This is an aritcle that Ryan Bruce wrote in 2005. The appendix has a transcript of an interview that covers a lot of early influences.
Neil Leonard is a musician interested in the interaction between computers and acoustic instruments. He is a saxophonist and computer musician who aims at integrating the computer into music as a progressive way of writing, composing and performing Jazz (Leonard, featured recordings). This paper first outlines Leonard’s historical background and current work to understand where Leonard has come from and what he is currently doing. The second section of this report discusses Leonard’s personal approach to interactive computer music and how he views composition, performance and electronics. The final section is a detailed discussion of Leonard’s piece “M87” from his solo album Timaeus released by Cedar Hill Records in 2001 (Leonard, featured recordings). The three sections of this report describe the preparation, approach and final product of Leonard’s interactive computer music.
Biography
Neil Leonard was born in 1959 in Cambridge, Massachusetts USA. He received a Bachelor’s in Music (BM) at the New England Conservatory of Music and has extensive experience in musical activities in Jazz and electronic music. His main instrument is the saxophone. He plays the soprano, alto and tenor saxophone and programmed the computer patches on his album Timaeus. He is currently a professor in Music Technology department at Berkley School of Music in Boston, Massachusetts (Leonard, Berkley Faculty Biography).
Leonard’s training on the saxophone has been received from Jazz greats such as Joe Allard (who also has taught Eric Dolphy, Michael Brecker, and Lee Konitz.) and Odean Pope (Leonard, interview). Leonard’s concert experience includes playing at Carnegie Hall, Roulette, Experimental Intermedia Foundation in New York, various electro-acoustic music festivals in Canada, Puerto Rico, Russia, Poland, Cuba, Spain and the United States. He has played and collaborated with other musicians such as George Lewis, John Medeski, Kevin Eubanks, Steve Swallow and many others (Leonard, long biography). He has recorded with many artists on CD’s such as New Music For Silent Films and Piece by Piece with The Alloy Orchestra, Sama Yie and Live on GyroScope with Ibrahima Camara, I Can’t Stand Another Night Alone (In Bed With You) with Steve Weisberg and Hal Weiner, Lost in the Stars – The Music of Kurt Weil. His own music has been recorded on his own album Timaeus, and on compilations Boston Cyberarts Festival Catalogue, and MIT press CD’s The Csound Book and Computer Music Journal Vol. 23, No.4 (Winter, 1999) (Leonard, discography).
Leonard’s commissions include a premiere of his piece “Totems” with Don Byron at the Interpretation series at Weill Recital Hall, works at the Museum of Modern Art in New York that was commissioned by the List Visual Arts Centre at MIT, commissions from broadcast stations such as WBGH-TV and BBC Television. Other commissions from individual patrons, the Boston Institute of Contemporary Art and the American Composers Forum extend his portfolio further (Leonard, long biography).
Leonard has also had many residencies. He has been a guest lecturer at the Contemporary Music department at Cento de Art Reina Sofia in Madrid, the National Conservatory in the Dominican Republic, the University of Puerto Rico and the Tchaikovski Conservatory in Moscow. He has also given workshops at many state colleges (Leonard, long biography).
Leonard has been published in many different types of print media and academic journals. The New York Times published an article in the Sunday Edition discussing new technologies in music. The Concord Journal, Computer Music Journal, Music Texte, Electronic Musician, Leonardo Music Journal, The Journal of Acoustical Study of America and Rhythm Music Magazine make up the bulk of his publications. Leonard writes articles and reviews of electronics, composition, performance and Latin music (Leonard, bibliography).
Personal Approach
Neil Leonard has many different approaches to his music. His first approach to programming came out of his work with George Lewis. Lewis’ program “Voyager” is an interactive program between an acoustic instrument and computer. The computer interacts with the live musician by being a listener and independent performer while generating MIDI samples. Leonard used the “Voyager” program as a basis for “creating chaotic functions to generate motion” in his piece “Turbulent Mirror”. This project ended when Leonard started writing his own software. Leonard began writing programs in the language C then soon switched to writing in the new object oriented language MAX (Leonard, interview). His ideas are based on the computer listening to the acoustic instrument (in Leonard’s case, the saxophone) and responding by playing MIDI samples within a set of programmed parameters. What the listener hears is a duo between the acoustic instrument and the computer generated MIDI samples.
