Main content

Improvisation

Tom Service considers the art of musical improvisation, asking if improvising can ever be 'free'. With musician and writer David Toop and improvising bassist Joelle Leandre.

Tom Service considers the art of musical improvisation. When pianist Lenny Tristano first recorded free improvisations in 1949, his record company didn't want to release them. Today, Free Improvisation is a well-established genre. But can improvising ever be "free"? Tom discusses with musician and writer David Toop and improvising bassist Jo毛lle Leandre.
Improvisation is a fundamental part of music-making - it even has a place in Western classical music, such as the freely invented cadenza in a piano concerto. Other musical traditions are fundamentally based in improvising, such as the classical Indian tradition, and jazz. In the 1950s, Free Improvisation developed from experiments in extending jazz, as an attempt to make music spontaneously with no reference to any style or tradition. David Toop has written a book about improvising, and Joelle Leandre has had a long career as a free improviser, playing with a wide variety of musicians around the world. But, she says, "we cannot be free...".

Available now

29 minutes

Last on

Sun 13 Nov 2016 17:00

Music Played

  • Sidney Bechet

    Perdido St Blues

    • Sidney Bechet In New York.
    • JSP.
  • Hariprasad Chaurasia

    Raga Bhupali

    • Beginner鈥檚 guide to Asia.
    • Nascente.
  • Olivier Latry

    Improvisation

    • Three Centuries of Organ Music.
    • Naive.
  • Spontaneous Music Ensemble

    Karyobin

    • Karyobin.
    • Chronoscope.
  • Johann Sebastian Bach

    Brandenburg concerto no.5, 1st mvt

    Performer: John Butt. Performer: Dunedin Consort.
    • Six Brandenberg Concertos.
    • LINN.
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Piano concerto no.15 K450, 1st mvt

    Performer: Robert Levin. Performer: Academy of Ancient Music. Performer: Christopher Hogwood.
    • Mozart - Piano Concertos 15 & 26.
    • Oiseau Lyre.
  • Louis Armstrong

    West End Blues

    • Louis Armstrong - Hot Five & Hot Seven.
    • Giants of Jazz.
  • Ravi Shankar

    Raga Patdeep

    • Rough Guide to Ravi Shankar.
    • World Music Network.
  • Jimi Hendrix

    Bold As Love

    Performer: The Jimi Hendrix Experience.
    • Axis: Bold as Love.
    • Track Records.
  • Karlheinz Stockhausen

    Aus den Sieben Tagen

    Performer: Ensemble Musique Vivante. Performer: Diego Masson.
    • Stockhausen - Aus den Sieben Tagen.
    • Harmonia Mundi.
  • Percy Grainger

    Free Music

    Performer: Academy of St Martin in the Fields Chamber Ensemble.
    • Grainger Edition box.
    • Chandos.
  • Lennie Tristano

    Digression

    • Abstraction and Improvisation.
    • FiveFour.
  • Hession / Wilkinson / Fell

    Snog with my drums

    • Foom! Foom!.
    • Bruce's Fingers.
  • Derek Bailey

    When your lover has gone

    • Ballads.
    • Tzadik label.
  • Joelle Leandre & India Cooke

    Just Now Two

    • Joelle Leansre at Le Mans Jazz Festival.
    • Leo Records.
  • John Zorn

    Cobra

    • Cobra live.
    • Hat Hut.

Broadcast

  • Sun 13 Nov 2016 17:00

Why do we call it 'classical' music?

Tom Service poses a very simple question (with a not-so-simple answer).

Six of the world's most extreme voices

From babies to Mongolian throat singers: whose voice is the most extreme of all?

How did the number 12 revolutionise music?

How did the number 12 revolutionise music?

How Schoenberg opened a new cosmos for composers and listeners to explore.

Why are we all addicted to bass?

Why are we all addicted to bass?

Bass is everywhere, but why do we enjoy it? Join Tom Service on a journey of discovery.

Watch the animations

Join Tom Service on a musical journey through beginnings, repetition and bass lines.

When does noise become music?

We like to think we can separate 鈥渘oise鈥 from 鈥渕usic鈥, but is it that simple?

Podcast