June 27, 2022 • 19 mins
S2 E1: How to Improvise Part 1: Experimentation
Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best.
The first of a five-part series on how to improvise, exploring each of Infinite Improvisation's creative practices: Experimentation, Play, Limitations, Deep Listening, and Reflection. In this episode, we dive into experimentation—embracing the scientific method, curiosity, and failure.
For a transcription of this episode and more: https://infiniteimprovisation.podbean.com/e/how-to-improvise-part-1-experimentation
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Steve Treseler (00:08):
Hello, and welcome to the Infinite Improvisation Podcast,
adventures in music and creativity.
And I am Steve Treselerjoined by Lauren Best.
Lauren Best (00:16):
Happy to be back.
Steve Treseler (00:18):
Yeah.
So in our first season we were workingon answering some questions about
why and, and what, and who we are.
And now we're gonna get intothe, how, how do we improvise?
How do we create new musical ideasor put new artistic works out into
the world and get into that process.
(00:41):
So these will be a series of fivemini episodes around the creative
practices of Infinite Improvisation.
And largely this willbe about the process.
It's a how episode, but not necessarily ahow to like a linear step by step process.
Mm-hmm um, what are, what are yourthoughts on that, of the, how a
(01:06):
creative process versus somethingthat's a little more linear?
Lauren Best (01:09):
You know, I heard someone describe it as a buffet.
It was, it was JD Derbyshire, who'sa, who's a comedian and playwright.
Uh, and they described it as likea creative buffet that, you know,
you give yourself lots of differentoptions and then you see what tastes
good and you see, you see whatyou feel like, like choosing from.
So I, I know what you meanwith not, um, not necessarily
(01:31):
a linear step by step process.
It's not baking , you know,where we have exact ratios and,
uh, and it's an exact formula.
Um, but there's, there's differentelements for different times,
different purposes, different people.
Steve Treseler (01:50):
yeah.
Whereas if you're coming up with your ownrecipe, if you're with the one writing
the recipe, that certainly could bemore of a creative, creative practice.
So, or something more linear, likeyou're learning how to change the tire in
your car, learn the D flat major scale.
It's something where theoutcome is predetermined.
You know what the goal isahead of time when you start.
So when we're developing skills,it's some of the most effective way.
(02:13):
You know, the research by Anders Ericksontells us that deliberate practice
helps us develop skills in the mostefficient way, which is knowing what
the outcome is and dividing it up intoactionable steps and getting coaching.
And that's really important forus as we're learning skills as
artists and musicians, but thecreative part is, is different.
And we might, when we're going toimprovise a piece, compose something.
(02:37):
Paint an original work,whatever your, your medium is.
You might not know what point B iswhen you start, when you're done,
like the results might surprise you.
So it takes a different, differentapproach and it's less, it's less
direct and have to embrace thisprocess of it being, you know,
about being more of a wandering,less EF, less efficient process.
(02:58):
Mm.
Lauren Best (02:59):
And within that, sometimes we do come up with certain
formulas, um, that we feel work for us.
Mm-hmm , uh, but Y and, and,and, well, we've talked before
about limitations, right?
Mm-hmm certain limitations orformulas that we might adjust.
Um, but Y like, there, there aremany possible variations and many
possible, I mean, within bakingI do improvise a little bit.
(03:23):
Mm-hmm because I know whatsome of the formulas are.
Right.
Mm-hmm that like, it's kind of, Isee it's about this amount of spice,
so I can maybe, you know, put insome different spices of my own.
Cause I kind of see what they're,where they're going with that.
Mm-hmm um, and sometimes I'll I'llthink, oh, that creative process
worked really well for me before.
I see I did some things, so maybe I'll,I'll try that again, but, there's a
(03:45):
lot more, as you're saying there's alot more that's unknown or intuitive
or where we kind of leave deliberateblank spaces to fill in later.
Steve Treseler (03:54):
Yeah.
So the first of these creativepractices to get into for this
episode is experimentation.
Um, a quote from Jacob Brokowski, which isthere is a likeness between the creative
acts of the mind in art and in science.
mm-hmm which I, which I really like.
So experimentation, this is embracingthe scientific method, which I
(04:17):
think about is how, how scientistslearn more about their domain.
It starts with maybe curiosity,like, oh, what's something I would
like an answer to or, or a problem.
And following your curiosityand setting up experiments.
So we can do this with our art,or is a, as a musical experiments
as a musical experiment.
And.
(04:38):
, you know, you're, you'll be gatheringdata and, you know, we may have
an idea of what, oh, we're gonnaexperiment and see what happens.
You might have a prediction of, we havea hypothesis and, but the results may
ultimately may ultimately surprise us.
