Composing while Dancing: An Improviser’s Companion examines the world of improvisational dance and the varied approaches to this art form. By introducing the improvisational strategies of twenty-six top contemporary artists of movement improvisation, Melinda Buckwalter offers a practical primer to the dance form. Each chapter focuses on an important aspect of improvisation including spatial relations, the eyes, and the dancing image. Included are sample practices from the artists profiled, exercises for further research, and a glossary of terms. Buckwalter gathers history, methods, interviews, and biographies in one book to showcase the many facets of improvisational dance and create an invaluable reference for dancers and dance educators.

First comprehensive overview of improvisation in dance.

(Jazz Book). Improv fundamentals for teachers and students, covering the blues, modes, scales, progressions and more, plus chapters on phrasing melodies, the "swing" concept, phraseology in modern jazz, chord nomenclature, and solo development.

Designed for Music Theory courses, Music Theory Through Improvisation presents a unique approach to basic theory and musicianship training that examines the study of traditional theory through the art of improvisation. The book follows the same general progression of diatonic to non-diatonic harmony in conventional approaches, but integrates improvisation, composition, keyboard harmony, analysis, and rhythm. Conventional approaches to basic musicianship have largely been oriented toward study of common practice harmony from the Euroclassical tradition, with a heavy emphasis in four-part chorale writing. The author’s entirely new pathway places the study of harmony within improvisation and composition in stylistically diverse format, with jazz and popular music serving as important stylistic sources. Supplemental materials include a play-along audio in the downloadable resources for improvisation and a companion website with resources for students and instructors.

Gerre Hancock has long been renowned for his extraordinary improvisations, and has for many years taught the art of improvisation at classes and workshops across the United States. Now he has codified and organized his teaching into a book which carries the organist from the scale through thefugue, covering on the way interludes, hymns, hymn preludes, sonata form, canon, and more. Written in an informal style and illustrated with musical examples and exercises, this book opens wide the door to musical and technical skill.

Improvisation for Classical, Fingerstyle, and Jazz Guitar - Creative Strategies, Technique and Theory: Is the product of over twenty five years experience as a professional musician and guitar tutor. Contains more than sixty exercises, in both standard notation and guitar tablature, ranging from simple, clear examples of the topics under discussion, to longer more complex sections of music that illustrate how these ideas can be developed. Suggests new techniques, and strategies, offering guitarists practical ideas for solo or group performance, recording, music exams, and expanding musical horizons. Demonstrates how to use improvisation as a universal way of making music, enabling Classical, Fingerstyle, and Jazz players to learn the essential skills to create sophisticated and rewarding improvised pieces. Places theory and practice in a much broader context, by including discussions on the historical development of improvisation, along with supplementary information on a wide range of inter-related literature and listening. Contains an extensive appendix showing how to adapt and apply the CAGED system, demonstrating how its five basic patterns can be transformed into hundreds of interlocking modes, scales, arpeggios and chords. www.paulcostelloguitar.co.uk www.facebook.com/pages/Paul-Costello-Guitar/328473160531215

Contingent Encounters offers a sustained comparative study of improvisation as it appears between music and everyday life. Drawing on work in musicology, cultural studies, and critical improvisation studies, as well as his own performing experience, Dan DiPiero argues that comparing improvisation across domains calls into question how improvisation is typically recognized. By comparing the music of Eric Dolphy, Norwegian free improvisers, Mr. K, and the Ingrid Laubrock/Kris Davis duo with improvised activities in everyday life (such as walking, baking, working, and listening), DiPiero concludes that improvisation appears as a function of any encounter between subjects, objects, and environments. Bringing contingency into conversation with the utopian strain of critical improvisation studies, DiPiero shows how particular social investments cause improvisation to be associated with relative freedom, risk-taking, and unpredictability in both scholarship and public discourse. Taking seriously the claim that improvisation is the same thing as living, Contingent Encounters overturns long-standing assumptions about the aesthetic and political implications of this notoriously slippery term.

"All these aspects of his life and art, including the rigorous training and arduous practice that transformed a blind peasant boy into a superb musician, his lifelong friendship with Olivier Messiaen, his sometimes turbulent family life, and the body of works he left - only J. S. Bach wrote more compositions for the organ - are narrated and analyzed by Ann Labounsky, who is uniquely qualified to write this definitive biography. A favorite Langlais pupil, she was asked by Langlais himself to write it and had his full cooperation for numerous long interviews over many years."--BOOK JACKET.

A most impressive 220-page edition of the first volume of "The Well-Tempered Clavier," these 24 preludes and 24 fugues were painstakingly researched over a period of 10 years, using the most important original manuscript sources. Baroque scholar Willard A. Palmer's thorough introduction discusses fugal construction, articulation and other aspects of performance interpretation. Volume I of "The Well-Tempered Clavier" has been updated with a new "look" to match Volume II. This essential masterpiece is a "must-have" for all pianists.