April 21, 2022 • 45 mins
S1 E2: What is Improvisation?
Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best.
Steve and Lauren discuss what it means to make things up. What is improvisation? What isn't improvisation? What are we even talking about? What are the links between improvisation, art, and life.
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Episode Transcript
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Steve Treseler (00:08):
Welcome to the Infinite Improvisation Podcast,
Adventures in Music and Creativity.
This is Steve Treseler, joined byLauren Best in our second pilot
episode for our first season.
So we, our first episode was on the why.
(00:28):
Why are we doing this?
Why the conversation, why improvisation.
And now we're moving over tothe what, what are we doing?
What is improvisation?
Um, I mean, to kick this off, Lauren,you've been working on some various
descriptions, short and long descriptionsfor our podcast and, and, and one of them,
you, you threw out there, what is improv?
(00:48):
Is it a practice, a philosophy, a game,a collaborative experiment, a ritual,
a culture, and I might throw in, isit winging it, or is it noodling?
Is it making up random things?
Is it some magical gift?
So we'll even start, we'll evenstart there and then get to the
more the mechanics of what, whatwe'll be doing in this podcast.
(01:09):
But I'll throw it back to you.
Which one of those is it?
Lauren Best (01:14):
Well, what I just thought of now, as you said, that.
Like it's, it's the comingtogether of like circumstances
and skills in some ways.
Right.
Or context and intention.
Right.
In terms of it's like havingby context and circumstances.
(01:36):
Right.
I mean, Like not only like aphysical place, but also kind of the
bounds we put on the improvisation.
Right.
Or like the norms around it.
Um, I can explain more.
Right.
And then how we relate to that in termsof what we have, what we bring to it with.
I don't know, skill might be thewrong term though, in terms of our,
our ideas or our contributions.
(01:59):
That's kind of how I wouldgo really broad with it.
What do you think.
Steve Treseler (02:04):
Yeah.
There's so many differentangles and perspectives on this.
It's might be a little, a littlelong-winded, but I've been prepping
for this thinking about this, butfrom a more narrow, so starting
narrow and getting broader, I guess.
So as a, you know, as a performingmusician, improvisation in my world,
it's really instant composition, right.
(02:26):
That we're composing somethingand performing it simultaneously.
That is the creation and the performanceall happening at the same moment.
And this is true in other domains,whether it's like improv theater or
comedy spoken word, freestyle rapping,visual arts that we have this yeah.
That.
(02:48):
Yeah, creating and, andperforming all at the same time.
Uh, but as we zoom out, there's so muchimprovisation that happens in arts.
That's not maybe animprovised performance.
It could be that, that moment ofinspiration or the aha moment,
just sort of making a connectionbetween two unrelated ideas.
Or as I, as I mentioned in the lastepisode, you might be experimenting,
(03:15):
riffing or noodling around andsomething pops up and that becomes the
seed or the inspiration for a, for alarger composition or artistic work
that in the end might be, might beedited and be a, or if it's a piece
of music, it could be something that'sperformed the same way each time.
But there was an, there was animprovised moment that got it started.
(03:36):
Um, and this can be the case forwhether it's either arts or crafts,
architecture or innovation of any, ofany kind in business or anywhere else.
Uh, and then if we zoom out evenfurther, just the improvisation
in how we navigate life.
Uh, one of my favorite quotes from the,uh, Steven Nachmanovitch , I just sent you
his book excited to hear what you thinkof the Art Of Is, but in interview, he
(04:00):
says, improvisation is what you do withthe information that is coming into all of
your senses at this moment in this room.
And very much relating to music.
You know, he says that you're not justdoing anything or being random or crazy
or noodling around, but it's very specificabout what, you know, reacting to what
(04:22):
you're taking in with your senses in thismoment, with these, with these people
and that kind of attunement to yourenvironment, which is necessary for other
, other disciplines, other expertise, youknow, whether you're a physician or a
therapist and you're in the room withsomeone taking in, what's what you're
taking in and how you're going to reactin that moment or a mechanic or someone
(04:45):
who's writing legislation is reallythat attunement to your environment.
And you know, this is how we navigatethe world, whether we're having a,
having a conversation or taking awalk somewhere unfamiliar, you're kind
of taking in making these decisionsbased on the environment around you.
Um, and, and then we can, all, we canall relate that we can relate that back
(05:08):
to something very specific as well.
And when we're creating art, butalso be talking about, yeah, some
of the larger, uh, larger, largerimplications in culture and in life.
So that's my kind of.
Lauren Best (05:22):
And, and I find so interesting the
intention behind it, right?
So like, you know, folks might, Ishouldn't say folks, people like,
people might say, um, of all sorts,whether they are folks or other
people, um, I'm just teasing.
Steve Treseler (05:41):
Louis Armstrong said all music is folk music.
Haven't heard of a horsesing a tune anyway.
Lauren Best (05:47):
Um, is that like the.
The performance aspect or like theintention of it being art or being
creation or whatever like that.
That is part of it.
I think a lot of, if I were toask people by folks, I meant if
I were to just ask someone on thestreet, like what is improvisation?
I think a lot of people would feelthat the intention of performance
or of sharing is part of that.
(06:07):
But I think of like, you know,if I'm outside and I hear a sound
in nature, I hear like the soundof a bird and I whistle back.
Like, is that improvisationor am I just playing?
Right.
What I don't know, you know.
And then if I keep whistling with thebird, are we now improvising together?
If I later on, because I'm thinking,oh, that whistling felt nice.
(06:31):
I'm imagining these sounds.
And then I whistle some more,you know, am I improvising then?
Am I doing what a bird has taught me?
Have I learned bird by rote?
Um, but I mean, that's justa scenario, just kind of.
Some what ifs, like I think, Ithink about within the scope of
improv of improvisation and what isimprovisation, I'm always curious
(06:52):
a bit curious about like what thelimits and boundaries are of that.
And something I've been curiousabout is how we can create
circumstances that encourage otherpeople to improvise as well as how
we explore it in our own practices.
Steve Treseler (07:06):
But with the, with the bird that I would say absolutely
improvisation and I'm working onrewriting, my, my ebook, it's the
Infinite Improvisation Handbook.
And it's actually starting out withlistening is a prompt to listen to your
environment and listen to all the ambientsounds in your environment and then make
some kind of response to it, and actuallyimprovising a duet with the ambient
(07:26):
sounds in your environment, which is kindof the new, the new way that it's set
up, which is that's the kind of, yeah.
One type of improvisation wecan do at, at any point, and
sometimes the tapping is annoying.
I've heard, but yeah, it's uh, whenI'm, when I'm drumming at the, at the
dinner table and yeah, that, yeah.
(07:47):
What are, what are the limits?
Artistically, it can be sort ofan abstract or mysterious thing,
but when it comes to conversation,we just do it all the time.
Like we don't musically, we mightbe used to playing something that's
that's, that's written down andwe know what's going to happen.
But if you're talking to someone whoyou can tell, they're reading off of a
script, like nobody likes that, or it'sjust a very scripted conversation or.
(08:08):
You know, who knows you, you know,you're on a date with someone and
they're like trying to rememberwhat the right question to ask is.
It's just like makes, we can, wecan detect it then it's, you know?
Lauren Best (08:17):
Yeah.
And there's certain norms withinconversation, which is interesting.
Right.
We think, oh, like conversation.
If we think of it as improvisation,it doesn't necessarily have
a lot of structure or plan.
We might think.
But there's certain normswithin conversation.
I've read an articleabout this awhile ago.
Like one being.
Like the amount you talk at once, right?
(08:39):
Like if I'm very short in my responsesand I'm kind of like violating that
norm by not saying enough, by saying, bybeing extremely short or extremely quiet,
like you would be like, what is wrong?
You know?
Like it would feel very weird andprobably pretty quickly you would wonder
if there was like, you know, If I'mupset, if I'm really shy, like it was
(09:02):
suddenly very much like take, take youout of that improvisation, so to speak.
Right.
And likewise, if I, if I talkedtoo much, which might happen to me
occasionally in life, you know, thatalso that also violates- there's
other like conversational norms.
Steve Treseler (09:19):
And one is to like, with a, you know, it's good to ask
questions, but if some, one personjust firing off a bunch of questions
without responding to it, you feellike you're being interrogated or say,
it can be strange if someone's not.
You know, riffing on your, even if they'remostly asking the questions, people like
when you, when you ask them questionsabout themselves, but then if there's no
response, that feels, that feels strange.
Lauren Best (09:38):
Yeah.
And it's actually like more, more way morestructured and way more complicated that
then in some ways we give it credit for.
Steve Treseler (09:49):
And then if you want, if you want to move on, it's like,
oh, what you got going on later in theday, if I'm trying to terminate this
conversation to get you to go away, thenyou kind of ask about, oh, something
going on next and then, all right, seeyou later, you know, there's different.
Lauren Best (10:02):
Or body language too, right?
There's certain, uh, like ways thatbody language might suggest that the
conversation's wrapping up or that, Imean, it can suggest a lot of things.
Yeah.
Steve Treseler (10:14):
And there are lots of, what's strange about doing this.
The video conferences too causenaturally body language people aren't
just like straight at each other, youknow, squared off at, you know, often
a more neutral position where you're alittle bit more of an angle, you know?
So it can be, yeah,there's, there's so much.
So much with that.
Lauren Best (10:29):
And it changes our interpretation of each
other's eyes, I think.
And we hear differently too, right?
Depending on whether, whether we haveheadphones on and like the quality of
audio, sometimes how we're hearing people,uh, can be, can be quite different.
What about, so this is whereall these circumstances we're
talking about are sort of.
(10:50):
Same room, same place, kind of like very,very relational or conversational even.
Um, I think we were talking aboutresponding to nature sounds it
still has that, that aspect to it.
Uh, what about asynchronous improvisation?
Like how do you think that ha like thestretchiness of that over time when
it's, when it's people responding to oneanother, but not necessarily in the same
(11:13):
room or, or maybe not at the same time?
Steve Treseler (11:19):
And yeah, that's a different, different flavor, but I've
been doing, you know, during the pandemicsand various collaborations with people
and some were improvised, you know,with the delay, with software, with the
sound painting group, you know, doingthis over zoom and recording ourselves.
