Forum on Music and Christian Scholarship

Groanings of the Spirit: Toward an Ethic of Christian Improvisation

Kevin Holm-Hudson, University of Kentucky

Most attentive listeners can intuit the difference between a “good” and a “bad” improvisation. Simply put, a good improviser listens—listens to the performance space, the audience, and his or her fellow musicians. A good improvisation—regardless of the musical style—has an inevitable “rightness” about it. A bad improvisation, on the other hand, seems to “go nowhere,” often resulting in—to paraphrase Shakespeare—sound and fury that signifies nothing. This is usually the result of not listening, filling up the sound space with notes for the sake of notes or to inflate one’s self-imagined virtuosity.

Improvisers often refer to themselves as “vessels” through which music can flow, aiming for negation of one’s ego through playing—a philosophy informed by popular conceptions of Zen Buddhism. Such practices are often problematic in their application, for in emphasizing the individual’s removal of “ego” blocks, the collective dynamic of music making is not addressed. Christian practice, on the other hand, focuses not on one’s self, but on our relationship to God through Jesus, and—based upon that—our relations with others. What shape, then, would a musical improvisation take if Scripture were consulted to provide the model?

In this workshop, I investigate this question by applying Biblical admonitions for corporate worship and group conduct (from I Corinthians, Ephesians, Philippians, and James) to music making situations, drawing on both original compositions and pieces by Stockhausen, Rzewski, and Coltrane. Improvisation from a Scriptural perspective has two interconnected dimensions—the individual practice and the group practice. (Even in solo improvisations, the audience can be considered to be part of the group dynamic.) Conference participants and students are invited to bring their instruments and voices as we explore free improvisation within a Christian paradigm together.