The compositions heard on Timaeus are rooted in the Jazz tradition. Leonard says that Ornette Coleman had a direct influence on the songs “Timaeus I”, “Timaeus II”, “M87” and “Passage” on the album (Leonard, interview). His approach to these songs could be heard conceptually in that the first three pieces sound more like “keyboard music” while “Passage” has more qualities of “a string that is dripped in oil and then in water” (Leonard, interview). Coleman’s Harmelodic method is used in some algorithms of Leonard’s work. George Russell also contributed to Leonard’s compositional approach in terms of modality, rhythm and form for the pieces “Timaeus I” and “Timaeus II” (Leonard, interview). In the interview with Leonard (see appendix A), careful planning in creating algorithms is stressed. His programs are therefore written for a specific idea to be played within set boundaries prescribed by the programmer.
Leonard’s main approach is to combine “ideas from both the jazz and electronic music schools”. He sees the computer as being the next extension to the jazz vocabulary. The history of jazz can be seen as incorporating new innovations into the music, for example the advent of the drum kit and the electric guitar. The computer is now the latest tool developed which can be used in the progression of Jazz music.
Among musical ideas Leonard also uses visual ideas to influence his music. For example, Leonard will be doing a sound installation in a 12th century civil hall in Padua, Italy in 2006. He says that the design of the structure, and the ceiling in particular will influence his sonic ideas (Leonard, interview).
An interesting trait in Leonard’s computer work is that he writes his programs for the user of the program. Like Duke Ellington, Leonard will change or tweak his writing for the person that is playing. For example, Leonard has done some work with the drummer/keyboardist Kenwook Dennard. After Leonard and Dennard listened to Timaeus, Leonard designed a program that worked more closely with Dennard’s ideas (Leonard, interview).
Leonard’s description of his piece “Legacy” is a good representation of his approach to writing computer algorithms. The program is described by taking a beat pattern and continually varying it with “algorithms for reorchestration, beat displacement and layer masking” (Leonard, A Personal Approach). This approach can be heard in many of the works on Timaeus where an idea is presented that is then varied through changes in orchestrated sound (MIDI samples), displacement of the idea and layering of ideas in the improvisation created by the computer.
Detailed Description of “M87”
“M87” is the first track on Leonard’s album Timaeus. The piece is an interaction between tenor saxophone and computer. The computer is programmed in MAX to respond to Leonard’s playing in real time by generating marimba and electronic sounds. The computer listens to Leonard’s playing via a Roland CD-40, which is an acoustic sensor that converts the pitch of the input to a MIDI number. The Alesis HR-16 sequences the computers MIDI output to a Kerzweil K200R that samples the sounds. The samples are then put through a PCM-80 signal effects processor for the final production of the computer-generated sounds (Leonard, featured recordings).
This song is an example of trained interaction. The melody played by the saxophone (in the whole tone mode) at the beginning of the piece is followed in unison by the computer. All sounds by the computer at this time are marimba samples. The computer saves the melody as it is played. The saved melody serves as the basis for the next section of the piece where the computer plays the melody back while Leonard improvises over it. Like an improvised duo, the computer listens to the solo that Leonard plays while it is playing back the original whole tone melody. The melody is then varied by the computer in relation to what Leonard is playing. For example, Leonard plays in a higher register in his solo and the computer reacts by moving in and out of the original melody by playing small melodic figures outside the range of the original melody. The saxophone and computer play the same rhythms through the first section creating a homophonic texture. This can be heard as the “head” of the piece.
The head is followed by a silence for approximately two seconds. The next section is the main solo section of the piece. Rhythmically dense figures played on the saxophone are repeated and varied by the computer. The computer begins to use more electronic sounds, more like a harpsichord in this section. Leonard moves through other ideas such as playing larger repeated intervals, arpeggios, rhythmic clusters, trills and flurry effects on the saxophone. The computer follows the ideas in imitation and variation to create an exchange that is mostly prompted by the saxophone. The computer ends the section by playing a beat figure with arpeggios that leads back into the head. The last part of the song is not the same melody as the head, but the same interactive concept. Homophonic textures that build harmonies between the two instruments serve as the head’s main idea. The piece is ended with a similar jazz feel like the beginning by having a three-note ostinato pattern played by the saxophone (scale degrees b7, 7, 1) that is harmonized by the computer.