And that's nearlysynchronous, but not quite.
And that's, it that's its own,that's its own thing, but I've been,
yeah, I'm working on self producing,a record, which involves, you
(11:40):
know, collaborating with differentimprovisers, but I might send them.
You know, a track or there's something,and then they'll improvise with it.
So it still feels very natural and likea type collaboration, you know, they may
take a few different passes at it, butthere's this still, this this improvising
happening and a connection, but it'snot in the same room at the same time.
(12:03):
So there's absolutelya place for doing it.
Yeah for doing this for doing thisasynchronous asynchronously, at
least that's what that's, whatcomes to mind a collaboration with
one person, record something, thensomeone else adds something else.
I did this in a remote class.
I was teaching at the university where Iwas designing this improvisation class.
We did it with like a drum circleand we did kind of a textual one
too, where someone just added,added some layer of something.
(12:25):
And then whenever someone elsehappened to have a layer to, there
was a small group, maybe four people.
So someone started something andsomeone else logged in and listened
to it used like a cloud based digitalaudio workstation, then someone else
would add the next layer and thensomeone else would add something.
And the first person came back andlistened to it and was like, holy moly.
I had no idea what was,what was going to happen
Lauren Best (12:43):
so with loops, like creating like a looped thing,
Steve Treseler (12:47):
it wasn't even a loop.
It was just one, it's like a two-minutetrack and someone else added another one.
And it was all, for this one, I think itwas all, I think it was all audio tracks.
Someone may have.
We may have had added maybe, it may havebeen a mix of virtual instruments and
midi and yeah, this one wasn't loops.
It was just a.
(13:09):
Uh, and that was following in a S uh, Ikeep saying assignment, but it's what it
was, it was a, it was a class for credit.
And the assignment of recordingof doing a duet with some ambient
sounds in your environment.
This one was pretty popular.
So, and what was good during the pandemic?
So much of it was liketheir roommate typing.
Yeah.
And so, and some of it could be live.
Other times people would recordit like a field recording to,
(13:30):
you know, record a rushing river.
And then later on, then drop that intotheir software and improvise on top of it.
But other times it would besomeone opened the window and.
Then, you know, you don't feelas alone, you actually playing a
duet with the sounds around you.
So city sounds or nature soundsor birds or, or any of that.
So we did that first.
Then when it came time to overdubdifferent layers, people had some ideas
(13:52):
of, of some other sound layers or thatwould be, that would be interesting
for this project besides playing notesand rhythms like they're used to.
So, yeah.
Lauren Best (14:03):
Well, I guess part of it is like deciding upon.
Some kind of structure or con,or we can call that context.
Right.
And then leaving something'sunknown, emergent.
I was going to say up to chance,but really sometimes, I mean,
it can be chance, but sometimesit's quite often not chance.
(14:23):
It's not, it's not luck or random.
It's like actually a very specificresponse, but not planned and kind
of, um, kind of opening that up,which sometimes as you're saying.
We have a piece, like, like a song,the song has structure and we're, we're
playing all kinds of stuff over it.
or getting someone else to, um, andsometimes you mentioned at the beginning,
(14:46):
like the idea of instant composition,like the whole thing is emergent.
Um, and there may be more orless structure around what might
be played in response to that.
Um, I was thinking of, in terms ofasyncronous improvisation or in terms of
stretching, what improvisation is maybe?
Um, so as when I was Poet Laureate,I was looking at different
(15:08):
kinds of creativity and how.
There's different types of creativitycan intersect with words, right.
And how we can use music, but other,other things like sculpture and
movement and a variety of, of kind ofways into words and ways into poetry.
Um, and out of that, and out ofthe various things I was doing,
(15:30):
um, I became really interested inthe idea of fill in the blanks and
Madlibs and, and what that does.
And I created a series offill in the blank, haiku.
Uh, because haiku has a veryspecific structure, right?
It's a very, like, it's thisthe number of syllables there's
actually even more structurethan that to haiku traditionally,
(15:52):
which is really interesting stuff.
Um, so I would write haiku that had likeunderlined spots, not with not with what
should you go in there, like Madlibs.
But just openings.
And so my idea with that was that wasan invitation to the reader to improvise
and that very moment reading it.
(16:14):
And so the reader thenkind of has a choice.
Like they don't have to participate.
Right.
They can read it and imagine a blank,but that is still a choice, right.
Versus taking the invitation andputting their own word in there.
And then, uh, when they dothat, Change the meaning or not.
Right.
(16:34):
Uh, but it also mightchange the structure or not.
They might like completelyexplode the haiku's structure
or they might stay within it.
And, um, they can do whatever comesto them first, or they can think
about it a little and then be like,ah, this is the fill in the blank.
And so I was, I was curious how Icould make an invitation and like, have
it be both very structured and veryopen-ended and kind of see what happened.
(16:57):
Uh, like in, in that way by, by tryingto draw people into the process a bit.
Steve Treseler (17:04):
Wow.
I would love to look to see those yeah.
Send to me or I'll buy him orhowever, the transaction to see
your fill in the blank haikus.
and you know, do them with my kid.
Okay.
Yeah.
Lauren Best (17:11):
They're on Instagram.
Steve Treseler (17:12):
That's great.
And that relates to what I'vebeen doing a lot musically.
I hadn't thought about itlike that as a, as a Madlib.
I was just doing a workshop, was kind ofleading a jam session at a high school.
in the in Seattle that has areally strong jazz program.
And a lot of the kids are really, reallyplaying great, but there's a lot of
new, new, new newcomers to the programthat had been on, you know, online,
(17:36):
online band for a couple of years.
So I was supposed to facilitatethe experience and hold
their hands a little bit.
Cause there was a stage with lightsand, and get them to come up.
So one thing I do is some fill inthe blank stuff, rather than like,
what happened to me is you stick amicrophone in front of each kid and
say, play a solo in front of everybody.
And you know, it's not goingto sound great and everyone's
looking at you and they freeze up.
And, but we were working on someconversational phrasing, like
(17:57):
taking this call and responsefrom black American music.
And it having this back andforth, but I was starting with
some question and answer phrases.
So I like gave everyone a rhythm and we'reall going, bop, bop do that, that, and
then I had them only change the last note.
So the question phrases, you have to goup at the end, uh, or you, you know, like
you're talking Canadian or something.
Sorry.
And then, uh, and then going downat the end, something really simple.
(18:21):
Right.
Up then just a real simplefilm of what they could all do.
It, they did it all together and thenthey took turns and like, no one was, you
know, and I'm asking him it's like, wasthat complicated or was that confusing?
No.
Was that scary?
No.
Okay.
We're doing it.
And then we started loosening therestriction, but I've done lots of that
musically in the, in the jazz world.
Same with asynchronous learning.
(18:45):
Uh, I put together my first online coursethat had, it came from these workshops.
It is very much.
Call and response to in the moment hereI play this, you play it back or I play
this and you play something different.
I didn't think it would really workpre recorded until I was having
to teach a pandemic workshop.
And there's so many kids Ihad to mute everybody and
say, I play and you play back.
(19:06):
And then I was realizing, I'mlike, well, if I can't hear any
of them and it's effective, likethis doesn't have to be live.
This can be prerecorded.
So it was my idea to put together acourse where here I play something.
You copy it and now go doit again, rewind the video.
And then.
I will play something and yourespond with something different,
have this conversational phrasing.
So it's very asynchronous.
And the advantage of thateducationally is now hundreds or
(19:26):
thousands of kids have done this.
And I don't have to be there, doingit, but there's still some improvised
moments happening when I was creating it.
And when they were, whenthey were responding and it
wasn't that it was a mad lib.
Lauren Best (19:39):
Yeah.
I've done some similar thingswith some of my students.
And sometimes because we'replaying piano, we have two hands.
So one hand can be the question andthe other hand can be the response.
Um, but as you were saying, I oftenstart with one hand just echoing.
a rhythm that the first-hand doesso that like, there may, we're
(19:59):
doing some improvising, but we'rekeeping it within like a very
specific, a very specific structure.
For it to be lower pressure, butsometimes what I've done is had the
kids actually record their own clipsand then improvise to themselves.
So they're doing theirrecording an ostinato.
Um, and then they can play along withtheir own ostinato that they've made.
(20:23):
Um, I mean, I don't know ifthat's typically how I would
answer what is improvising.
I'm not when I'm doing this with thekids, it's not only for improvising.
It's also to get themthinking in multiple parts.
And to give them a little of that,you know, like stem, steam education,
like learning about recordingthemselves and what that's like.
Um,
Steve Treseler (20:44):
but the answer is yes.
Can it be asynchronous?
Like when you're saying it'sin this moment right now?
Well, what about if it's well,
Lauren Best (20:50):
elements of it, like elements of the structure?
Um, I it's interesting right inimprovisation can be, so it's like, so
open-ended, it can be so in the moment.
Quite structured and asynchronous
it can be all
Steve Treseler (21:06):
it'd be all of these things.
And as we get to, we're talking aboutdoing the episodes on how, how do
we do this as maybe its own its ownseries or its own its own season.
Uh, but so much of that is having somevery narrow structure and limitations
like self-imposed limitations.
It seems counterintuitive.
We want to be free and create anddo, do whatever, whatever we wish,
(21:29):
but the practice of it so much can belimiting our tools and we have to be
more, more resourceful in other areas.
And so I was telling the kidsyesterday, I'm like, this
is a temporary rule for now.
I'm not saying this is Steve's rulesfor how you need to prescriptively
improvise, but we're going tostay within these limitations and.
You know, and it can't,it can't be a challenge.
And then navigating that challengeis actually how we, how we practice.
Lauren Best (21:52):
I was thinking, I was that part, I think I said this to you when we
were planning this actually, that part ofthe question is what isn't improvisation
Steve Treseler (22:01):
I was going to bring that up.
Cause you asked that I've had that onmy list of questions and I'm like, I
don't, I'll let you feel that one first.
Cause I didn't have, I'm kindof formulating an answer cause
they're like, oh, it's it's life.
But
Lauren Best (22:12):
yeah, what is not improvising.
