As I slowly rebuild the website, I have been slowly revisiting my blog posts and Youtube videos. And I discovered a video that has no blog post! In 2011, I was a semi-finalist at the André Marchal Improvisation Competition held in Biarritz, France. According to Youtube, it is the first video I posted and it is really fun listening to it after almost seven years. It is fascinating to see how much the focus of my career has changed (and in many ways how it hasn’t).
I had just begun my academic teaching life at CCAC (Community College of Allegheny County). I was teaching three sections of class piano and I had to miss a week of teaching to attend the competition. I played this video for one of the classes after I returned and they all looked at me like I was on another planet. In hindsight, it is clear to me now that most people’s experience with music is not what this improvisation contains.
I remember using this improvisation as an exploration of the instrument. There are things I would not do now and that includes setting up the camera (and mic consequently) in the loft with the organ. Not until the end do you get a sense of the acoustic which of course makes the instrument sound much better than the recording itself.
BUT, I love looking back at something like this. Twenty years ago, I tried to imagine what my musical life would be like and it never looks like what I expect. Now, twenty years on in my professional career, composing, improvising, and performing, this is a beautiful time capsule. That said, I don’t think the improv is formally concise, just trying out the different stop combinations in a very broad arch form. I’m not entirely sold on this improvisation but I have eyes and ears that hear it differently. Enjoy this retro post!