The piece is very structured. The three main sections of the piece (head, solo, head) would have been planned out ahead of time for the computer to understand its boundaries to play in. I would suppose that the piece has multiple patches that are changed as the piece moves forward, triggered either by the user (as in the first head to the solo) or by musical signals (such as repeated notes and rhythmic ideas from the saxophone).
“M87” is an excellent example of Leonard’s work because it incorporates ideas of Jazz (i.e. modal and ostinato ideas in the head, and the overall ABA structure of head, solo, head) with the computer. Incorporating the computer as player and instrument, the piece stretches the boundaries of jazz by not playing the confined melody as head, but allows the head to be a concept of rhythm, time and harmony. In this context, “M87” holds true to tradition but moves forward in jazz by incorporating new technology and using the computer to sprout new ideas in musical form and interaction.
Appendix A
Neil Leonard interviewed by Ryan Bruce
October 15, 2005
1) I noticed in your liner notes that you gave thanks to George Lewis. I was wondering what context this was in. Is your work associated with his "Voyager" program, or how did he help you with your ideas.
I first heard of George's work with computers in 1986. There were no recordings of this, so I promptly invited him to Boston and produced a concert of his work with the “Voyager” program. We became friends and talked about computers, music, and art in general. I hosted lectures by George at Berklee College of Music and Massachusetts College of Art. I checked out George’s music in detail and played with the “Voyager” program.
George is committed to the idea of using one system for all pieces. Early on, I created a piece called "Turbulent Mirror" that used an open-ended approach inspired by “Voyager.” I used chaotic functions to generate motion, which is one thing that George had not done. After several years of performing “Turbulent Mirror,” I abandoned this approach in favor of creating a unique software program for each of my pieces.
George was super helpful in terms of critiquing my work and offering suggestions and general moral support. He was a primary force in getting me involved in computer music. I could not release a CD without thanking him.
2) Your saxophone playing has some elements of some players, for example Steve Lacy (which I have read, and heard in your playing). What other musicians should I be listening to that are sprouting your ideas.
Lacy played melodies that were simple and striking. His command of the instrument was impeccable. He could play the Monk songbook on solo soprano and every song sounded complete. (Incidentally, he lived the last few years of his life just blocks away from my home.) As far as soprano is concerned, Shorter, Coltrane, and Bechet were also critical, as was playing clarinet and studying with Joe Allard (who also taught Dolphy, Brecker, and Konitz).
I think of Jazz and music as a sort of alchemy. Jazz musicians spent the 20th century taking trashy songs and turning them into beautiful music. Armstrong, Holiday, and Monk were geniuses at this. Lacy was very important to me because he worked within this framework without sounding like a jazz repertoire act.
On alto, I gravitated towards James Spaulding. Spaulding adapted Hodges’ approach to the music of Sun Ra, Charles Toliver, Wayne Shorter, and Freddie Hubbard. Gary Bartz was also an influence, but he is less playful than Spaulding in terms of intonation.
In my development, finding a personal approach to intonation became paramount. There is a Japanese phrase, “attaining Buddhahood in a single sound.” Billie Holiday must have been a Buddhist, because she could blow you away singing a single note. After a few years of playing, I started to focus on finding my own way to create motion in the pitch of each note.
I studied with Odean Pope. His has one of the most amazing sounds on tenor. Odean played a lot around town, so I got to hear him in many different settings. His LP, "Almost Like Me", on the Moers label really best represents what he sounds like in person.
Odean and I played classical etudes and duets at each lesson. I was 16 and had just learned to drive. My first drive alone into Philadelphia was to take a lesson with Odean. I remember feeling all wound up from driving through Philly and then switching over to playing Klose and Universal Method studies in this big reverberant storefront with Odean. Through my studies with Odean, I began to search for ways to reach the listener by using very soft sounds. I also studied how to create a sonic arc in a single note.