I mean, when I, because I work withkids a lot, I often think to myself,
things like, how would this go?
If, if I just tried it witha bunch of kids, right?
We were talking about those kinds oflike conversational norms or like that
as, as we gain more experience, westart to assume certain things about
what the norms are in a given group.
(22:33):
Right?
So like you and I, if we are with a groupof musicians, we're going to make certain
assumptions about how communicationis likely to go and how we're likely
to go about improvising and stuff.
Whereas kids don't always have asense of those norms or a sense
of as much impulse control.
(22:53):
Right.
So I think as, as teachers sometimesto avoid some of those surprises
that come with that, such as kidsbeing very exuberant, but that can
be loud and intense on instruments.
And sometimes we really stop that quicklyand then tell them exactly what to do to
avoid- sometimes it's like to avoid damageto our ears damage to the instruments.
(23:17):
Like there can be a lot ofgood reasons to have those
structures and those boundaries.
Um, but I think sometimes it canbe kind of prescriptive and that
we don't necessarily open thosedoors again, as widely as we
might, as quickly as we might.
Um, and that sometimes, wecan, we can create even more
(23:40):
space for, for improvisation.
I don't know if that quite, that didn'treally answer what isn't improvised.
I guess that was a little more of what is
Steve Treseler (23:46):
like, no, but that says it as, as you have more and more
people involved and you've got to dosome crowd control to make it the right
space for everyone it's there needsto be more and more structure to make
it a musical experience that works aswe get more people involved in that.
Yeah, maybe that didn'tanswer the question.
What isn't improvisation Lauren.
Well, I
Lauren Best (24:06):
think about, I mean, improvisation is not
utter and complete randomness.
It is, is generally response, likewithin having some kinds of goals for
it, I would say it's not totally random.
Although some degree of randomnesscan be a part of the exploration.
Right.
Um, I would say improvisation isnot a 100% predictable, right?
(24:34):
Like there needs to besome unpredictability.
Yeah.
I would say even if, if thatunpredictability is like, the notes
might be predictable as we've talked,that might be the re that might be
the one of the constraints, but otherthings could change around that.
Steve Treseler (24:49):
And that makes me think about other areas for improvisation in
life, but things that aren't improvisedwhen you don't want them to be predictable
sometimes where someone's trying to makea very carefully curated experience.
That's I mean, I'm even thinking of,uh, events, you know, you imagine
a bunch of kids running around andplaying at a birthday party and
then they go, okay, now everyone'sgoing to play this game altogether.
(25:11):
They have this idea in theirhead of what it's supposed to
be, and then try to execute.
That and making the experience, not whatit is in the moment, but with some other
idea of what it is or what it was in thepast, I think that's, that can be moments
and that that happens artistically aswell, where we, we snap out of the moment.
And we're trying to, we're either, youknow, planning for something else or
(25:31):
thinking about a previous event thathappened, but even music that can be very
much composed or similar each time, therecan be some magic of improvisation of
some, some dynamics that are happening.
Um, in the moment like thatshow, I went to last night with a
Wailin' Jennys the amazing gift.
Um, amazing folk vocal I don't know,alt country ensemble, I don't know.
(25:53):
what you call it, but I've heard thatI've heard some of the stuff recorded.
A lot of it's very similar, but asthere was just some magic of being
very attuned to the room and the momentthat felt that there was, there was
those improvised moments happening,even though the music itself wasn't
what we think of as improvised music.
Lauren Best (26:11):
Interesting.
Right.
Because it kind of brings up thequestion of why improvise, if we don't
have to write, like in a performance.
It would be in some ways lessrisky to not improvise at all and
to have every thing, absolutelyeverything meticulously planned.
But as you just said, that'snot always what you want.
(26:33):
Right.
Steve Treseler (26:34):
And that, that makes me even more nervous because I can't
improvise my way out of whatever I gotmyself into, if it's all predetermined,
but not every, not everyone is like that.
Most more people are not like that.
They like happen for a lot of people.
They have less anxiety when theyknow they have control over the
situation and what's going to happen.
It helps them navigate their fight orflight response when they have that, they
feel like they have that control over it.
(26:55):
And I mean, it happens in the jazzworld too, that a lot of people learn
it's, it's very complicated and we getto jazz language or jazz vocabulary,
which is a really sophisticated wayof communication and traditions.
But some people interpret that to meanlike cutting and pasting some well
here's lick one and here's lick two.
If you want to learn the vocabulary,they associate like semantics of
words with this particular lick.
(27:16):
So sometimes there's some like cutting.
Cutting and pasting.
And that can be helpful as like anetude to put some things together.
But then there are some people that, youknow, the improvising is things that are,
you know, rhythmically and melodically inthis jazz language or flow, but there's
not anything spontaneous happening.
It sounds, sounds like jazz.
(27:36):
And, but there are some playersthat repeat them, you know,
it's a bit, it's complicated.
It's not like the best players arejust, it's all just a brand new,
stream of consciousness idea thathas never been played before, even
some great improvisers, repeat theirown, build their own vocabulary-
pin for pin for another episode.
But there's definitely like the straightup cutting and pasting or these jazz
(27:58):
competitions where people will, someonehas already written an improvised solo
that someone else already played, wroteit down and someone, instead of listening
to it as like looking at it, and they'retrying to play it note for note and they
perform that written solo exactly as theyhave practiced it on stage and get a,
you know, and get a trophy or whatever.
And so that feels, you know, there'sways of playing other people's
(28:20):
music to make it feel improvised.
But in that, in that case where it's amoment for someone to improvise and you're
trying to play it exactly as someone elseplayed it as it's written down exactly
as you'd played it before, that's not it.
Lauren Best (28:35):
Yeah.
And for me, like improvisation isa tool as opposed to an outcome.
If I'm that makes sense, right?
It's not, it's not a path thatleads to one particular destination.
I think it's a tool that can beused in a lot of different ways.
Uh, and it's like such a hugewide, wide spectrum of things.
(28:56):
And as you were saying, like with.
With repeating things, right.
And that repeating things can be apart of improvisation and improvisation
doesn't mean like necessarily, youknow, like no rules, no repeats, right?
Like that's not part of it.
And I find that a like, thinkingback to the examples I was giving of
piano students, I find almost everystudent that I've encouraged to do
(29:20):
some kind of improvising activity.
I have to remind them to repeatthemselves, you know, like
it's okay to have silence.
Have a moment, is okay.
To slow down, play lessand repeat yourself more.
Steve Treseler (29:40):
Yeah, absolutely.
And when it comes down to, and peopledo this deliberately and like thematic
development, you can take a theme andthen improvising, and this is something
that's part of how I practice and teach.
Like, let's take this musical theme ora motif, and then we're going to develop
it and change it and transform it.
And that's one of the yeah.
Really important toolto have in the toolkit.
(30:02):
But yeah, I mean, with you thatit's all, it's the pro it's not
the final w it's not predictable.
What the final product will be, butit, at some point, those of us have a
career doing this, building a portfolio,you know, here's some, uh, okay.
So it's at some point some productsshow up too, you know, improvise, and
then at some point like document it.
And it's not about yeah.
(30:25):
And I find that, yeah, it iscurious that the more I'm embracing
the process, then what ends upbeing the quote product ends up.
Can surprise me at times, butends up being something I'm.
More proud of than trying tomake it a certain, a certain way.
Lauren Best (30:41):
I mean, I think improvisation can be with, or without
a product, but it can be a reallylike, just straight up useful way of
getting to the product where like itfeels better and the result is better.
Um, I think it can be, uh, anexcellent aesthetic tool, let's say.
Like a tool kind of on the way to gettingsomewhere that could have been not
(31:02):
improvised, but it was improvised andit's likely, you know, better for it.
Um, I think it can also be a tool that'sentirely process-based and that, uh,
it's about the learning within thatprocess as much as it is about, uh, an
aesthetic product or an aesthetic outcome.
Hmm.
(31:22):
Yeah.
I mean, I think there's.
There's a pretty wide range.
When I think of what improvisationisn't often I think to myself.
Ah, but it's so close to what it is.
We could just change itand make it a little more.
Steve Treseler (31:34):
It's everything.
Yeah.
Lauren Best (31:37):
And that, like, it's not about constantly being generative.
We mentioned this in the last episode.
It's not like against repeating, um, like,you know, an idea or learning traditional
music or learning notated music.
It's up, there's this wholeother, other tube toolbox within
(31:58):
the idea of what improvising is.
I was gonna say it a lot to try tosum up in like one podcast episode.
Right?
It's like as much as we were saying, oh,the whole podcast is really about the why
in a way the whole podcast is also about.
About the what and aboutlooking at those aspects too.
Steve Treseler (32:17):
Absolutely.
And this gets to something we hadtouched on before about, you know,
why, why is this, this relevant?
Like, well, if we're playing music,that's composed, you know, why, why
is why is improvising relevant?
But we've touched on some bigger.
Bigger topics and well, and alsoin some of your descriptions too,
(32:38):
talking about changing the worldthrough improvisation, you know?
Okay.
Thinking real big.
So, I mean, what are some of thosebigger, bigger picture issues?
I mean, this might touch on, I knowyou said maybe you had some unfinished
business on from our, why episode two.
I don't know if that was, thatwas part of it or, but yeah.
Talk about the, your thoughts on that.
Some of the bigger, thebigger implications beyond.
You know, experimenting in our own.
Lauren Best (33:01):
Well, I think that improvisation serves as a model for
risk-taking right where there's somethinginherently risky about it, right.
Because there's, there's an unknown to it.
And as you're saying, thisis something that we kind of
do in our, in our lives too.
Right.
So I think doing it in thesemore controlled circumstances.
(33:22):
Um, control is maybe the wrong word, butwhere are there some boundaries around it?
Right.
But it still feels frightening.
It can feel bad.
Like it can feel fun and good.
And then lead us to making music more.
And that's real.
But it can also feel like bad and scaryand not like we want to feel making music,
(33:44):
but I think we still learn from that.
Right.
Because through, through incorporating itin our practice, we can work with that.
And, uh, and starting to look atthat a little more neutrally, like
instead of, oh, I felt terrified.