Lauren Best (04:52):
Mm-hmm yeah.
And the idea of multiple possibleoutcomes mm-hmm and, and kind
of suspending judgment on those.
That we can embrace some of the,some of the various possibilities
as parts of that process.
Steve Treseler (05:06):
Mm-hmm
. So for this concept, this is less of a.
As we go, we'll, we'll try to giveyou even more practical, getting
closer to the how to thing, but theexperimentation, it's more of the
mindset that we're TA we're taking thiswith the curiosity of a scientist and
that we're, that we're gathering data.
So our art and our music is very, it'svery important and special to us,
(05:30):
but at the same time, we, as we're,as we're having these experiments,
sometimes the results won't be whatwe expected, or we're not happy with
the results, but treating, treatingthis as a scientist that we're looking
at all of this as data that we'regathering, that we're gathering data.
And it doesn't mean you'rea bad scientist because your
hypothesis wasn't entirely right.
(05:50):
Well then we devise a new experimenthave a new hypothesis and that's.
I mean, that's how you get betterat that's how you get better
at science and that's how youget better at creating things.
Lauren Best (06:00):
Cool.
Yeah.
I mean, I would agree with that andalso thinking about it helps us,
I think, separate, um, some of thedifferent elements of the outcome.
Mm-hmm, , uh, like we'vetalked before about, you know,
one outcome is how we feel.
, mm-hmm, like how our emotions feel,how, like, what we're noticing.
Um, and then another outcome is howthe music actually sounds or how the,
(06:24):
the creative work actually, um, likeimpacts us or impacts other people.
Um, you know, and there could be other,other categories we add onto that.
Steve Treseler (06:36):
mm-hmm yeah.
And.
Eventually as, as you go, we wantart and music that really resonates
with us and with other people.
But the way to get there is through someof this experimentation, having data
and, uh, and, and throw and throwingthings out, you know, we have you
generate lots and lots of data and whenthings don't work being just free to
(06:58):
toss it out and, and, and try again.
Yeah, mm-hmm , while I'm doing quotes,quote's from Brahm's the composer,
which I believe is the mark of anartist is how much he throws away.
So kind of, if.
If your, uh, garbage can, is mostfull with your scores that didn't
work out, then you'll in the process.
You'll get to the gems.
I mean, we're in the process now ofwriting our theme song for this podcast
(07:20):
and, you know, we'll keep, we'll keepgoing until we're we have something
that we're happy with, and we're veryproud of the results, but you can only
get there through the messy process.
It just doesn't come to beginningto end perfectly formed.
Like it fell outta the sky, which isa misconception some people have of
folks that are creative or talentedin some way that this final product
just, you know, drops straight fromthe muse and straight out of your
(07:43):
straight out of your pen or yourpaintbrush or your, or your voice mm-hmm
But yeah, the, the process is, youknow, just embrace this, this messiness.
You'll be having a lot ofexperiments, generating lots of data.
You're not happy with how some of it turnsout and you make changes and you just have
to be ready for that, for that journey.
Lauren Best (08:00):
Mm.
. Yeah.
And then you kind of learn to anticipatethat, and that becomes part of it.
you know, mm-hmm, like I find sometimesI'll sometimes I'll improvise and
record it and try to just do a bunchof different recordings in a row mm-hmm
and oftentimes a lot of it, like you'resaying a lot of it, I don't want to
keep, it's kind of like a lot of run onsentences sometimes, you know, mm-hmm
(08:23):
but then within that, I'm able, I'm ableto notice things, notice patterns, or
just notice little moments I want topick out that I may not have arrived
at if I had not been in the middle ofthose run hard sentences, you know, I
wouldn't have necessarily gotten there.
Ju like, uh, you know, it's like, itwouldn't, it wouldn't make sense for
me to be like, I'm gonna sit downand I'm only gonna play the keepers,
(08:45):
you know, like that that's, that'snot it, you know, mm-hmm, , that's
not how I'm going to get there.
I need to, I need to gothrough this process.
That's very different than what itwould be if I was trying to write
a song or trying to, you know, evenjam with someone else, I'm kind of
allowing, for, for a certain kind ofmindset or a certain kind of sound
Steve Treseler (09:04):
mm-hmm yeah.
Writers do that with free writing, justwrite, write, write, write, and then,
then you can get to the good stuff.
And then it happens with composing,you know, the intro to the song
isn't working and then suddenlysomething amazing happens.
And you're like, oh, thisis actually the song.
And you just, you had toget through the other stuff.
And that can be similarto skill development too.
If you're learning how to hit a golfball and you go to the driving range,
I'm only gonna hit, I'm only gonna hit itstraight down the middle every time, you
(09:26):
know, that doesn't doesn't quite happen.