I also played with alto saxophonist Byard Lancaster, who has a very personal sound, like Spaulding and a bit like Ornette. Once, I sat in with Byard and vibraphonist Kahn Jamal. Going one-on-one with Byard was unforgettable. We played in Worchester, and I know that there is a tape of that in existence somewhere.
John Gilmore was a model on tenor. He could make the simplest things, like quarter notes lines, sound amazing and also make beautiful sounds with multiphonics. I frequently heard Gilmore with Sun Ra in Philadelphia. When you listen to my tenor playing in “Zig Zag,” on my website, or “Caxionics,” on my CD, you can hear the influence of Pope and Gilmore.
I never got to play with or know Gilmore, but Marshal Allen, who was another mainstay in the Sun Ra Archestra, joined my sax trio, “Garden of Reeds[,]” on one occasion. You can hear an excerpt of that on my website as well. We rehearsed in Ra’s former home. Marshall was 82 years old, but he sounded like he was 20.
I think that a lot had been set into motion while I was still a teenager living in Philadelphia. My father was a professor of American Civilization at Penn, and he played me a lot of recordings of early jazz. Eventually, this exerted an influence, as did his critical writing. He wrote a book called Jazz and the White Americans that followed the evolution of early jazz from a sociological point of view. There is a chapter called “The Effect of Mechanization” that outlines the ways that radio changed jazz. So, this thinking about jazz and technology is “in the DNA.”
I left Philadelphia to go to college in Boston. I got involved with computers after college. I presented my computer music to Juan Blanco, John Cage, Charles Dodge, Herbert Brun, and others who came up through the ranks of classical music. My goal was to create a synthesis of ideas from both the jazz and electronic music schools. However, given your questions regarding Lewis and Lacy, I’ll focus on the jazz influences for the moment.
"Legacy" borrows ideas about meter from a bassist named Jymmie Merritt, who played bass with Dizzy Gillespie, B.B. King, Art Blakey, Max Roach, and Lee Morgan. I rehearsed with Merritt’s band for several months and played his music that really broke the ground of using odd meters and superimposing meter in jazz. He could also keep the time flowing as smoothly as B.B. King and play very freely while keeping the beat in these compound meters. I’ve never heard anyone do this as fluidly as Merritt.
Through playing with Merritt and listening to the way that jazz percussion evolved in the 70s, I began to explore how multiple meters and tempi could co-exist and how counting beats was not a linear process. I also started to play with the orchestration of the polyrhythm. “Legacy: San Lazaro” starts one bar, in 7/4, and plays with this motif in a way that is rooted in this sensibility.
Ornette Coleman had a direct influence on the realization of Timaeus. M87, Passage, and Timaeus I & II were recorded a couple of days after performing this music live, one-on-one, for Ornette Coleman in his studio on 125 St in NY. Ornette's keyboard man, David Bryant, thought that Ornette might be interested, so I went down and played for him.
I performed "M87" and "Sacred Bath" for Ornette first. He liked the music and asked if I could get the computer to sound less like "keyboard music and more like a string that is dipped in oil and then in water. The coat of water comes off, but the oil sticks." I played Passage and he said, "thats it!" My approach to playing with intonation was not lost on him. Ornette and Bryant later explained parts of Ornette's Harmolodic method and I wrote some algorithms to make music in this vein. Ornette checked it out on breaks during rehearsals with his group Prime Time .
The tracks "Timaeus I & II" were inspired by George Russell's music and his teachings on modality. There is a lot of his thinking that did not make it into his books, including ideas regarding form, rhythm, and planning. I organized these pieces very carefully using some of those ideas and showed them to Russell as the work evolved.
From the beginning, George said that my approach to working with computers was "compatible" with his concepts. This was very significant for me because he made this seminal electronic jazz suite, "Electronic Sonata for Souls Loved by Nature." It is not widely known that Stockhausen invited George to share bills in Europe in the 60's. Stockhausen actually did the house mix for George's band. George's music was ground zero for electronic music as far as I was concerned.