I think, oh, I felt a little shaky orlike, oh, I felt, I felt excited or
like, you know, I felt nervous energy.
As opposed to, oh, I felt terrified.
(34:05):
I didn't think I was going to be ableto do it, or, you know, for example.
So I think sometimes from practicing that,even in these really small ways, right.
Practicing it with ourselves,practicing it with like our family.
I mean, I think improvisation isimportant just because it increases
how we connect to people around us.
(34:26):
And I think using improvisationin families is important for, like
improving our mood and our cognitionand just connecting us and helping
us relate to one another, but justonly on a personal level, even if we
aren't making music with our families,um, I think it teaches those things.
I think it's useful.
Uh, and I think that it like doing lessof it in our culture and in our schools-
(34:53):
I do think that's changing over time,but I think the emphasis, uh, kind
of being away from a variation, theemphasis being on, on perfection and
competitive music and, and some ofthese other aspects doesn't allow
for the diversity of experiencethat could benefit us in many ways.
Steve Treseler (35:15):
Yeah.
And we're talking about the model for thepublic schools, you know, very much this
product of that, you know, the industrialera where it's like, okay, we need things
to be efficient and predetermined outcomesand have students sit in rows and, and,
you know, measure the results, which.
You know, helpful for many things, butyeah, if we're talking about other areas,
especially if it's more valuable, nowthose are anything that can be totally
predetermined and turned into a system.
(35:36):
That's easier to have, you know, a robotdo it, or, um, or find someone hold he'll
do it, do it for less and less money.
But if we're.
And what was, we're looking at ideaslike innovation or empathy or leadership,
all these things are so important thatyou can't just get to that through
(35:58):
rubrics and measuring everything.
So it gets to that.
Yeah.
Broader talk of, yeah.
Education
Lauren Best (36:04):
and I mean, I think music, even without improvising music teaches
us a lot of transferable skills, likea huge amount of transferable skills.
I think when we add.
Improvising into that.
And I mean, I could substituteinto music like other art forms.
Also, teaches a lotof transferable skills.
I think that like most people are onboard with this and education around
(36:27):
that music and arts have value.
Not only.
Music for the sake of music, but alsobecause of these like transferable
aspects, as you were talking about interms of leadership and empathy and
communication, then physical coordinationand problem solving and, and, uh,
you know, helping shape our values.
But in my opinion, when we add moreimprovisation and creativity, I think
(36:50):
it just increases, um, kind of thedepth to which we acquire those skills.
And I think, I think we get even more.
Out of it from, fromadding in improvisation,
Steve Treseler (37:02):
uh, as you, as you said, using those, practicing
those skills where it's a morecontrolled or safe environment.
I mean, one example, personal examplethat came up was just thinking didn't
mean to do so much pandemic talk thisthis episode, but you know, navigating,
you know, when the pandemic shuteverything down, I was, I kind of
put my, put myself into crazy musicalsituations where I need to improvise with
these two, you know, hi, I'm on stage.
(37:24):
And then I'm going toimprovise in this way.
And.
kind of a, strange set of limitations.
I put on myself and work my way out of it.
And then in life suddenly hadthese limitations that okay, What's
in helps support my family andpay this mortgage and everything
I'd been doing to earn money.
I can't do it anymore.
Like I can't teach lessons.
I'm not playing gigs.
I'm not doing workshops.
Everything was in person.
And I mean, I was treating it asan improvised exercise and I'm
(37:47):
like, how can I pay my bills?
But I can't leave my basement.
Like I'm in this chair,here's the new structure.
Here's the new, my other ways of,oh, I want to do this and that.
And that I'm like, no, I needto stay within the limitation.
And then it took some creative problemsolving and you know, it wasn't all, it
wasn't all wonderful, but I'm like, okay.
And then it ended up with newthings to offer or serving the
(38:07):
same, same people in different ways.
And I just had to like flip everythingout, but I think, I really think
that they, you know, improvised lifeor improvise of making myself do
uncomfortable things in weird situations.
It's a weird cut.
Yeah.
As a, for fun, we're doing it.
Artistically made it a lot easier to dowhen, when life throws situations like
that, like here's, here's the situations,here's the limitations and the limitations
(38:31):
often aren't what we think they are.
We have these, that's a whole,that's a whole nother talk, but
I remember thinking that, that Iwas able to like adjust him and.
Can we not say pivot anymore?
What's the word, whatever.
But
Lauren Best (38:43):
I think part of it's staying in the zone.
Right.
And you know that withinthat zone, there may be fear.
There may be uncertainty.
There may be.
Absolute confusion, you know, but youlike, you know that from experience.
And so it becomes easier to stayin the zone and not think, oh, this
uncertainty or confusion means thatI should run away and hide because
(39:04):
it's certain to lead to death, right.
That we kind of holdourselves within that.
I I've been using an example latelywhere it's like, we can like rush into
something like, you know, that feelingof rushing to get somewhere and then
like you arrive and sometimes youarrive and you slow down, but sometimes
you arrive and you still feel rushed.
You're like, you don't have to rushany more, but you're still, you're
(39:26):
like pressed against the future almost.
And you're pressed against yourexpectations and you're kind
of you, it's your, it's thispressure, this pressurized feelng
is that
Steve Treseler (39:36):
why I feel weird when I get somewhere early in the event that
I do, I'm like, okay, well, I'm here.
What am I supposed to do now?
I am fifteen minutes to early
Lauren Best (39:43):
that's a, that's a whole other conversation.
I don't claim to be anexpert at being early.
We'll have,
Steve Treseler (39:49):
we'll have a punctual expert expert on a future episode.
Lauren Best (39:52):
And then on the other side of that, We can, I mean, there's
arriving late and you're rushing,but there's like, we can kind of
hang back in an experience, right?
Like we can hang back and, andnot fully commit ourselves.
And maybe like that, sometimesisn't even totally intentional.
Right?
Sometimes it's like, there's a fear.
Sometimes we're extremely tiredand we just are not like in it.
(40:13):
Cause we're not really feelingit because it's just hard to kind
of fully show up in that way.
And then there's thesweet spot in the middle.
Right.
And I think we're not always thereautomatically, but just extend what
you were saying when we've had thisexperience of either kind of pushing
our, like pressuring ourselves againstsome, uh, against the future or kind of
(40:34):
holding back in the past versus reallybeing in the moment with something.
I think that those micromoments of needing to do that.
Because it will go badly sometimes, butgetting through it helps us stay with
that and build our capacity for, uh,as I was talking to you before about
that noticing what is without needingto stress out about it right away or
(40:57):
change it right away and just noticingand relating and responding to, to what's
actually towards actually happening.
Um, even if what's actuallyhappening is challenging.
Steve Treseler (41:08):
Exactly.
Rather than relating to an ideaof what you think is supposed to
be or what it was like last time.
And I mean, that's somuch of what it's about.
We've put this in somany different angles.
So, I mean, w w w.
I mean I hear so many timeslike, oh, improvisation,
what's kind of a jazz thing.
Right?
And like, well, those were much, muchbigger concept than that, but so much
of it, I mean, that theme is, I mean,as I like to say, it's the attunement
(41:29):
to your environment and making decisionson what's, what's really here and that
can work musically and in all theseother areas, areas of life, and that is
something I'm still in the process ofdoing that, you know, being attuned to.
What's here in front of me, eventhough we're talking about it.
I still, I still can get distractedand wander and plan and think
(41:50):
ruminate on whatever as muchas, as much as the next person.
Yeah.
Lauren Best (41:53):
Yeah.
And it's, it's like on onehand I can think of so many.
Joyful and wonderful and excitingexperiences, improvising, like even
just in a playful way as a child,but in a way that's actually like,
has some degree of skill to it, likeimagining, you know, dancing around
and lip-syncing as a child, right.
(42:15):
I'm doing some things that areactually like have some degree of
skill to, to it at that point, youknow, I'm not thinking about it.
Right.
And as an adult of course hadjoyful, wonderful experiences.
I've also had really like embarrassingand frightening experiences.
Um, you know, but it's, it's,uh, like coming back from that
(42:35):
and allowing space for that.
And I think sometimes.
Access like those embarrassing andfrightening experiences might even be
just with myself or like one other personI don't necessarily mean you know, in
front of a huge, huge number of people,however, it can, that happens too.
Yeah, that happens too.
But we, we kind of learn this,this, figure it out aspect.
(42:58):
And I think that increasesour trust in ourselves.
I think that increasesour trust in the process.
And I think that it also increasesour tolerance for even if.
Like we know that trust in ourselves meansthat doesn't go perfectly necessarily,
but we trust that we can continue.
Steve Treseler (43:16):
Yeah.
And that's a future conversation to have.
It's like, why, why aresome of these risks?
You know, it's like why some of these,what feels like high risk activities and
subjecting yourself to embarrassment?
Like why, why is it worth doing it ratherthan staying safe and comfortable, but
that's, that's a whole nother talk.
Um, and I'm going to do this thing.
That's the conversational norm whereI talk about the future thing in
order to wrap up the conversation.
Next time, our next pilot episode,now that we fully exhausted everything
(43:40):
about what is improvisation.
Okay.
We didn't even talk about whatis the format of our podcast.
We didn't even get there, but, um, letme get to that, but we have to wrap up.
Yeah.
Well, if you're going to, yeah.
Future, future conversations about what,what the, what this, uh, the structure
of our podcast and some of our ideas forsegments and all that will look like, but
also the who, the, who episode is nextabout, you know, you'll can learn a little
(44:02):
bit, go a little bit deeper into, intoboth of our lives and experiences and.
Lauren Best (44:09):
And I'll learn who you really are.
Who, who, who do you think you are?
So that's yeah, that's coming up, comingup next for pilot episode number three.
Yeah.
Thanks everyone.
For those of you that madeit to the end of the episode.
Thanks for, thanks for being here.
And you can go to infiniteimprovisation.com and connect with us
(44:30):
in our online community and downloadsome resources if you're interested
and let us know what you think.
Maybe what is improvisation and somethingyou would answer a little differently and
I'd like to know how you'd answer that.
Steve Treseler (44:44):
Yeah.
