Philosophy of the Performing Arts

performance i: improvisation and rehearsal 155
Improvisation on a theme
In the most familiar scenario, a performer or a group of performers begins
with an existing “theme” upon which they proceed to improvise. As we
saw in the previous section, the improvisation develops subject to certain
constraints that are operative in the relevant performative community and
tradition. In many cases, the theme is based upon the prescriptions for a
performable work of some kind. In jazz ensemble performances of this
sort, musical ideas based upon a musical work’s prescriptions frame the
performance in a fairly literal sense. Such ideas provide the performance
with both its starting point and its terminus – the “head” to which the musi-
cians return – while also functioning as a reference point for the interven-
ing improvisations. But it is rarely the prescriptions themselves that play
this role. It would be unusual for a jazz improvisation on a standard theme
to begin or end with a straight performance that complies in detail with
what the work prescribes. Rather, performers feel free to embroider upon
these prescriptions, altering the melody or chord structure, or modifying
the tempo or time signature, in the interests of a particular improvisational
project. As a result, different improvisational performances of a melodically
complex standard such as “You Don’t Know What Love Is” can differ dra-
matically not only in their freely improvisational passages but also in their
framing thematic ideas. Indeed, as we shall see shortly, it is an open question
whether such performances are indeed of performable works. This question
clearly arises when improvisations taking their initial direction from a stand-
ard theme have a more open-ended structure. Indeed, some of Coltrane’s
later performances under the title of “My Favorite Things” abandoned even
the convention that the performance begin with a recognizable execution of
the theme. But the preceding examples must be distinguished from another
kind of jazz improvisation on a theme, where the basis for the improvised
performance is something designed expressly to function as a frame for
improvisation. This applies to such pieces as Miles Davis’s “Blue in Green”
and Thelonius Monk’s “Straight, No Chaser.”
Improvisation on a theme is also a feature of some theatrical and dance
performances. Consider, for example, James Hamilton’s more radical Hedda
Gabler variation Something to Tell Yo u , described in Chapter 6. While this produc-
tion, as Hamilton presents it, involves performances based on rehearsals, we
can easily imagine an improvisational performance standing in the same kind
of relation to Ibsen’s text. Actors participate in such a performance by spon-
taneously adapting lines from Ibsen’s play to make statements of their own,
responding to the improvisations of their fellow performers. As in the case of
musical improvisations upon a standard theme, the prescriptions for Ibsen’s
performable work constrain the improvisational activities of the company