasi, India to study contrasting methodological approaches in musical improvisation from the realms of Hindustani (North Indian) Classical Music and so called “Free Improvisation.” This project was generously funded by the University of Michigan’s Center for World Performance Studies and supported in part by the School of Music, Theatre, and Dance Eileen Weiser EXCEL Fund. The original impetus for this project sprung from my desire to return to Varanasi and reunite with my tabla Guru, Soumya Kanti Mukherjee, with whom I studied for extended periods in 2012 and 2014. I also wanted to connect my renewed study of Hindustani Classical Music with my years-long practice of spontaneous musical improvisation, also the foundation of my graduate studies at U of M.

The Project

Background, General Observations

I approached this project from two distinct angles. The first involved intensive study of tabla with my guru via lessons 3-4 times per week. The main goal here was simply to deepen my relationship with the instrument, expand my musical vocabulary, and refine my sound, which had fallen off from several years of inconsistent practice. To that end, I arrived with little in the way of a specific agenda, and in the tradition of the master-disciple instead followed whatever path my guru determined for me. Tabla, an extremely demanding instrument, is taught by rote, with one’s guru reciting phrases and compositions using the bol system, a syllabary that corresponds to specific sounds made by the right hand (on the tabla or dayan drum), the left hand (on the bayan drum), or both together. Said bols combine to form compositions that the tabla artist uses, in the case of solo performance, as the basis for improvisational exposition.

The other half of the project involved meeting 2-3 times per week to rehearse with an ensemble of musicians trained in Hindustani Classical Music (HCM). I hoped to exchange methodologies for improvisation from our respective musical background and develop a distinct shared musical vocabulary. My contribution came through considering various musical phenomena common to so-called “free improvisation” (a contentious term that I’ll use now for the sake of simplicity). This is neither an exhaustive nor definitive list — just a collection of musical qualities that I’ve observed from years of listening to and participating in this music. An improviser’s personal musical language may feature:

• Fluid motion through extreme polarities, i.e. density/silence, loud/soft, fast/slow, in time/out of time

• Foregrounding timbre and texture as material of consequence alongside more conventional musical elements such as melody and rhythm

• Widespread and integrated use of extended technique

• Intuitive, spontaneous decision making based on deep listening and not necessarily guided by a preconceived musical form

• Nonhierarchical ensemble structure wherein each individual has complete agency to affect the direction of the music at any moment. Put another way, while one is listening to their ensemble-mates they are not following them. This may take the form of, for example, overlapping rhythmic figures that don’t resolve at the same time.

Of course, none of these happen in a vacuum; the above is merely an analysis of the expression of a very specific musical culture. The musical language that we consider contemporary “free improvisation” was developed by the great innovators of Black American Music (BAM). That fact is foundational to my understanding of this music which is why a main method for these rehearsals involved listening to recordings by important artists of the idiom. This is a musical practice that has given so much to me and is a constant source for inspiration and insight, and I was curious to see how musicians trained in another endlessly rich musical culture might react to it. Indeed, every musician in my ensemble had only limited exposure to jazz music, and none to the more experimental branches of BAM. I hoped that listening combined with exercises focusing on the aforementioned musical qualities (some preconceived and many made up on the fly) would resonate with my ensemble-mates and lead us into fertile musical territory.

At first glance this seemed like a real possibility due to the fact that Hindustani Classical Music is heavily rooted in improvisation. In fact, “improvisation” is a vast field of inquiry that spans far beyond the performing arts, musicology, and music theory, to cognitive science, neuroscience, cultural studies, and biology, among others. Musically speaking, the parameters for improvisation vary significantly from culture to culture. Considering this, I expected the process would be challenging and carried with it a high likelihood for failure. Furthermore, I was in Varanasi for just over a month with the partial purpose of directing dedicated musicians towards a foreign musical language that took years for me to find my “voice” in. Early on, I noted several key differences in my ensemble-mates’ musical worldview that contrasted with my own. These observations helped me refine my approach while simultaneously granting insight into certain aesthetic principles of HCM:

• Established hierarchy of soloist and accompanists

  • While still engaged in dialogue, the melodic soloist represents a clear center of gravity to which the rest of the ensemble refers. The overwhelming density of simultaneous streams of distinct voices or overlapping ostinati that you may find in free improvisation would be out of place in a Hindustani musical context.