So you can, yeah, you can reach usat hello@infiniteimprovisation.com.
Lauren Best (44:51):
Yeah.
Looking forward to seeing you again soon.
Welcome to the Infinite Improvisation Podcast,
Adventures in Music and Creativity.
This is Steve Treseler, joined byLauren Best in our second pilot
episode for our first season.
So we, our first episode was on the why.
(00:28):
Why are we doing this?
Why the conversation, why improvisation.
And now we're moving over tothe what, what are we doing?
What is improvisation?
Um, I mean, to kick this off, Lauren,you've been working on some various
descriptions, short and long descriptionsfor our podcast and, and, and one of them,
you, you threw out there, what is improv?
(00:48):
Is it a practice, a philosophy, a game,a collaborative experiment, a ritual,
a culture, and I might throw in, isit winging it, or is it noodling?
Is it making up random things?
Is it some magical gift?
So we'll even start, we'll evenstart there and then get to the
more the mechanics of what, whatwe'll be doing in this podcast.
(01:09):
But I'll throw it back to you.
Which one of those is it?
Lauren Best (01:14):
Well, what I just thought of now, as you said, that.
Like it's, it's the comingtogether of like circumstances
and skills in some ways.
Right.
Or context and intention.
Right.
In terms of it's like havingby context and circumstances.
(01:36):
Right.
I mean, Like not only like aphysical place, but also kind of the
bounds we put on the improvisation.
Right.
Or like the norms around it.
Um, I can explain more.
Right.
And then how we relate to that in termsof what we have, what we bring to it with.
I don't know, skill might be thewrong term though, in terms of our,
our ideas or our contributions.
(01:59):
That's kind of how I wouldgo really broad with it.
What do you think.
Steve Treseler (02:04):
Yeah.
There's so many differentangles and perspectives on this.
It's might be a little, a littlelong-winded, but I've been prepping
for this thinking about this, butfrom a more narrow, so starting
narrow and getting broader, I guess.
So as a, you know, as a performingmusician, improvisation in my world,
it's really instant composition, right.
(02:26):
That we're composing somethingand performing it simultaneously.
That is the creation and the performanceall happening at the same moment.
And this is true in other domains,whether it's like improv theater or
comedy spoken word, freestyle rapping,visual arts that we have this yeah.
That.
(02:48):
Yeah, creating and, andperforming all at the same time.
Uh, but as we zoom out, there's so muchimprovisation that happens in arts.
That's not maybe animprovised performance.
It could be that, that moment ofinspiration or the aha moment,
just sort of making a connectionbetween two unrelated ideas.
Or as I, as I mentioned in the lastepisode, you might be experimenting,
(03:15):
riffing or noodling around andsomething pops up and that becomes the
seed or the inspiration for a, for alarger composition or artistic work
that in the end might be, might beedited and be a, or if it's a piece
of music, it could be something that'sperformed the same way each time.
But there was an, there was animprovised moment that got it started.
(03:36):
Um, and this can be the case forwhether it's either arts or crafts,
architecture or innovation of any, ofany kind in business or anywhere else.
Uh, and then if we zoom out evenfurther, just the improvisation
in how we navigate life.
Uh, one of my favorite quotes from the,uh, Steven Nachmanovitch , I just sent you
his book excited to hear what you thinkof the Art Of Is, but in interview, he
(04:00):
says, improvisation is what you do withthe information that is coming into all of
your senses at this moment in this room.
And very much relating to music.
You know, he says that you're not justdoing anything or being random or crazy
or noodling around, but it's very specificabout what, you know, reacting to what
(04:22):
you're taking in with your senses in thismoment, with these, with these people
and that kind of attunement to yourenvironment, which is necessary for other
, other disciplines, other expertise, youknow, whether you're a physician or a
therapist and you're in the room withsomeone taking in, what's what you're
taking in and how you're going to reactin that moment or a mechanic or someone
(04:45):
who's writing legislation is reallythat attunement to your environment.
And you know, this is how we navigatethe world, whether we're having a,
having a conversation or taking awalk somewhere unfamiliar, you're kind
of taking in making these decisionsbased on the environment around you.
Um, and, and then we can, all, we canall relate that we can relate that back
(05:08):
to something very specific as well.
And when we're creating art, butalso be talking about, yeah, some
of the larger, uh, larger, largerimplications in culture and in life.
So that's my kind of.
Lauren Best (05:22):
And, and I find so interesting the
intention behind it, right?
So like, you know, folks might, Ishouldn't say folks, people like,
people might say, um, of all sorts,whether they are folks or other
people, um, I'm just teasing.
Steve Treseler (05:41):
Louis Armstrong said all music is folk music.
Haven't heard of a horsesing a tune anyway.
Lauren Best (05:47):
Um, is that like the.
The performance aspect or like theintention of it being art or being
creation or whatever like that.
That is part of it.
I think a lot of, if I were toask people by folks, I meant if
I were to just ask someone on thestreet, like what is improvisation?
I think a lot of people would feelthat the intention of performance
or of sharing is part of that.
(06:07):
But I think of like, you know,if I'm outside and I hear a sound
in nature, I hear like the soundof a bird and I whistle back.
Like, is that improvisationor am I just playing?
Right.
What I don't know, you know.
And then if I keep whistling with thebird, are we now improvising together?
If I later on, because I'm thinking,oh, that whistling felt nice.
(06:31):
I'm imagining these sounds.
And then I whistle some more,you know, am I improvising then?
Am I doing what a bird has taught me?
Have I learned bird by rote?
Um, but I mean, that's justa scenario, just kind of.
Some what ifs, like I think, Ithink about within the scope of
improv of improvisation and what isimprovisation, I'm always curious
(06:52):
a bit curious about like what thelimits and boundaries are of that.
And something I've been curiousabout is how we can create
circumstances that encourage otherpeople to improvise as well as how
we explore it in our own practices.
Steve Treseler (07:06):
But with the, with the bird that I would say absolutely
improvisation and I'm working onrewriting, my, my ebook, it's the
Infinite Improvisation Handbook.
And it's actually starting out withlistening is a prompt to listen to your
environment and listen to all the ambientsounds in your environment and then make
some kind of response to it, and actuallyimprovising a duet with the ambient
(07:26):
sounds in your environment, which is kindof the new, the new way that it's set
up, which is that's the kind of, yeah.
One type of improvisation wecan do at, at any point, and
sometimes the tapping is annoying.
I've heard, but yeah, it's uh, whenI'm, when I'm drumming at the, at the
dinner table and yeah, that, yeah.
(07:47):
What are, what are the limits?
Artistically, it can be sort ofan abstract or mysterious thing,
but when it comes to conversation,we just do it all the time.
Like we don't musically, we mightbe used to playing something that's
that's, that's written down andwe know what's going to happen.
But if you're talking to someone whoyou can tell, they're reading off of a
script, like nobody likes that, or it'sjust a very scripted conversation or.
(08:08):
You know, who knows you, you know,you're on a date with someone and
they're like trying to rememberwhat the right question to ask is.
It's just like makes, we can, wecan detect it then it's, you know?
Lauren Best (08:17):
Yeah.
And there's certain norms withinconversation, which is interesting.
Right.
We think, oh, like conversation.
If we think of it as improvisation,it doesn't necessarily have
a lot of structure or plan.
We might think.
But there's certain normswithin conversation.
I've read an articleabout this awhile ago.
Like one being.
Like the amount you talk at once, right?
(08:39):
Like if I'm very short in my responsesand I'm kind of like violating that
norm by not saying enough, by saying, bybeing extremely short or extremely quiet,
like you would be like, what is wrong?
You know?
Like it would feel very weird andprobably pretty quickly you would wonder
if there was like, you know, If I'mupset, if I'm really shy, like it was
(09:02):
suddenly very much like take, take youout of that improvisation, so to speak.
Right.
And likewise, if I, if I talkedtoo much, which might happen to me
occasionally in life, you know, thatalso that also violates- there's
other like conversational norms.
Steve Treseler (09:19):
And one is to like, with a, you know, it's good to ask
questions, but if some, one personjust firing off a bunch of questions
without responding to it, you feellike you're being interrogated or say,
it can be strange if someone's not.
You know, riffing on your, even if they'remostly asking the questions, people like
when you, when you ask them questionsabout themselves, but then if there's no
response, that feels, that feels strange.
Lauren Best (09:38):
Yeah.
And it's actually like more, more way morestructured and way more complicated that
then in some ways we give it credit for.
Steve Treseler (09:49):
And then if you want, if you want to move on, it's like,
oh, what you got going on later in theday, if I'm trying to terminate this
conversation to get you to go away, thenyou kind of ask about, oh, something
going on next and then, all right, seeyou later, you know, there's different.
Lauren Best (10:02):
Or body language too, right?
There's certain, uh, like ways thatbody language might suggest that the
conversation's wrapping up or that, Imean, it can suggest a lot of things.
Yeah.
Steve Treseler (10:14):
And there are lots of, what's strange about doing this.
The video conferences too causenaturally body language people aren't
just like straight at each other, youknow, squared off at, you know, often
a more neutral position where you're alittle bit more of an angle, you know?
So it can be, yeah,there's, there's so much.
So much with that.
Lauren Best (10:29):
And it changes our interpretation of each
other's eyes, I think.
And we hear differently too, right?
Depending on whether, whether we haveheadphones on and like the quality of
audio, sometimes how we're hearing people,uh, can be, can be quite different.
What about, so this is whereall these circumstances we're
talking about are sort of.
(10:50):
Same room, same place, kind of like very,very relational or conversational even.
Um, I think we were talking aboutresponding to nature sounds it
still has that, that aspect to it.
Uh, what about asynchronous improvisation?
Like how do you think that ha like thestretchiness of that over time when
it's, when it's people responding to oneanother, but not necessarily in the same
(11:13):
room or, or maybe not at the same time?
Steve Treseler (11:19):
And yeah, that's a different, different flavor, but I've
been doing, you know, during the pandemicsand various collaborations with people
and some were improvised, you know,with the delay, with software, with the
sound painting group, you know, doingthis over zoom and recording ourselves.
And that's nearlysynchronous, but not quite.
