Poseur to Composer

Work got the best of me today. I feel chewed up and spit out like a piece of Bubblicious. I wish I had more time, more energy, to read, theorize, strategize how to innovate my personal practice.

Composers like George Russell and John Cage were "big picture" visionaries and strategists (Miles Davis to a lesser degree). Instead of working within existing frameworks they created their own. I admire these conceptual artists most, but also have deep admiration for Bill Evans (his contribution to music should be obvious to everyone reading this blog) and there are others.

I practiced So What several times tonight, gluing together the various parts and smoothing it over. I've already learned the piano-and-bass introduction and the So What chord, now I'm ready to take on more.

The process reminds me of the guy who ate a Cessna 150 airplane, but I digest.

Time bookstanding today: 35 minutes Quality of meditation (out of 10): 5

Bill Evans in a concert in 1969. Photo by Fauban

On my last post, I mentioned Bill Evans and his expressive improvisations. Particularly on Peace Piece, Evans seems to bare his soul. As psychoanalysis is a deep interest of mine, it made me wonder if musical improvisations reveal a person's psychological state, like the Rorschach ink blot test or Critical Stimulus.

Music may be better for conveying complex mental and emotional states because it's multisensory. Words are reductionist. The more descriptive you get, the less you mean. Use enough words and it means nothing at all.

I'd like to try psychoanalysing my own improvisations, using Peace Piece as a template. In the song, Evans comps with his left hand and improvises with his right. So today I started learning easy chord patterns for my left hand. Then I'll need some guidelines on piano improvisation (it's harder than it looks and sounds). Then maybe I'll start recording my improvisations and post them online.

There's no timeframe for this though. I'm contemplating another musical project too (shiny object syndrome strikes again) and of course I'm committed to learning So What.

Time bookstanding today: 15 minutes Quality of meditation (out of 10): 5

I've been reading up on comping with the sparse free time I've had today (comping is shorthand for accompaniment). Actually, not so much reading but hoarding articles, how-tos, videos and anything else that might help me grok this. I'll sit down and calmly read them when things slow down.

Tomorrow is the Sabbath, my day off. Hoo boy do I need it.

Time bookstanding today: 0 minutes Quality of meditation (out of 10): 0

Note: Got slammed this morning. Suffice to say I've been recording my meditation times at DailyDiary.com and will analyse the data at the end of this project. I used Daily Diary once before and here are the insights I gained.