Improv at DePauw

Here at DePauw, we have several different varieties of concerts that we can attend.  Last semester there was one concert that really spoke to me.  Additionally, this concert ties very well into our class.  This concert featured the improvisation group at DePauw.  This group is made up of several students at DePauw playing a variety of instruments from cellos to saxophones.  This group is headed by Dr. Eric Edberg.   This concert also featured an oboist from the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra and members from the Fifth House Ensemble.  Each one of these performers brought something special to the performance and they all worked to blend their ideas into one flowing movement. 

Immediately you could tell that this wasn’t going to be a normal concert.  Right away, Dr. Edberg broke down the wall between audience and performers and invited them to take part in the performer’s warmups.  It was very unusual and at first I really didn’t know what to think of it but I soon warmed up to it.  After the warmup, the group settled down and began their first “piece”.  It stated with a singular cello voice and slowly but surely more voices began to add their sound to the mixture.  At certain times in the piece, two or more voices would begin to have a conversation with each other, calling out to one another and responding in kind.  In some cases, the performer’s body language would convey even more emotion than the music could.  Sarcasm is one example of this extra emotion.  This back and forth conversation continued until everything was said.  The next piece proceeded in about the same way with calls back and forth between instruments and the vocalist that was also in this piece.  Also like the previous piece, once all the conversation was done, the piece ended and would never be heard again. 

After these first two pieces, Dr. Edberg asked the audience to select duos from the group of performers to perform improvised duets.   This was a very interesting part of the concert.  Since it was open for the audience to choose the performers, there were some interesting combos that were made.  An example of one such combo was a ukulele paired with a violin.  While both are string instruments, their pairing seemed very unusual to me but when it was performed I didn’t hear anything that sounded wrong with it.  A more common pairing was trio comprised of two saxophones and a jazz piano.   This trio worked very well together, as one would guess.  In fact, they sounded so good, it almost sounded like it could have been rehearsed. 

The final part of the concert had an audience participation element to it.  It consisted of the audience and performers singing a pitch that they come up with and then trying to match another person’s pitch.  It was very interesting to listen to and to be a part of.  It was similar to the improv session earlier.  And all of a sudden people all came together in one final chord, in perfect harmony, and then it all went silent.  With that perfect ending, Edberg decided to call that the end of the concert. 

With all of these different sections of the concert, this added up to be a very memorable concert.  And you better hope it was memorable, since these pieces will never be heard again.  From the interesting duo pairings to the audience participation in the concert, this will be a concert that I certainly will not forget anytime soon.