• Adherence to musical form, especially as it relates to the tal (beat cycle)

  • Sum, what western musicians would call beat one, or the beginning of the beat cycle, was sacrosanct. In one instance, we were playing in deepchandi tal, a 14 beat cycle, and I began a phrase in the middle of the cycle, not dissimilar to how I would approach accompaniment in a contemporary jazz setting. My ensemble heard that not as me finding a creative avenue through the cycle, but as being lost. Indeed, a mark of creative accomplishment in Hindustani Music is one’s ability to produce complicated rhythmic phrases with full awareness and acknowledgement of sum.

• Tuning is indispensable

  • This is not necessarily surprising nor unique to Indian music, but I believe it’s worth noting due to these two instances from my trip: I attended one performance, a duet of santoor (hammer dulcimer) and tabla, that was riveting for its high energy and virtuosity. As the artists neared the climax of the performance, they stopped abruptly. The santoor had fallen out of tune, so the music was put on pause for several minutes to retune. Afterwards the duo resumed from where they left off. The audience seemed unaffected by what I would consider a “disruption” to the performance. It was notable to me that, for the performers, the creation of energetic and affecting music itself was an incomplete experience when done with out-of-tune instruments. One would not expect this in, for instance, a jazz performance, where continuity and emotional intensity supplant other concerns. On another occasion, during rehearsal, I played a brass cymbal with a mallet, creating a loud, sustained, and overtone-heavy sound. Immediately, everyone stopped playing. I thought it was because they were were stricken by the sound itself, but instead they lamented that the cymbal was out of tune!

    
    

Other differences were technical. For instance, the nature of acoustic classical Indian instruments limits the breadth of dynamic possibilities. This springs from the fact that their has remained largely unchanged for centuries and their performances historically were intended for smaller audiences, often in formal settings. Tabla, santoor, sitar, etc were not initially designed to be performed in giant concert halls and predate amplification by several hundred years. Therefore, wild explorations of high dynamics density have a natural ceiling, especially when compared to the intense loudness capable of, say, a pianist, saxophonist and drummer playing free-jazz.

The Music

Methodology, Analysis, Examples

I participated in the ensemble with an auxiliary percussion set up of whatever I could get my hands on. This included my suitcase (a great kick drum sound), a pair of brass cymbals I purchased in Delhi, some aluminum cups lent by Kamala Shankar, who played in the ensemble and hosted rehearsals, and a couple of percussion instruments borrowed from my guru. I had hoped to gradually accumulate an arsenal of found sounds by exploring shops and markets during the day, but the intense heat of the pre-monsoon North Indian summer, regularly upwards of 110 degrees fahrenheit, rendered my wanderlust unsafe.

As my ensemble-mates were all deeply studied in Hindustani Classical Music, the methodology for their half of the exchange was relatively straight forward: they played together and I accompanied as best I could, responding to the momentum they generated and after the fact asking questions about context and structural considerations. This proved to be an invaluable experience for better understanding and beginning to embody tenets of their musical system. In particular, I became very sensitive to conventional rhythmic cadences that propelled the music back to Sum. I also grew accustomed to ensemble dynamics revealed through musical dialogue between the soloist and accompanist, namely between percussive and melodic instruments. This felt not dissimilar from the soloist/accompanist relationship in jazz, except I sensed a different attitude in the treatment of pitch. there is an intense focus on each note that simultaneously acknowledges the preceding moment while receiving the inevitability of the next one. The hierarchy implied by tonality, where the chord dictates the function of notes, is nowhere to be found; there are no “passing tones". Each tone is given detailed treatment. I am very ill-equipped to speak on Raga ,the system of melodic frameworks/pitch collections similar to scales, but no doubt rigourous training in it encourages a deep and nuanced attention to detail for both micro and macro structures in the music.