You.
You've gotta shank, shank them as well.
Uh,
\Lauren Best: and it gets us used to that too, so that we kind of
can have emotional safety withinthis broader range of experiences.
Mm-hmm um, and I think too, thatthinking of it, like a scientist also
encourages us to, to measure things.
Even if that's kind of measuringjust based on our own observations
(09:49):
and not like specifics, but measurethings in different ways too.
Like, like notice different aspectsof how we're feeling like noticing,
well I was talking before about our,our, um, our emotions or what we're
feeling in our body, or noticing aboutour experiences within ourselves,
within our emotions or our thoughts,um, or our physicality noticing how
(10:13):
things actually feel in our body.
Um, but also noticing like what we cansee and what we can hear and kind of
like teasing out and separating thedifferent aspects of what we're observing
mm-hmm . Yeah.
Lauren Best (10:28):
Does that kind, does that resonate?
Like that's sort of separating out someof those elements so that we can, uh, I
mean, a lot of it ends up being that wethink it's one thing and then suddenly
we realize, or one hypothesis, right.
Mm-hmm and then we realize that'sactually like a number of different
experiments or different elements of thisthat we're observing at the same time.
Or we might even revisewhat the question is.
(10:49):
yeah.
Steve Treseler (10:50):
And we'll get to, to some of those too, as we get to the, our
fifth mini episode on reflection as welland reflecting and, and with our, yeah.
With our experiments and, and what,what to do next, based on how it,
how it feels and how it sounds.
Lauren Best (11:05):
I was gonna ask you, are there any like kind of tips and tricks?
I was gonna say tips and tricks, butjust things about experimenting that.
You'd say, Hey, this is what I'velearned about creative experiments.
You know, mm-hmm, like any sort of,um, for someone starting off on that
adventure or someone who's listeningto this and thinking, ah, I never
(11:28):
thought of that as an experiment.
I'm going to go do some experiments now.
Thank you, Steve.
I am now a scientist.
um, how would you like tosend them on their way?
Steve Treseler (11:38):
Yeah, so you can think of something that you're
something that you're somethingthat you're curious about.
It might even be experimenting, youknow, with a new medium, or sometimes
that might, you know, a new soundmaking, a new instrument shows up, like
I'm gonna, figure out all the soundsthis thing can make and it can shape
(11:59):
into, um, it can shape into somethingcompelling or interesting or, or not.
But we'll also this, this will tie inall, all these practices intersect with
each other, but, uh, with the limitations.
So we'll have some.
In the, in the show notes, we'llshare some for, for musicians, some,
some ways of setting up musicalexperiments through a limitation menu.
(12:21):
So this comes from a book thatyou can download on the infinite
improvisation website as well.
It's called Creativity Triggersfor Musicians, uh, and it's, I'm
all I'm in the process of re.
revising it as the InfiniteImprovisation Handbook.
So depending on when you're listeningto this episode, you'll be able to
find it on the website under one ofthose two, two names, but diving into
(12:41):
having a very specific limitation.
So saying, okay, I'm gonna experiment, butI'm only going to use the black keys on
the piano and one hand and experiment.
And then within, within that limitation,just see what happens and can I
make something, they make somethinginteresting and I've done other,
(13:02):
you know, just limitation like that.
A class I was just teaching, Iwas having some students improvise
with just two notes, but their jobwas to try to make someone else
laugh with only those two notes.
So then suddenly they're havingto do a lot with dynamics and
expressiveness and all of these.
So that was just an experiment.
We, I set up and it's not aboutsetting up the right, what's the
correct experiment to set up.
So I'm like, I'm gonna set up anexperiment of having one fifth
(13:25):
grader, make a group of fifthgraders laugh only using two notes.
So , it doesn't have to be all,um, doesn't have to be super
serious, the, the whole process.
So it can be the playful element, whichis another mini episode on another
mini episode on play, but it can betaking one, uh, just yeah, narrowing
(13:47):
down what tools you're working with.
So it could be these notes.
It could be this dynamics, itcould be this paint color, uh, and.
And then seeing experimentingwith it within a narrow scope.
Lauren Best (13:59):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I was going to say that, that feweroptions I find often mm-hmm, , you
know, I think of an idea andthen I have to narrow it down.
Mm-hmm , you know, I do an experimentand then I need to narrow it down more.
And even though earlier I talkedabout, um, kind of run on sentence
improvisations where they're sort oflike free writing mm-hmm , but for
(14:21):
improvising, um, and I, in that case,my limitation was play short things.
Mm-hmm, don't plan, you know, but Iwould, I wouldn't start there necessarily.
