Are Classical Musicians Excluded from Improvisation? Cultural Hegemony and the Effects of Ideology on Musicians’ Attitudes Towards Improvisation

Ayerst, Jonathan

doi:10.1080/07494467.2021.2001945

Cited by 2 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…As an object, the non-white body is lost to the non-white person, existing now as an observer to the objectified body that is not extended by the contours of the white space but diminished by the bodily extensions of others. This is the space of institutionalized whiteness, a system established by and for white people (Ahmed 2006(Ahmed , 2007Ewell 2020;Kajikawa 2019Kajikawa , 2021Ayerst 2021). In the context of classical music this means a canon of works composed by white people and selected for preservation and reverence by educational institutions and societies founded to propagate that canon and the ideals it represents (Kajikawa 2019;Hess 2021;Ramstedt 2022;Goehr 1994;Griffiths 2020); domination of these educational spaces by white students and teachers (Ewell 2020;Ramstedt 2022;Griffiths 2020); textbooks and exemplary works written by and about white people (Ewell 2020;Kajikawa 2019); curriculum and learning outcomes shaped by the ideals of white people (Ayerst 2021;Hess 2021); concert audiences, critics, and orchestras (including their conductors) comprised of majority white people (Devinish et al 2020;Flagg 2020;Ramstedt 2022); and idealized performers and composers exemplified by white people (Ewell 2020;Ramstedt 2022).…”

Section: Institutional Spacementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Bodies allowed into the space either already inhabit the image and orientation of the space or are subject to institutional shaping. Ahmed describes this shaping as an unease felt by a body that is incongruent with the shape of the space resulting in that body changing to adhere to the space's contours but it is also framed through a Marxist lens by Ayerst as ideological domination in the form of organization and regulation of behaviour, beliefs, attitudes, and values of individuals, namely, hegemonic enforcement (Ayerst 2021;Althusser 1970). Either way, the result is a body that is more in line with the orientation and shape of the ideological space and the preservation of the structure of the institution.…”

Section: Preservation: Recruitment and Hegemonic Enforcementmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The shape and image of the classical music institution is maintained, not just through implicit social pressures (e.g., when participants felt they needed to behave a certain way, such as a needing to listen to more classical music than they were), but also through explicit hegemonic enforcement by tutors and those higher up in the hierarchy of the institution (Ayerst 2021).…”

Section: Institutional Maintenance: Explicit Enforcementmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Improvisational Inqueery Inclusion, Intercorporeality, and the Classical Music Institution

Rowlands

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<p><strong>Improvisation has a long history as a part of the creative processes of performers and composers of European art music prior to the 20th century, commonly referred to as classical music. Despite this, it is typically excluded from the activities of the modern-day classical institution. In this thesis, I explore questions of why and how improvisation is excluded from classical music institutions today. I do so by engaging with concepts such as bodies, spaces, orientations, queering, and whiteness as they relate to the classical music institution and its construction as an ideological entity, and how improvisation — representing (in classical music) cultures, identities, and ideals associated with the constructed other — is an undesirable practice in this space. I discuss the role improvisation played in the development of counterpoint and the other practices of European musicians prior to the nineteenth century as well as attitudes and narratives that contributed to its decline in acceptance within the institution. I use qualitative data collected in interviews and practical focus groups I conducted with classically trained musicians to highlight some of its exclusionary and marginalizing structures. I also draw on this data to examine how these structures work to maintain the white, cisgender, heteronormative maleness of the space, while remaining hostile to bodies and ideals that exist deviant from those norms. I reflect on my own experience as an improvisor in conjunction with literature concerned with improvisation, embodiment, and phenomenology to conceive of improvisation as an intimately social, intercorporeal interaction between empathetically attuned human bodies. Finally, I consider how improvisation may be mobilised, alongside perspectives such as antiracism, to subvert and deconstruct unjust institutional structures and apply this consideration to the implementation of an inclusive and subversive final performance I called an “Inter-Creative Space.”</strong></p>

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Section: Institutional Spacementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Preservation: Recruitment and Hegemonic Enforcementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Institutional Maintenance: Explicit Enforcementmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Improvisational Inqueery Inclusion, Intercorporeality, and the Classical Music Institution

Rowlands

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City Noir by John Adams: a Way to Interpretation

Tsaregradskaya

2023

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John Coolidge Adams is at the present times is one of the leading composers of the USA. Being a conductor of world renown, he composes particularly frequently for the orchestra — the musical means that is the closest for the composer. In 2009 he composer City Noir — a three-movement orchestral piece inspired by an entire “bouquet” of sources. Among them is the culture and the spirit of the West Coast of the USA in general and of California in particular, the aura of Los Angeles and the era in the life of the city connected with the emergence of films in the style of “noir.” It is referred to the time period of the 1940s and the 1950s with their half-criminal romanticism of night-time adventures, bold energies and a blood-bustling freedom. Dedicated to conductor Dudamel, the orchestral composition City Noir balances in terms of genre between a three-movement symphony, a soundtrack to a film and a jazz suite, relegating the listener’s imagination to the cult figures in jazz during the 1950s, the experience of composing in the jazz idiom (among such composers as Milhaud and Gershwin) and to elements of ekphrasis (referring to Wat Disney’s unique concert hall constructed by the ingenious architect Frank Gary). The article provides an overview of all the sources of Adams’ musical ideas and engages in the attempt to interpret the result of the composer’s work.

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Are Classical Musicians Excluded from Improvisation? Cultural Hegemony and the Effects of Ideology on Musicians’ Attitudes Towards Improvisation

Cited by 2 publications

References 18 publications

Improvisational Inqueery Inclusion, Intercorporeality, and the Classical Music Institution

Improvisational Inqueery Inclusion, Intercorporeality, and the Classical Music Institution

City Noir by John Adams: a Way to Interpretation

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