3) Is your computer work integrated with your playing ideas, or do you think of it as something separate. For example, do you try for a certain "player" aesthetic (like Lacy) in your computer work, or is it more philosophic, or music concepts embedded in your programming. Or -- are there other computer/interactive musicians that influence your computer ideas?
I am always leveraging what I know from composing and playing when I work with computers. That said, I am presently redefining the way that I work with the computer in concert. Rather than having it accompany me, I am reversing the process and letting the computer take more of a lead in defining the sound.
I do a lot of work with sound installation and find links between ideas that I encounter in the visual arts and new music. Next year I will be doing an installation in a 12th century civic hall in Padua, Italy. The ceiling is designed after the ribbed hull of a ship, only the hull is inverted. Well, this is like playing inside of a huge Brancusi or Martin Puryear sculpture, so this structure and its history will influence the sound.
4) When working on your patches in MAX, how successful are they at first? I don't mean to put a value on your work, or how quickly things come out for you, but I am more interested in how many iterations or how much algorithmic planning goes into your work.
The pieces on Timaeus were carefully planned. I had a musical model in mind before I started coding. The coding involves a lot of trial and error to really fine-tune the parameters, sounds, and levels. Much of the work on this CD was played live and fine-tuned for 5-10 years prior to the recording.
I started performing interactive music before MAX was really available or practical. “Legacy” was first written in C and performed as the first piece in the 1991 International Computer Music Convention in Montreal. I had a 1 Mhz computer that could run the piece just fine. I later made a version that runs in MAX, but the Markov functions are not the same as the C version. At this point, JavaScript has become a way to solve problems that are too unwieldy for MAX.
The coding is getting faster, and that’s a product of knowing what I want musically. I recently did a duet with Kenwood Dennard. Kenwood plays drums and keyboards and sings simultaneously; there no other musicians who can play the way he plays. Well, we sat down and listened to Timaeus and looked at some of the core algorithms. We designed a system that would make these processes accessible to Kenwood and I had it coded in about two weeks. We called it “Linear illuminations, harmonic tapestries and the poly-algorythmik-acuzmatic beat.” The performance was a total thrill and we are planning to do it again.
5) I was wondering if you are willing to share any specifics with your MAX
Programming. Not necessarily you code, but maybe your ideas for a particular work or works and some of your algorithmic approaches.
Any specific questions outside of my aforementioned responses?
So much of my work with computers centers on turning the theoretical essence of the music that I love into software, only to use it to make music again.
6) Like my original question, and this pertains to my above questions as well -- is there any published material, or people that I should listen to that may point me in the right direction for listening or getting a different
Perspective on your music. Also, if my questions are answered anywhere that is published, or on the web, let me know and I'll check it out.
The direction to go in is straight towards the music that you love and can't get enough of. If you are enamored by a musician‘s work, and try to dress like them, or have their picture on your wall, then THAT’S the one. Beethoven is great, and I have copied out the score to his "Eroica Symphony" and the "Grosse Fugue" in their entirety by hand. That said, if it were not for Coltrane, Pink Floyd, Hendrix and Sun Ra, I probably would not have set out to make Timaeus. THAT is what determined the direction that I went in. I learned to sing a 'Tranes solo on "Love Supreme" and a Miles solo on "Calypso Frelimo" before I studied a note of Beethoven. Trane and Miles became my first computer music mentors.
In short, I just looked at who amazed me and tried to figure out what they followed. They did not follow any one person or style, so following them was not a working plan. The love of making music and searching for that next moment of "Ahhh, I see ..." or "Ahhh, this can work ... " is the goal.
Works Cited
Leonard, Neil. A Personal Approach to Contemporary Jazz: Works for Saxophone and Computer-Controlled Electronics. Leonardo Music Journal, (1996): 15-20.
Bibliography. 3 October 2005
Discography . 3 October 2005
Long Biography. 3 October 2005
Berklee Faculty Biography: Neil Leonard. 29 October 2005
Interview. “Neil Leonard interviewed by Ryan Bruce,” E-mail to Ryan Bruce. 15 October 2005. (Interview in Appendix A).
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