I would start even, even ina more, even simpler way.
Mm.
Um, and as you're saying, even just acouple notes, you know, I mean, there's
(14:43):
different, there's different ways to doit, but, uh, I find often it's like less.
Even less, even less.
Because by, by scaling it down,then you start to actually come up
with more ideas, you know, mm-hmm
so at least, you know, on piano,if I think it's only two notes.
Okay.
But I could play those twonotes in different octaves.
(15:04):
Right.
And then I start to think of differenttypes of, um, different types of
patterns I might not have otherwise.
So yeah, I would agree.
I would agree with the kind ofkeeping it simple and then you
can always add, add on more.
Steve Treseler (15:14):
Mm-hmm yeah.
And, and as we, as we go, we'll bedoing some of these experiments live
on the podcast as, as we go along.
So we wanna model this ourselvesand have other folks in our, our
online community too, come together.
And, and do these together as a, as acommunity that you're not just in, in
isolation, experimenting, you know,bringing forth your results with, with
(15:37):
other people because the other, theother point, uh, I, I wanted to touch on,
uh, I, I mentioned to you this to youbefore some, some folks, when I, when
I say that I'm a professional musician,they go, oh, you're a musician.
You must be good at math becausemusic and math are the same thing.
I'm like now it's made me grumpy.
And I didn't quite know how torespond other than like yeah.
Uhhuh.
(15:58):
Sure.
Um, but now I like to say I'm like,actually it's much closer to, uh, much
closer to a science and the scientificmethod and talk about what we're talking
about with experimenting and makingexperiments and looking at the results and
changing things and seeing what happens.
And, um, mm-hmm, , it'snot exactly it, isn't art.
It's partly, you know, Partly art, partlyscience, there's math in there, in there
(16:19):
too, but I feel much more comfortablewith the creative process being more
like the scientific method than justthan, uh, turning into a math formula.
Lauren Best (16:31):
Yeah.
And changing variables, um, individuallymm-hmm or, or maybe a couple at a time,
but like if something different didn'twork rather than starting from scratch
mm-hmm I mean, you, you are welcometo start from scratch, but you'll learn
a lot more by changing like one thing.
And then did that thing that you changed,change the outcome as you were expecting.
(16:52):
Mm-hmm like, how can it helps,I think, to make choices about
how you adjust things, when youthink of it as an experiment, as
opposed to necess it being like a.
um, you know, that it's all wrong.
mm-hmm, it doesn't mean that everythingleading up to the outcome was wrong, if
you didn't get what you were hoping for.
It means you need to adjustparts of, um, well, I won't
(17:14):
say the formula, but, um, yeah.
Of the, of the experiment.
Steve Treseler (17:18):
Yeah.
And.
Then it helps you be detached to somedegrees like, okay, this music, it needs
to be really meaningful and powerful.
And this is, I put my life into it.
You can put just a lot of expectationsonto the results, which can be, you know,
we have to, this is important to us, butyou still have to be a little bit detached
from all the data you're collectingand, and move forward from there.
And mm-hmm, not toharsh on math too much.
(17:39):
I apparently, if you studymathematics at a very high level,
it becomes as open and creative.
You know, it becomes a verybeautiful creative thing.
I've never quite made it to that level.
So I didn't experience that,that level of, of mathematics,
but I hear, I hear it's there.
Lauren Best (17:53):
Well, and apparently, I think a lot of us learn mathematics
with a lot of, um, like memorizationmm-hmm and, and semantic information.
And, um, and that, uh, what we're.
And sometimes people learnscience that way too.
Mm-hmm um, but kind of thinkingabout what you're doing as a
system, is more like what most ofus would think of when we think of
(18:17):
experimentation is kind of working inthese systems, but these systems that
are, um, kind of like a manageable,adjustable, um, kind of playground.
You know, uh, a seriousplayground, but a playground
, Steve Treseler: that's true.
In science class, we had ourscience experiments, they were all
dictated out of the textbook andyou had to do it a certain way.
(18:38):
And you know, teacher knew it advancewhat the, what the results would
be if you did the experiment right.
So not quite what we're talking about.
Yeah.
More like the, um, uh, this, the,the scientist that's, that's sort
of driven by passion in their lab,kind of working in a more holistic
(18:59):
way as opposed to, uh, you know, the,the textbook the textbook approach.
Steve Treseler (19:07):
Yeah.
Perhaps, well, well, Ithink we can leave it.
Is this still within mini episode range?
I think we did it, I think so.
I think we kept it shorterthan mm-hmm than 40 minutes.