And that's, it that's its own,that's its own thing, but I've been,
yeah, I'm working on self producing,a record, which involves, you
(11:40):
know, collaborating with differentimprovisers, but I might send them.
You know, a track or there's something,and then they'll improvise with it.
So it still feels very natural and likea type collaboration, you know, they may
take a few different passes at it, butthere's this still, this this improvising
happening and a connection, but it'snot in the same room at the same time.
(12:03):
So there's absolutelya place for doing it.
Yeah for doing this for doing thisasynchronous asynchronously, at
least that's what that's, whatcomes to mind a collaboration with
one person, record something, thensomeone else adds something else.
I did this in a remote class.
I was teaching at the university where Iwas designing this improvisation class.
We did it with like a drum circleand we did kind of a textual one
too, where someone just added,added some layer of something.
(12:25):
And then whenever someone elsehappened to have a layer to, there
was a small group, maybe four people.
So someone started something andsomeone else logged in and listened
to it used like a cloud based digitalaudio workstation, then someone else
would add the next layer and thensomeone else would add something.
And the first person came back andlistened to it and was like, holy moly.
I had no idea what was,what was going to happen
Lauren Best (12:43):
so with loops, like creating like a looped thing,
Steve Treseler (12:47):
it wasn't even a loop.
It was just one, it's like a two-minutetrack and someone else added another one.
And it was all, for this one, I think itwas all, I think it was all audio tracks.
Someone may have.
We may have had added maybe, it may havebeen a mix of virtual instruments and
midi and yeah, this one wasn't loops.
It was just a.
(13:09):
Uh, and that was following in a S uh, Ikeep saying assignment, but it's what it
was, it was a, it was a class for credit.
And the assignment of recordingof doing a duet with some ambient
sounds in your environment.
This one was pretty popular.
So, and what was good during the pandemic?
So much of it was liketheir roommate typing.
Yeah.
And so, and some of it could be live.
Other times people would recordit like a field recording to,
(13:30):
you know, record a rushing river.
And then later on, then drop that intotheir software and improvise on top of it.
But other times it would besomeone opened the window and.
Then, you know, you don't feelas alone, you actually playing a
duet with the sounds around you.
So city sounds or nature soundsor birds or, or any of that.
So we did that first.
Then when it came time to overdubdifferent layers, people had some ideas
(13:52):
of, of some other sound layers or thatwould be, that would be interesting
for this project besides playing notesand rhythms like they're used to.
So, yeah.
Lauren Best (14:03):
Well, I guess part of it is like deciding upon.
Some kind of structure or con,or we can call that context.
Right.
And then leaving something'sunknown, emergent.
I was going to say up to chance,but really sometimes, I mean,
it can be chance, but sometimesit's quite often not chance.
(14:23):
It's not, it's not luck or random.
It's like actually a very specificresponse, but not planned and kind
of, um, kind of opening that up,which sometimes as you're saying.
We have a piece, like, like a song,the song has structure and we're, we're
playing all kinds of stuff over it.
or getting someone else to, um, andsometimes you mentioned at the beginning,
(14:46):
like the idea of instant composition,like the whole thing is emergent.
Um, and there may be more orless structure around what might
be played in response to that.
Um, I was thinking of, in terms ofasyncronous improvisation or in terms of
stretching, what improvisation is maybe?
Um, so as when I was Poet Laureate,I was looking at different
(15:08):
kinds of creativity and how.
There's different types of creativitycan intersect with words, right.
And how we can use music, but other,other things like sculpture and
movement and a variety of, of kind ofways into words and ways into poetry.
Um, and out of that, and out ofthe various things I was doing,
(15:30):
um, I became really interested inthe idea of fill in the blanks and
Madlibs and, and what that does.
And I created a series offill in the blank, haiku.
Uh, because haiku has a veryspecific structure, right?
It's a very, like, it's thisthe number of syllables there's
actually even more structurethan that to haiku traditionally,
(15:52):
which is really interesting stuff.
Um, so I would write haiku that had likeunderlined spots, not with not with what
should you go in there, like Madlibs.
But just openings.
And so my idea with that was that wasan invitation to the reader to improvise
and that very moment reading it.
(16:14):
And so the reader thenkind of has a choice.
Like they don't have to participate.
Right.
They can read it and imagine a blank,but that is still a choice, right.
Versus taking the invitation andputting their own word in there.
And then, uh, when they dothat, Change the meaning or not.
Right.
(16:34):
Uh, but it also mightchange the structure or not.
They might like completelyexplode the haiku's structure
or they might stay within it.
And, um, they can do whatever comesto them first, or they can think
about it a little and then be like,ah, this is the fill in the blank.
And so I was, I was curious how Icould make an invitation and like, have
it be both very structured and veryopen-ended and kind of see what happened.
(16:57):
Uh, like in, in that way by, by tryingto draw people into the process a bit.
Steve Treseler (17:04):
Wow.
I would love to look to see those yeah.
Send to me or I'll buy him orhowever, the transaction to see
your fill in the blank haikus.
and you know, do them with my kid.
Okay.
Yeah.
Lauren Best (17:11):
They're on Instagram.
Steve Treseler (17:12):
That's great.
And that relates to what I'vebeen doing a lot musically.
I hadn't thought about itlike that as a, as a Madlib.
I was just doing a workshop, was kind ofleading a jam session at a high school.
in the in Seattle that has areally strong jazz program.
And a lot of the kids are really, reallyplaying great, but there's a lot of
new, new, new newcomers to the programthat had been on, you know, online,
(17:36):
online band for a couple of years.
So I was supposed to facilitatethe experience and hold
their hands a little bit.
Cause there was a stage with lightsand, and get them to come up.
So one thing I do is some fill inthe blank stuff, rather than like,
what happened to me is you stick amicrophone in front of each kid and
say, play a solo in front of everybody.
And you know, it's not goingto sound great and everyone's
looking at you and they freeze up.
And, but we were working on someconversational phrasing, like
(17:57):
taking this call and responsefrom black American music.
And it having this back andforth, but I was starting with
some question and answer phrases.
So I like gave everyone a rhythm and we'reall going, bop, bop do that, that, and
then I had them only change the last note.
So the question phrases, you have to goup at the end, uh, or you, you know, like
you're talking Canadian or something.
Sorry.
And then, uh, and then going downat the end, something really simple.
(18:21):
Right.
Up then just a real simplefilm of what they could all do.
It, they did it all together and thenthey took turns and like, no one was, you
know, and I'm asking him it's like, wasthat complicated or was that confusing?
No.
Was that scary?
No.
Okay.
We're doing it.
And then we started loosening therestriction, but I've done lots of that
musically in the, in the jazz world.
Same with asynchronous learning.
(18:45):
Uh, I put together my first online coursethat had, it came from these workshops.
It is very much.
Call and response to in the moment hereI play this, you play it back or I play
this and you play something different.
I didn't think it would really workpre recorded until I was having
to teach a pandemic workshop.
And there's so many kids Ihad to mute everybody and
say, I play and you play back.
(19:06):
And then I was realizing, I'mlike, well, if I can't hear any
of them and it's effective, likethis doesn't have to be live.
This can be prerecorded.
So it was my idea to put together acourse where here I play something.
You copy it and now go doit again, rewind the video.
And then.
I will play something and yourespond with something different,
have this conversational phrasing.
So it's very asynchronous.
And the advantage of thateducationally is now hundreds or
(19:26):
thousands of kids have done this.
And I don't have to be there, doingit, but there's still some improvised
moments happening when I was creating it.
And when they were, whenthey were responding and it
wasn't that it was a mad lib.
Lauren Best (19:39):
Yeah.
I've done some similar thingswith some of my students.
And sometimes because we'replaying piano, we have two hands.
So one hand can be the question andthe other hand can be the response.
Um, but as you were saying, I oftenstart with one hand just echoing.
a rhythm that the first-hand doesso that like, there may, we're
(19:59):
doing some improvising, but we'rekeeping it within like a very
specific, a very specific structure.
For it to be lower pressure, butsometimes what I've done is had the
kids actually record their own clipsand then improvise to themselves.
So they're doing theirrecording an ostinato.
Um, and then they can play along withtheir own ostinato that they've made.
(20:23):
Um, I mean, I don't know ifthat's typically how I would
answer what is improvising.
I'm not when I'm doing this with thekids, it's not only for improvising.
It's also to get themthinking in multiple parts.
And to give them a little of that,you know, like stem, steam education,
like learning about recordingthemselves and what that's like.
Um,
Steve Treseler (20:44):
but the answer is yes.
Can it be asynchronous?
Like when you're saying it'sin this moment right now?
Well, what about if it's well,
Lauren Best (20:50):
elements of it, like elements of the structure?
Um, I it's interesting right inimprovisation can be, so it's like, so
open-ended, it can be so in the moment.
Quite structured and asynchronous
it can be all
Steve Treseler (21:06):
it'd be all of these things.
And as we get to, we're talking aboutdoing the episodes on how, how do
we do this as maybe its own its ownseries or its own its own season.
Uh, but so much of that is having somevery narrow structure and limitations
like self-imposed limitations.
It seems counterintuitive.
We want to be free and create anddo, do whatever, whatever we wish,
(21:29):
but the practice of it so much can belimiting our tools and we have to be
more, more resourceful in other areas.
And so I was telling the kidsyesterday, I'm like, this
is a temporary rule for now.
I'm not saying this is Steve's rulesfor how you need to prescriptively
improvise, but we're going tostay within these limitations and.
You know, and it can't,it can't be a challenge.
And then navigating that challengeis actually how we, how we practice.
Lauren Best (21:52):
I was thinking, I was that part, I think I said this to you when we
were planning this actually, that part ofthe question is what isn't improvisation
Steve Treseler (22:01):
I was going to bring that up.
Cause you asked that I've had that onmy list of questions and I'm like, I
don't, I'll let you feel that one first.
Cause I didn't have, I'm kindof formulating an answer cause
they're like, oh, it's it's life.
But
Lauren Best (22:12):
yeah, what is not improvising.
I mean, when I, because I work withkids a lot, I often think to myself,
things like, how would this go?
If, if I just tried it witha bunch of kids, right?
