Jazz and the Avant Garde

It seems quite natural to me that jazz would and should find common ground with both the worlds of experimental music and the avant garde.  As far as avant garde music goes, jazz is a rapidly developing art form the was invented only 100 years ago and has made rapid and tremendous strides since then in many different directions.  All of these directions were "avant garde" for a time, be it the first bop (Bird and Dizzy), the first cool jazz (the California scene), and more.  Jazz met with classical music in the works of several composers, especially Bernstein (who actually composed at least one work for big band, Prelude, Fugue, and Riffs), and Duke Ellington, a jazz composer/bandleader who composed several works for "classical" ensembles.  And where worlds like these collide, that is where we find a new area of the avant garde.

Bernstein, Prelude, Fugue, and Riffs (1949): composed for the Woody Herman band--part of the same project that also resulted in Stravinsky's Ebony Concerto

It was only a matter of time before jazz and the more adventurous region of the avant garde met and formed a union.  We see examples of this in many works of John Zorn, such as Forbidden Fruit (work for string quartet, with many jazz elements).

That said, it seems to me significantly more inevitable that jazz would meet with experimental music frequently and in a big way.  Both have strong ties with improvisation; both have required a great deal of physical invention in the last 100 years (new ensembles, new instruments e.g. drum set, etc);  both have required innovations in electronics (amplification of instruments for jazz, all sorts of stuff in experimentalism).  The key here is that both have a huge stress on musical play.  Jazz started as a way for talented musicians to make up stuff together, on the spot.  The earliest jazz was collective improvisation, with full groups improvising at once to create on-the-spot compositions.  Though collective improv is now rare in the jazz idiom, improvisation is still a key and central facet of the art form, and groups are flexible to adapt on the go during performances.  Similarly, experimental music has always been about playing with sounds, playing with electronics, playing around with instruments, and general interplay of musicians to create--always something new, always unexpected.

And though collective improv has all but died out in jazz, it has grown in experimental music in recent decades.  There are many groups dedicated to experimental improvisation.  A favorite of mine is Meridien, a trio consisting of Ithacan Nick Hennies, former Cornell professor Tim Feeney, and Greg Stuart.  

Meridien, in a performance from 2012

In fact, I am part of an experimental improv group called the Convergence Quintet, with fellow IC School of Music students Aaron Walters, Tom Smith, Andrew Hedge, and Christina Christiansen.  We hope to have some videos online at some point, but at the moment we have a recording from an early rehearsal that can be found here if you want to check it out sometime:

Convergence Quintet, "rehearsal" 10/26/13

All this goes to say that jazz and experimental music have vast amounts in common, especially a sense of play, and the idea of not knowing what exactly will happen in a work.  They were bound to meet, and in very colorful ways, like John Zorn's game piece Cobra.  I would sincerely love to play Cobra someday (emphasis on play).  It looks massively fun to be a part of.  I do not have any idea how exactly it works, but it must be fun when you're with a group of musicians who dedicate themselves to the piece alongside you.

Cobra also brings up the question of the line between music and performance art.  Sure, the players are all making sounds with musical interments, but so much of it is interplay between people and a very active referee, who does not play an instrument -- he only referees, which is much closer to acting than music-making (though perhaps now that I say that, an orchestral conductor may also be rather closer to an actor than a music-maker -- not sure what I think about this, but it's worth pondering.  Maybe when I'm less tired.)  This work relies on the acting, visual interplay, and outright performing in addition to the music to create its overall effect.  In this way, it is as much a work of performance art as it is a piece of music.