So,
Lauren Best (19:16):
and please let us know if you have questions, let us know where
this takes you and how you relate tothis, and what kind of experiments
you've been doing or what you plan to do.
Steve Treseler (19:26):
Yeah.
And connect with us atinfiniteimprovisation.com, you
can find our online community.
And, uh, and send us, send us a message.
Hello, and welcome to the Infinite Improvisation Podcast,
adventures in music and creativity.
And I am Steve Treselerjoined by Lauren Best.
Lauren Best (00:16):
Happy to be back.
Steve Treseler (00:18):
Yeah.
So in our first season we were workingon answering some questions about
why and, and what, and who we are.
And now we're gonna get intothe, how, how do we improvise?
How do we create new musical ideasor put new artistic works out into
the world and get into that process.
(00:41):
So these will be a series of fivemini episodes around the creative
practices of Infinite Improvisation.
And largely this willbe about the process.
It's a how episode, but not necessarily ahow to like a linear step by step process.
Mm-hmm um, what are, what are yourthoughts on that, of the, how a
(01:06):
creative process versus somethingthat's a little more linear?
Lauren Best (01:09):
You know, I heard someone describe it as a buffet.
It was, it was JD Derbyshire, who'sa, who's a comedian and playwright.
Uh, and they described it as likea creative buffet that, you know,
you give yourself lots of differentoptions and then you see what tastes
good and you see, you see whatyou feel like, like choosing from.
So I, I know what you meanwith not, um, not necessarily
(01:31):
a linear step by step process.
It's not baking , you know,where we have exact ratios and,
uh, and it's an exact formula.
Um, but there's, there's differentelements for different times,
different purposes, different people.
Steve Treseler (01:50):
yeah.
Whereas if you're coming up with your ownrecipe, if you're with the one writing
the recipe, that certainly could bemore of a creative, creative practice.
So, or something more linear, likeyou're learning how to change the tire in
your car, learn the D flat major scale.
It's something where theoutcome is predetermined.
You know what the goal isahead of time when you start.
So when we're developing skills,it's some of the most effective way.
(02:13):
You know, the research by Anders Ericksontells us that deliberate practice
helps us develop skills in the mostefficient way, which is knowing what
the outcome is and dividing it up intoactionable steps and getting coaching.
And that's really important forus as we're learning skills as
artists and musicians, but thecreative part is, is different.
And we might, when we're going toimprovise a piece, compose something.
(02:37):
Paint an original work,whatever your, your medium is.
You might not know what point B iswhen you start, when you're done,
like the results might surprise you.
So it takes a different, differentapproach and it's less, it's less
direct and have to embrace thisprocess of it being, you know,
about being more of a wandering,less EF, less efficient process.
(02:58):
Mm.
Lauren Best (02:59):
And within that, sometimes we do come up with certain
formulas, um, that we feel work for us.
Mm-hmm , uh, but Y and, and,and, well, we've talked before
about limitations, right?
Mm-hmm certain limitations orformulas that we might adjust.
Um, but Y like, there, there aremany possible variations and many
possible, I mean, within bakingI do improvise a little bit.
(03:23):
Mm-hmm because I know whatsome of the formulas are.
Right.
Mm-hmm that like, it's kind of, Isee it's about this amount of spice,
so I can maybe, you know, put insome different spices of my own.
Cause I kind of see what they're,where they're going with that.
Mm-hmm um, and sometimes I'll I'llthink, oh, that creative process
worked really well for me before.
I see I did some things, so maybe I'll,I'll try that again, but, there's a
(03:45):
lot more, as you're saying there's alot more that's unknown or intuitive
or where we kind of leave deliberateblank spaces to fill in later.
Steve Treseler (03:54):
Yeah.
So the first of these creativepractices to get into for this
episode is experimentation.
Um, a quote from Jacob Brokowski, which isthere is a likeness between the creative
acts of the mind in art and in science.
mm-hmm which I, which I really like.
So experimentation, this is embracingthe scientific method, which I
(04:17):
think about is how, how scientistslearn more about their domain.
It starts with maybe curiosity,like, oh, what's something I would
like an answer to or, or a problem.
And following your curiosityand setting up experiments.
So we can do this with our art,or is a, as a musical experiments
as a musical experiment.
And.
(04:38):
, you know, you're, you'll be gatheringdata and, you know, we may have
an idea of what, oh, we're gonnaexperiment and see what happens.
You might have a prediction of, we havea hypothesis and, but the results may
ultimately may ultimately surprise us.
Lauren Best (04:52):
Mm-hmm yeah.
And the idea of multiple possibleoutcomes mm-hmm and, and kind
of suspending judgment on those.
That we can embrace some of the,some of the various possibilities
as parts of that process.