We were talking about those kinds oflike conversational norms or like that
as, as we gain more experience, westart to assume certain things about
what the norms are in a given group.
(22:33):
Right?
So like you and I, if we are with a groupof musicians, we're going to make certain
assumptions about how communicationis likely to go and how we're likely
to go about improvising and stuff.
Whereas kids don't always have asense of those norms or a sense
of as much impulse control.
(22:53):
Right.
So I think as, as teachers sometimesto avoid some of those surprises
that come with that, such as kidsbeing very exuberant, but that can
be loud and intense on instruments.
And sometimes we really stop that quicklyand then tell them exactly what to do to
avoid- sometimes it's like to avoid damageto our ears damage to the instruments.
(23:17):
Like there can be a lot ofgood reasons to have those
structures and those boundaries.
Um, but I think sometimes it canbe kind of prescriptive and that
we don't necessarily open thosedoors again, as widely as we
might, as quickly as we might.
Um, and that sometimes, wecan, we can create even more
(23:40):
space for, for improvisation.
I don't know if that quite, that didn'treally answer what isn't improvised.
I guess that was a little more of what is
Steve Treseler (23:46):
like, no, but that says it as, as you have more and more
people involved and you've got to dosome crowd control to make it the right
space for everyone it's there needsto be more and more structure to make
it a musical experience that works aswe get more people involved in that.
Yeah, maybe that didn'tanswer the question.
What isn't improvisation Lauren.
Well, I
Lauren Best (24:06):
think about, I mean, improvisation is not
utter and complete randomness.
It is, is generally response, likewithin having some kinds of goals for
it, I would say it's not totally random.
Although some degree of randomnesscan be a part of the exploration.
Right.
Um, I would say improvisation isnot a 100% predictable, right?
(24:34):
Like there needs to besome unpredictability.
Yeah.
I would say even if, if thatunpredictability is like, the notes
might be predictable as we've talked,that might be the re that might be
the one of the constraints, but otherthings could change around that.
Steve Treseler (24:49):
And that makes me think about other areas for improvisation in
life, but things that aren't improvisedwhen you don't want them to be predictable
sometimes where someone's trying to makea very carefully curated experience.
That's I mean, I'm even thinking of,uh, events, you know, you imagine
a bunch of kids running around andplaying at a birthday party and
then they go, okay, now everyone'sgoing to play this game altogether.
(25:11):
They have this idea in theirhead of what it's supposed to
be, and then try to execute.
That and making the experience, not whatit is in the moment, but with some other
idea of what it is or what it was in thepast, I think that's, that can be moments
and that that happens artistically aswell, where we, we snap out of the moment.
And we're trying to, we're either, youknow, planning for something else or
(25:31):
thinking about a previous event thathappened, but even music that can be very
much composed or similar each time, therecan be some magic of improvisation of
some, some dynamics that are happening.
Um, in the moment like thatshow, I went to last night with a
Wailin' Jennys the amazing gift.
Um, amazing folk vocal I don't know,alt country ensemble, I don't know.
(25:53):
what you call it, but I've heard thatI've heard some of the stuff recorded.
A lot of it's very similar, but asthere was just some magic of being
very attuned to the room and the momentthat felt that there was, there was
those improvised moments happening,even though the music itself wasn't
what we think of as improvised music.
Lauren Best (26:11):
Interesting.
Right.
Because it kind of brings up thequestion of why improvise, if we don't
have to write, like in a performance.
It would be in some ways lessrisky to not improvise at all and
to have every thing, absolutelyeverything meticulously planned.
But as you just said, that'snot always what you want.
(26:33):
Right.
Steve Treseler (26:34):
And that, that makes me even more nervous because I can't
improvise my way out of whatever I gotmyself into, if it's all predetermined,
but not every, not everyone is like that.
Most more people are not like that.
They like happen for a lot of people.
They have less anxiety when theyknow they have control over the
situation and what's going to happen.
It helps them navigate their fight orflight response when they have that, they
feel like they have that control over it.
(26:55):
And I mean, it happens in the jazzworld too, that a lot of people learn
it's, it's very complicated and we getto jazz language or jazz vocabulary,
which is a really sophisticated wayof communication and traditions.
But some people interpret that to meanlike cutting and pasting some well
here's lick one and here's lick two.
If you want to learn the vocabulary,they associate like semantics of
words with this particular lick.
(27:16):
So sometimes there's some like cutting.
Cutting and pasting.
And that can be helpful as like anetude to put some things together.
But then there are some people that, youknow, the improvising is things that are,
you know, rhythmically and melodically inthis jazz language or flow, but there's
not anything spontaneous happening.
It sounds, sounds like jazz.
(27:36):
And, but there are some playersthat repeat them, you know,
it's a bit, it's complicated.
It's not like the best players arejust, it's all just a brand new,
stream of consciousness idea thathas never been played before, even
some great improvisers, repeat theirown, build their own vocabulary-
pin for pin for another episode.
But there's definitely like the straightup cutting and pasting or these jazz
(27:58):
competitions where people will, someonehas already written an improvised solo
that someone else already played, wroteit down and someone, instead of listening
to it as like looking at it, and they'retrying to play it note for note and they
perform that written solo exactly as theyhave practiced it on stage and get a,
you know, and get a trophy or whatever.
And so that feels, you know, there'sways of playing other people's
(28:20):
music to make it feel improvised.
But in that, in that case where it's amoment for someone to improvise and you're
trying to play it exactly as someone elseplayed it as it's written down exactly
as you'd played it before, that's not it.
Lauren Best (28:35):
Yeah.
And for me, like improvisation isa tool as opposed to an outcome.
If I'm that makes sense, right?
It's not, it's not a path thatleads to one particular destination.
I think it's a tool that can beused in a lot of different ways.
Uh, and it's like such a hugewide, wide spectrum of things.
(28:56):
And as you were saying, like with.
With repeating things, right.
And that repeating things can be apart of improvisation and improvisation
doesn't mean like necessarily, youknow, like no rules, no repeats, right?
Like that's not part of it.
And I find that a like, thinkingback to the examples I was giving of
piano students, I find almost everystudent that I've encouraged to do
(29:20):
some kind of improvising activity.
I have to remind them to repeatthemselves, you know, like
it's okay to have silence.
Have a moment, is okay.
To slow down, play lessand repeat yourself more.
Steve Treseler (29:40):
Yeah, absolutely.
And when it comes down to, and peopledo this deliberately and like thematic
development, you can take a theme andthen improvising, and this is something
that's part of how I practice and teach.
Like, let's take this musical theme ora motif, and then we're going to develop
it and change it and transform it.
And that's one of the yeah.
Really important toolto have in the toolkit.
(30:02):
But yeah, I mean, with you thatit's all, it's the pro it's not
the final w it's not predictable.
What the final product will be, butit, at some point, those of us have a
career doing this, building a portfolio,you know, here's some, uh, okay.
So it's at some point some productsshow up too, you know, improvise, and
then at some point like document it.
And it's not about yeah.
(30:25):
And I find that, yeah, it iscurious that the more I'm embracing
the process, then what ends upbeing the quote product ends up.
Can surprise me at times, butends up being something I'm.
More proud of than trying tomake it a certain, a certain way.
Lauren Best (30:41):
I mean, I think improvisation can be with, or without
a product, but it can be a reallylike, just straight up useful way of
getting to the product where like itfeels better and the result is better.
Um, I think it can be, uh, anexcellent aesthetic tool, let's say.
Like a tool kind of on the way to gettingsomewhere that could have been not
(31:02):
improvised, but it was improvised andit's likely, you know, better for it.
Um, I think it can also be a tool that'sentirely process-based and that, uh,
it's about the learning within thatprocess as much as it is about, uh, an
aesthetic product or an aesthetic outcome.
Hmm.
(31:22):
Yeah.
I mean, I think there's.
There's a pretty wide range.
When I think of what improvisationisn't often I think to myself.
Ah, but it's so close to what it is.
We could just change itand make it a little more.
Steve Treseler (31:34):
It's everything.
Yeah.
Lauren Best (31:37):
And that, like, it's not about constantly being generative.
We mentioned this in the last episode.
It's not like against repeating, um, like,you know, an idea or learning traditional
music or learning notated music.
It's up, there's this wholeother, other tube toolbox within
(31:58):
the idea of what improvising is.
I was gonna say it a lot to try tosum up in like one podcast episode.
Right?
It's like as much as we were saying, oh,the whole podcast is really about the why
in a way the whole podcast is also about.
About the what and aboutlooking at those aspects too.
Steve Treseler (32:17):
Absolutely.
And this gets to something we hadtouched on before about, you know,
why, why is this, this relevant?
Like, well, if we're playing music,that's composed, you know, why, why
is why is improvising relevant?
But we've touched on some bigger.
Bigger topics and well, and alsoin some of your descriptions too,
(32:38):
talking about changing the worldthrough improvisation, you know?
Okay.
Thinking real big.
So, I mean, what are some of thosebigger, bigger picture issues?
I mean, this might touch on, I knowyou said maybe you had some unfinished
business on from our, why episode two.
I don't know if that was, thatwas part of it or, but yeah.
Talk about the, your thoughts on that.
Some of the bigger, thebigger implications beyond.
You know, experimenting in our own.
Lauren Best (33:01):
Well, I think that improvisation serves as a model for
risk-taking right where there's somethinginherently risky about it, right.
Because there's, there's an unknown to it.
And as you're saying, thisis something that we kind of
do in our, in our lives too.
Right.
So I think doing it in thesemore controlled circumstances.
(33:22):
Um, control is maybe the wrong word, butwhere are there some boundaries around it?
Right.
But it still feels frightening.
It can feel bad.
Like it can feel fun and good.
And then lead us to making music more.
And that's real.
But it can also feel like bad and scaryand not like we want to feel making music,
(33:44):
but I think we still learn from that.
Right.
Because through, through incorporating itin our practice, we can work with that.
And, uh, and starting to look atthat a little more neutrally, like
instead of, oh, I felt terrified.
I think, oh, I felt a little shaky orlike, oh, I felt, I felt excited or
like, you know, I felt nervous energy.