Below is an example of some of the music we played in this style, adapted from a devotional song in Raag Bhupaali, in Kaherwa Tal (8 beat cycle):

This work was enhanced by my tabla studies (and vice versa), which focused primarily on solo repertoire and gave me better appreciation for the vast complexity and sophistication of the Hindustani Classical musical system. This is best illustrated through the last composition I learned during my stay, a Kayeda in Tintal, a common 16 beat cycle. A couple of notes: Tabla is generally divided into six main gharana, or schools of tabla playing. These are regional distinctions that refer to both an inherited repertoire and a technical approach. For example, I mostly learned compositions from the Benares Gharana, native to Varanasi, which typically uses a unique full palm technique for executing bols. A Kayeda is a common type of tabla composition with three main features: First, it consists of a primary theme that is referenced in the creation of variations during an extended improvisation/exposition. Next, its form is divided, in the case of tintal, with an open Mudi section wherein the low bass tone of the bayan drum is not sounded, and which occurs in the 3rd quarter of the composition, and Khuli sections, heard in the remaining three quarters and heavily featuring the bayan’s bass sound. Finally, it ends with a Tihai, a rhythmic pattern repeated three times that ends on Sum. This is a Delhi Kayeda (i.e. a kayeda from the Delhi gharana), in Tintal that sounds like this:

Again, this kayeda is Tintal, a common 16 beat cycle similar to what western musicians call 4/4 time. Listen again and try to count this in 4/4. This composition left me baffled when guruji shared it with me — I simply could not hear it in Tintal. After writing out and analyzing it, I could begin to appreciate its sophisticated structure. Here is a recording of me reciting it, the way it was taught to me:

Here is the first half of the composition written out, separated by phrase and with reference to the beat cycle:

A few things stick out about this composition, the most prominent being the odd lengths of phrase. The first is three matras, or beats, combining with the next phrase of two matras for a larger five beat phrase. The beginning of each phrase is punctuated by the bol Dha. This is among the most common sounds produced on tabla, achieved by striking the tonal bol na in the right hand and the open bass bol ge in the left hand. Dha carries a gravity to it, and a beginning tabla student will begin building their vocabulary by learning compositions where Dha is featured on the “downbeat” of even phrases 2 or 4 matras in length. It feels similar to a kick drum on beat 1 of a backbeat. Because of this strong association, I heard the kayeda “resetting” at the beginning of each phrase. That is indeed the intended effect, but it remains rooted to the larger even 16 beat cycle, actually resetting on Sum after a composite collection of odd phrases.

Other phrases draw the ear towards a conclusion that doesn’t come to pass. Beginning on the 12th matra, we hear the rapid figure, written in short hand, kttk trkt tk ta trkt. This phrase is common throughout tabla repertoire, but typically one would expect to hear it at the beginning of a set of 4 matras, i.e. the “downbeats” of 5, 9, or 13. For instance, another composition I’ve learned features a combination of the figures found here on matras 12-13 and 15-16, resulting in an even 4 beat phrase. A young tabla student will learn to hear Kttk trkt tk ta trkt as an antecedent to a consequent phrase of equal length. It is coded with expectations. By following it up with a longer odd phrase, as in this kayeda, those expectations are subverted.

Finally, notice the prevalence of thin na and thin na ke na, found at the end of nearly every phrase. Refer back to my brief explanation of mudi and khuli, formal markers distinct in their use of the left hand bayan drum. In mudi, the bayan will play only the closed sound ke, while in khuli it includes the open bass tone ge. Below is the full composition, divided into khuli and mudi (and with bols landing on matras in bold). Thin is produced through combining the open tone tu in the right hand with ke in the left. One could call it the mudi version of dhin, a combination of tu and ge. Because of the use of closed left hand sounds, one would expect to hear thin na or thin na ke na within or in preparation to mudi. In khuli, these would be played as dhin na and dhin na ge na. Indeed, a student of tabla will learn to hear thin na and thin na ke na as setting up mudi, thereby signaling a midway point in the composition. Instead, the expected function of this phrase is flipped on its head. My guru mentioned that this composition sounds like an argument between two people, each phrase an escalation in tension. No release comes until the very end of the composition where finally, the knowledgeable listener hears what she expects, the resolution to dhin na ge na.

Through embodied practice of tabla studies and rehearsals, I became more sensitive to the aesthetics of HCM, allowing me to better appreciate when conventions were subverted. The generosity and patience of my guru and ensemble-mates gave me the chance to participate in this deep, rich, and complex musical culture, a process I hope to continue for the rest of my life. 