Steve Treseler (05:06):
Mm-hmm
. So for this concept, this is less of a.
As we go, we'll, we'll try to giveyou even more practical, getting
closer to the how to thing, but theexperimentation, it's more of the
mindset that we're TA we're taking thiswith the curiosity of a scientist and
that we're, that we're gathering data.
So our art and our music is very, it'svery important and special to us,
(05:30):
but at the same time, we, as we're,as we're having these experiments,
sometimes the results won't be whatwe expected, or we're not happy with
the results, but treating, treatingthis as a scientist that we're looking
at all of this as data that we'regathering, that we're gathering data.
And it doesn't mean you'rea bad scientist because your
hypothesis wasn't entirely right.
(05:50):
Well then we devise a new experimenthave a new hypothesis and that's.
I mean, that's how you get betterat that's how you get better
at science and that's how youget better at creating things.
Lauren Best (06:00):
Cool.
Yeah.
I mean, I would agree with that andalso thinking about it helps us,
I think, separate, um, some of thedifferent elements of the outcome.
Mm-hmm, , uh, like we'vetalked before about, you know,
one outcome is how we feel.
, mm-hmm, like how our emotions feel,how, like, what we're noticing.
Um, and then another outcome is howthe music actually sounds or how the,
(06:24):
the creative work actually, um, likeimpacts us or impacts other people.
Um, you know, and there could be other,other categories we add onto that.
Steve Treseler (06:36):
mm-hmm yeah.
And.
Eventually as, as you go, we wantart and music that really resonates
with us and with other people.
But the way to get there is through someof this experimentation, having data
and, uh, and, and throw and throwingthings out, you know, we have you
generate lots and lots of data and whenthings don't work being just free to
(06:58):
toss it out and, and, and try again.
Yeah, mm-hmm , while I'm doing quotes,quote's from Brahm's the composer,
which I believe is the mark of anartist is how much he throws away.
So kind of, if.
If your, uh, garbage can, is mostfull with your scores that didn't
work out, then you'll in the process.
You'll get to the gems.
I mean, we're in the process now ofwriting our theme song for this podcast
(07:20):
and, you know, we'll keep, we'll keepgoing until we're we have something
that we're happy with, and we're veryproud of the results, but you can only
get there through the messy process.
It just doesn't come to beginningto end perfectly formed.
Like it fell outta the sky, which isa misconception some people have of
folks that are creative or talentedin some way that this final product
just, you know, drops straight fromthe muse and straight out of your
(07:43):
straight out of your pen or yourpaintbrush or your, or your voice mm-hmm
But yeah, the, the process is, youknow, just embrace this, this messiness.
You'll be having a lot ofexperiments, generating lots of data.
You're not happy with how some of it turnsout and you make changes and you just have
to be ready for that, for that journey.
Lauren Best (08:00):
Mm.
. Yeah.
And then you kind of learn to anticipatethat, and that becomes part of it.
you know, mm-hmm, like I find sometimesI'll sometimes I'll improvise and
record it and try to just do a bunchof different recordings in a row mm-hmm
and oftentimes a lot of it, like you'resaying a lot of it, I don't want to
keep, it's kind of like a lot of run onsentences sometimes, you know, mm-hmm
(08:23):
but then within that, I'm able, I'm ableto notice things, notice patterns, or
just notice little moments I want topick out that I may not have arrived
at if I had not been in the middle ofthose run hard sentences, you know, I
wouldn't have necessarily gotten there.
Ju like, uh, you know, it's like, itwouldn't, it wouldn't make sense for
me to be like, I'm gonna sit downand I'm only gonna play the keepers,
(08:45):
you know, like that that's, that'snot it, you know, mm-hmm, , that's
not how I'm going to get there.
I need to, I need to gothrough this process.
That's very different than what itwould be if I was trying to write
a song or trying to, you know, evenjam with someone else, I'm kind of
allowing, for, for a certain kind ofmindset or a certain kind of sound
Steve Treseler (09:04):
mm-hmm yeah.
Writers do that with free writing, justwrite, write, write, write, and then,
then you can get to the good stuff.
And then it happens with composing,you know, the intro to the song
isn't working and then suddenlysomething amazing happens.
And you're like, oh, thisis actually the song.
And you just, you had toget through the other stuff.
And that can be similarto skill development too.
If you're learning how to hit a golfball and you go to the driving range,
I'm only gonna hit, I'm only gonna hit itstraight down the middle every time, you
(09:26):
know, that doesn't doesn't quite happen.
You.
You've gotta shank, shank them as well.
Uh,
\Lauren Best: and it gets us used to that too, so that we kind of
can have emotional safety withinthis broader range of experiences.