As opposed to, oh, I felt terrified.
(34:05):
I didn't think I was going to be ableto do it, or, you know, for example.
So I think sometimes from practicing that,even in these really small ways, right.
Practicing it with ourselves,practicing it with like our family.
I mean, I think improvisation isimportant just because it increases
how we connect to people around us.
(34:26):
And I think using improvisationin families is important for, like
improving our mood and our cognitionand just connecting us and helping
us relate to one another, but justonly on a personal level, even if we
aren't making music with our families,um, I think it teaches those things.
I think it's useful.
Uh, and I think that it like doing lessof it in our culture and in our schools-
(34:53):
I do think that's changing over time,but I think the emphasis, uh, kind
of being away from a variation, theemphasis being on, on perfection and
competitive music and, and some ofthese other aspects doesn't allow
for the diversity of experiencethat could benefit us in many ways.
Steve Treseler (35:15):
Yeah.
And we're talking about the model for thepublic schools, you know, very much this
product of that, you know, the industrialera where it's like, okay, we need things
to be efficient and predetermined outcomesand have students sit in rows and, and,
you know, measure the results, which.
You know, helpful for many things, butyeah, if we're talking about other areas,
especially if it's more valuable, nowthose are anything that can be totally
predetermined and turned into a system.
(35:36):
That's easier to have, you know, a robotdo it, or, um, or find someone hold he'll
do it, do it for less and less money.
But if we're.
And what was, we're looking at ideaslike innovation or empathy or leadership,
all these things are so important thatyou can't just get to that through
(35:58):
rubrics and measuring everything.
So it gets to that.
Yeah.
Broader talk of, yeah.
Education
Lauren Best (36:04):
and I mean, I think music, even without improvising music teaches
us a lot of transferable skills, likea huge amount of transferable skills.
I think when we add.
Improvising into that.
And I mean, I could substituteinto music like other art forms.
Also, teaches a lotof transferable skills.
I think that like most people are onboard with this and education around
(36:27):
that music and arts have value.
Not only.
Music for the sake of music, but alsobecause of these like transferable
aspects, as you were talking about interms of leadership and empathy and
communication, then physical coordinationand problem solving and, and, uh,
you know, helping shape our values.
But in my opinion, when we add moreimprovisation and creativity, I think
(36:50):
it just increases, um, kind of thedepth to which we acquire those skills.
And I think, I think we get even more.
Out of it from, fromadding in improvisation,
Steve Treseler (37:02):
uh, as you, as you said, using those, practicing
those skills where it's a morecontrolled or safe environment.
I mean, one example, personal examplethat came up was just thinking didn't
mean to do so much pandemic talk thisthis episode, but you know, navigating,
you know, when the pandemic shuteverything down, I was, I kind of
put my, put myself into crazy musicalsituations where I need to improvise with
these two, you know, hi, I'm on stage.
(37:24):
And then I'm going toimprovise in this way.
And.
kind of a, strange set of limitations.
I put on myself and work my way out of it.
And then in life suddenly hadthese limitations that okay, What's
in helps support my family andpay this mortgage and everything
I'd been doing to earn money.
I can't do it anymore.
Like I can't teach lessons.
I'm not playing gigs.
I'm not doing workshops.
Everything was in person.
And I mean, I was treating it asan improvised exercise and I'm
(37:47):
like, how can I pay my bills?
But I can't leave my basement.
Like I'm in this chair,here's the new structure.
Here's the new, my other ways of,oh, I want to do this and that.
And that I'm like, no, I needto stay within the limitation.
And then it took some creative problemsolving and you know, it wasn't all, it
wasn't all wonderful, but I'm like, okay.
And then it ended up with newthings to offer or serving the
(38:07):
same, same people in different ways.
And I just had to like flip everythingout, but I think, I really think
that they, you know, improvised lifeor improvise of making myself do
uncomfortable things in weird situations.
It's a weird cut.
Yeah.
As a, for fun, we're doing it.
Artistically made it a lot easier to dowhen, when life throws situations like
that, like here's, here's the situations,here's the limitations and the limitations
(38:31):
often aren't what we think they are.
We have these, that's a whole,that's a whole nother talk, but
I remember thinking that, that Iwas able to like adjust him and.
Can we not say pivot anymore?
What's the word, whatever.
But
Lauren Best (38:43):
I think part of it's staying in the zone.
Right.
And you know that withinthat zone, there may be fear.
There may be uncertainty.
There may be.
Absolute confusion, you know, but youlike, you know that from experience.
And so it becomes easier to stayin the zone and not think, oh, this
uncertainty or confusion means thatI should run away and hide because
(39:04):
it's certain to lead to death, right.
That we kind of holdourselves within that.
I I've been using an example latelywhere it's like, we can like rush into
something like, you know, that feelingof rushing to get somewhere and then
like you arrive and sometimes youarrive and you slow down, but sometimes
you arrive and you still feel rushed.
You're like, you don't have to rushany more, but you're still, you're
(39:26):
like pressed against the future almost.
And you're pressed against yourexpectations and you're kind
of you, it's your, it's thispressure, this pressurized feelng
is that
Steve Treseler (39:36):
why I feel weird when I get somewhere early in the event that
I do, I'm like, okay, well, I'm here.
What am I supposed to do now?
I am fifteen minutes to early
Lauren Best (39:43):
that's a, that's a whole other conversation.
I don't claim to be anexpert at being early.
We'll have,
Steve Treseler (39:49):
we'll have a punctual expert expert on a future episode.
Lauren Best (39:52):
And then on the other side of that, We can, I mean, there's
arriving late and you're rushing,but there's like, we can kind of
hang back in an experience, right?
Like we can hang back and, andnot fully commit ourselves.
And maybe like that, sometimesisn't even totally intentional.
Right?
Sometimes it's like, there's a fear.
Sometimes we're extremely tiredand we just are not like in it.
(40:13):
Cause we're not really feelingit because it's just hard to kind
of fully show up in that way.
And then there's thesweet spot in the middle.
Right.
And I think we're not always thereautomatically, but just extend what
you were saying when we've had thisexperience of either kind of pushing
our, like pressuring ourselves againstsome, uh, against the future or kind of
(40:34):
holding back in the past versus reallybeing in the moment with something.
I think that those micromoments of needing to do that.
Because it will go badly sometimes, butgetting through it helps us stay with
that and build our capacity for, uh,as I was talking to you before about
that noticing what is without needingto stress out about it right away or
(40:57):
change it right away and just noticingand relating and responding to, to what's
actually towards actually happening.
Um, even if what's actuallyhappening is challenging.
Steve Treseler (41:08):
Exactly.
Rather than relating to an ideaof what you think is supposed to
be or what it was like last time.
And I mean, that's somuch of what it's about.
We've put this in somany different angles.
So, I mean, w w w.
I mean I hear so many timeslike, oh, improvisation,
what's kind of a jazz thing.
Right?
And like, well, those were much, muchbigger concept than that, but so much
of it, I mean, that theme is, I mean,as I like to say, it's the attunement
(41:29):
to your environment and making decisionson what's, what's really here and that
can work musically and in all theseother areas, areas of life, and that is
something I'm still in the process ofdoing that, you know, being attuned to.
What's here in front of me, eventhough we're talking about it.
I still, I still can get distractedand wander and plan and think
(41:50):
ruminate on whatever as muchas, as much as the next person.
Yeah.
Lauren Best (41:53):
Yeah.
And it's, it's like on onehand I can think of so many.
Joyful and wonderful and excitingexperiences, improvising, like even
just in a playful way as a child,but in a way that's actually like,
has some degree of skill to it, likeimagining, you know, dancing around
and lip-syncing as a child, right.
(42:15):
I'm doing some things that areactually like have some degree of
skill to, to it at that point, youknow, I'm not thinking about it.
Right.
And as an adult of course hadjoyful, wonderful experiences.
I've also had really like embarrassingand frightening experiences.
Um, you know, but it's, it's,uh, like coming back from that
(42:35):
and allowing space for that.
And I think sometimes.
Access like those embarrassing andfrightening experiences might even be
just with myself or like one other personI don't necessarily mean you know, in
front of a huge, huge number of people,however, it can, that happens too.
Yeah, that happens too.
But we, we kind of learn this,this, figure it out aspect.
(42:58):
And I think that increasesour trust in ourselves.
I think that increasesour trust in the process.
And I think that it also increasesour tolerance for even if.
Like we know that trust in ourselves meansthat doesn't go perfectly necessarily,
but we trust that we can continue.
Steve Treseler (43:16):
Yeah.
And that's a future conversation to have.
It's like, why, why aresome of these risks?
You know, it's like why some of these,what feels like high risk activities and
subjecting yourself to embarrassment?
Like why, why is it worth doing it ratherthan staying safe and comfortable, but
that's, that's a whole nother talk.
Um, and I'm going to do this thing.
That's the conversational norm whereI talk about the future thing in
order to wrap up the conversation.
Next time, our next pilot episode,now that we fully exhausted everything
(43:40):
about what is improvisation.
Okay.
We didn't even talk about whatis the format of our podcast.
We didn't even get there, but, um, letme get to that, but we have to wrap up.
Yeah.
Well, if you're going to, yeah.
Future, future conversations about what,what the, what this, uh, the structure
of our podcast and some of our ideas forsegments and all that will look like, but
also the who, the, who episode is nextabout, you know, you'll can learn a little
(44:02):
bit, go a little bit deeper into, intoboth of our lives and experiences and.
Lauren Best (44:09):
And I'll learn who you really are.
Who, who, who do you think you are?
So that's yeah, that's coming up, comingup next for pilot episode number three.
Yeah.
Thanks everyone.
For those of you that madeit to the end of the episode.
Thanks for, thanks for being here.
And you can go to infiniteimprovisation.com and connect with us
(44:30):
in our online community and downloadsome resources if you're interested
and let us know what you think.
Maybe what is improvisation and somethingyou would answer a little differently and
I'd like to know how you'd answer that.
Steve Treseler (44:44):
Yeah.
So you can, yeah, you can reach usat hello@infiniteimprovisation.com.
Lauren Best (44:51):
Yeah.
Looking forward to seeing you again soon.
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