My contribution to the ensemble was less straight-forward. I was essentially trying to get 5 disciplined musicians, wholly dedicated to their practice, to approach music from a radically different perspective in just over a month. This was not a smooth process. I found myself struggling to communicate concepts, and solo illustrations of a style of music that I typically play with at least one other like-minded musician, without my main instrument, proved difficult. Furthermore, one of my cornerstone proposed methodologies, involving rehearsing a series of graphic scores I developed over the prior year, proved to be a non-starter. 

Still, there were promising moments that suggest potential avenues for further study. For example, after a few frustrating rehearsals, I attempted to frame free-improvisation independently from a performative musical context. I suggested that we play in a way that mimics the ambient sounds of daily life. This is notable for the fact that Varanasi, typical of crowded urban centers in North India, is extremely noisy. Most of the day is a bustling soundscape of, for example, vehicle horns, devotional bhajans amplified from countless temples, animal sounds, vendors announcing their goods, arguments, and construction. Asking the ensemble to channel the “banal” sounds of daily life tapped us into sonic chaos made up of coexisting yet independent elements. This “soundscape” exercise became a regular feature of rehearsals. Because it took us away from idiom and towards sound, it was easy to create new varieties that investigated musical qualities such as dynamics, density, and subgroupings, but it also allowed us to play imaginatively, putting ourselves in the role of directors filling out a scene. This process began to open us up to a foregrounding of texture and timbre that, as I indicated before, is a notable feature of free improvisation. 

On the other hand, one of the most efficacious methods came through listening to recordings. As I mentioned earlier, none of my ensemble-mates had familiarity with experimental improvised music, and had only limited exposure to jazz music of any kind. I created a playlist of experimental BAM artists prior to my trip that I hoped would clearly illustrate features of free improvisation. The playlist included recordings from Roscoe Mitchell, Ornette Coleman, Amina Claudine Meyers, Wadada Leo Smith, Cecil Taylor Gerald Cleaver, Carla Bley, and others. In retrospect, it may have benefited the group to include more so-called “straight ahead” jazz or blues to give a historical context for the more adventurous experimental work that I presented. Regardless, the ensemble was very willing to attempt to mimic what they gleaned from these recordings. After some time, I recognized that fleeting moments of cohesive improvised dialogue started happening.

I will share two striking examples of this. The first occurred at an early rehearsal courtesy of Dishari Biswas, a talented Odissi dancer who sat in on the first couple weeks of rehearsal. Odissi is an Indian dance form that traditionally interprets and illustrates epic religious stories and devotional poems through movement. I happened to share with the group a recording from my band Teiku, which interprets unique and ancestral Jewish devotional melodies, and was touched when Dishari said that this music inspired her to dance. Her movement expressed the type of gestural spontaneity and emotional vulnerability that I hoped to convey through this process. Here is a portion of her interpretation (apologies to Dishari for her head being out of frame for portions of the performance):

I will conclude by offering what was, for me, the most compelling and successful instance of free improvisation that occurred during my time. A few weeks into my trip I determined that smaller groupings might facilitate a more seamless musical dialogue. This recording, from one of the last rehearsals before our culminating studio recording session, is a duet between myself and Kamala Shankar, who plays an instrument she invented called the Shankar Veena. Played on the lap and similar to a traditional South Indian Veena, Kamala constructs her own instrument by repurposing hollow body guitars (she also builds her own, right down to carving the body). This performance occurred immediately after listening to a dynamic group, Farmers by Nature, a collaboration of the great improvisers William Parker, Craig Taborn, and Gerald Cleaver. I believe that it demonstrates many of the concepts I outlined above, and builds on the “soundscape” exercises and listening work that we practiced in the preceding weeks. Most crucially, both Kamala and I maintain our respective voices; she is still playing with Hindustani stylistic elements, while I am playing in a manner similar to a free jazz show in the states. Still, there is unmistakable dialogue occurring. This brief instance is exactly the type of musical landscape I hoped to find at the outset of this project, and hopefully this process can be continued and expanded through future visits and study.