Mm-hmm um, and I think too, thatthinking of it, like a scientist also
encourages us to, to measure things.
Even if that's kind of measuringjust based on our own observations
(09:49):
and not like specifics, but measurethings in different ways too.
Like, like notice different aspectsof how we're feeling like noticing,
well I was talking before about our,our, um, our emotions or what we're
feeling in our body, or noticing aboutour experiences within ourselves,
within our emotions or our thoughts,um, or our physicality noticing how
(10:13):
things actually feel in our body.
Um, but also noticing like what we cansee and what we can hear and kind of
like teasing out and separating thedifferent aspects of what we're observing
mm-hmm . Yeah.
Lauren Best (10:28):
Does that kind, does that resonate?
Like that's sort of separating out someof those elements so that we can, uh, I
mean, a lot of it ends up being that wethink it's one thing and then suddenly
we realize, or one hypothesis, right.
Mm-hmm and then we realize that'sactually like a number of different
experiments or different elements of thisthat we're observing at the same time.
Or we might even revisewhat the question is.
(10:49):
yeah.
Steve Treseler (10:50):
And we'll get to, to some of those too, as we get to the, our
fifth mini episode on reflection as welland reflecting and, and with our, yeah.
With our experiments and, and what,what to do next, based on how it,
how it feels and how it sounds.
Lauren Best (11:05):
I was gonna ask you, are there any like kind of tips and tricks?
I was gonna say tips and tricks, butjust things about experimenting that.
You'd say, Hey, this is what I'velearned about creative experiments.
You know, mm-hmm, like any sort of,um, for someone starting off on that
adventure or someone who's listeningto this and thinking, ah, I never
(11:28):
thought of that as an experiment.
I'm going to go do some experiments now.
Thank you, Steve.
I am now a scientist.
um, how would you like tosend them on their way?
Steve Treseler (11:38):
Yeah, so you can think of something that you're
something that you're somethingthat you're curious about.
It might even be experimenting, youknow, with a new medium, or sometimes
that might, you know, a new soundmaking, a new instrument shows up, like
I'm gonna, figure out all the soundsthis thing can make and it can shape
(11:59):
into, um, it can shape into somethingcompelling or interesting or, or not.
But we'll also this, this will tie inall, all these practices intersect with
each other, but, uh, with the limitations.
So we'll have some.
In the, in the show notes, we'llshare some for, for musicians, some,
some ways of setting up musicalexperiments through a limitation menu.
(12:21):
So this comes from a book thatyou can download on the infinite
improvisation website as well.
It's called Creativity Triggersfor Musicians, uh, and it's, I'm
all I'm in the process of re.
revising it as the InfiniteImprovisation Handbook.
So depending on when you're listeningto this episode, you'll be able to
find it on the website under one ofthose two, two names, but diving into
(12:41):
having a very specific limitation.
So saying, okay, I'm gonna experiment, butI'm only going to use the black keys on
the piano and one hand and experiment.
And then within, within that limitation,just see what happens and can I
make something, they make somethinginteresting and I've done other,
(13:02):
you know, just limitation like that.
A class I was just teaching, Iwas having some students improvise
with just two notes, but their jobwas to try to make someone else
laugh with only those two notes.
So then suddenly they're havingto do a lot with dynamics and
expressiveness and all of these.
So that was just an experiment.
We, I set up and it's not aboutsetting up the right, what's the
correct experiment to set up.
So I'm like, I'm gonna set up anexperiment of having one fifth
(13:25):
grader, make a group of fifthgraders laugh only using two notes.
So , it doesn't have to be all,um, doesn't have to be super
serious, the, the whole process.
So it can be the playful element, whichis another mini episode on another
mini episode on play, but it can betaking one, uh, just yeah, narrowing
(13:47):
down what tools you're working with.
So it could be these notes.
It could be this dynamics, itcould be this paint color, uh, and.
And then seeing experimentingwith it within a narrow scope.
Lauren Best (13:59):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I was going to say that, that feweroptions I find often mm-hmm, , you
know, I think of an idea andthen I have to narrow it down.
Mm-hmm , you know, I do an experimentand then I need to narrow it down more.
And even though earlier I talkedabout, um, kind of run on sentence
improvisations where they're sort oflike free writing mm-hmm , but for
(14:21):
improvising, um, and I, in that case,my limitation was play short things.
Mm-hmm, don't plan, you know, but Iwould, I wouldn't start there necessarily.
I would start even, even ina more, even simpler way.
Mm.
Um, and as you're saying, even just acouple notes, you know, I mean, there's
(14:43):
different, there's different ways to doit, but, uh, I find often it's like less.
Even less, even less.
Because by, by scaling it down,then you start to actually come up
with more ideas, you know, mm-hmm
so at least, you know, on piano,if I think it's only two notes.
Okay.
But I could play those twonotes in different octaves.
(15:04):
Right.
And then I start to think of differenttypes of, um, different types of
patterns I might not have otherwise.
So yeah, I would agree.
I would agree with the kind ofkeeping it simple and then you
can always add, add on more.
Steve Treseler (15:14):
Mm-hmm yeah.
And, and as we, as we go, we'll bedoing some of these experiments live
on the podcast as, as we go along.
So we wanna model this ourselvesand have other folks in our, our
online community too, come together.
And, and do these together as a, as acommunity that you're not just in, in
isolation, experimenting, you know,bringing forth your results with, with
(15:37):
other people because the other, theother point, uh, I, I wanted to touch on,
uh, I, I mentioned to you this to youbefore some, some folks, when I, when
I say that I'm a professional musician,they go, oh, you're a musician.
You must be good at math becausemusic and math are the same thing.
I'm like now it's made me grumpy.
And I didn't quite know how torespond other than like yeah.
Uhhuh.
(15:58):
Sure.
Um, but now I like to say I'm like,actually it's much closer to, uh, much
closer to a science and the scientificmethod and talk about what we're talking
about with experimenting and makingexperiments and looking at the results and
changing things and seeing what happens.
And, um, mm-hmm, , it'snot exactly it, isn't art.
It's partly, you know, Partly art, partlyscience, there's math in there, in there
(16:19):
too, but I feel much more comfortablewith the creative process being more
like the scientific method than justthan, uh, turning into a math formula.
Lauren Best (16:31):
Yeah.
And changing variables, um, individuallymm-hmm or, or maybe a couple at a time,
but like if something different didn'twork rather than starting from scratch
mm-hmm I mean, you, you are welcometo start from scratch, but you'll learn
a lot more by changing like one thing.
And then did that thing that you changed,change the outcome as you were expecting.
(16:52):
Mm-hmm like, how can it helps,I think, to make choices about
how you adjust things, when youthink of it as an experiment, as
opposed to necess it being like a.
um, you know, that it's all wrong.
mm-hmm, it doesn't mean that everythingleading up to the outcome was wrong, if
you didn't get what you were hoping for.
It means you need to adjustparts of, um, well, I won't
(17:14):
say the formula, but, um, yeah.
Of the, of the experiment.
Steve Treseler (17:18):
Yeah.
And.
Then it helps you be detached to somedegrees like, okay, this music, it needs
to be really meaningful and powerful.
And this is, I put my life into it.
You can put just a lot of expectationsonto the results, which can be, you know,
we have to, this is important to us, butyou still have to be a little bit detached
from all the data you're collectingand, and move forward from there.
And mm-hmm, not toharsh on math too much.
(17:39):
I apparently, if you studymathematics at a very high level,
it becomes as open and creative.
You know, it becomes a verybeautiful creative thing.
I've never quite made it to that level.
So I didn't experience that,that level of, of mathematics,
but I hear, I hear it's there.
Lauren Best (17:53):
Well, and apparently, I think a lot of us learn mathematics
with a lot of, um, like memorizationmm-hmm and, and semantic information.
And, um, and that, uh, what we're.
And sometimes people learnscience that way too.
Mm-hmm um, but kind of thinkingabout what you're doing as a
system, is more like what most ofus would think of when we think of
(18:17):
experimentation is kind of working inthese systems, but these systems that
are, um, kind of like a manageable,adjustable, um, kind of playground.
You know, uh, a seriousplayground, but a playground
, Steve Treseler: that's true.
In science class, we had ourscience experiments, they were all
dictated out of the textbook andyou had to do it a certain way.
(18:38):
And you know, teacher knew it advancewhat the, what the results would
be if you did the experiment right.
So not quite what we're talking about.
Yeah.
More like the, um, uh, this, the,the scientist that's, that's sort
of driven by passion in their lab,kind of working in a more holistic
(18:59):
way as opposed to, uh, you know, the,the textbook the textbook approach.
Steve Treseler (19:07):
Yeah.
Perhaps, well, well, Ithink we can leave it.
Is this still within mini episode range?
I think we did it, I think so.
I think we kept it shorterthan mm-hmm than 40 minutes.
So,
Lauren Best (19:16):
and please let us know if you have questions, let us know where
this takes you and how you relate tothis, and what kind of experiments
you've been doing or what you plan to do.
Steve Treseler (19:26):
Yeah.
And connect with us atinfiniteimprovisation.com, you
can find our online community.
And, uh, and send us, send us a message.
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