Myra Melford’s Multi-Disciplinary Graduate Seminar for Composers, Improvisers, and Artists of Diverse Media at UC Berkeley, Spring 2009

A weekly forum to explore and engage in the rich possibilities and diverse strategies for creating multi-disciplinary work through the use of improvisation, activities include exploration of improvisation techniques across disciplines and the study of existing multi-disciplinary works that have incorporated improvisation either in the process of creating the work and/or in the final product. In an intimate setting of four people in the seminar, with frequent guest artists, including Pauline Oliveros, hold workshops across disciplines, including theatre improv, dance, voice and improvised prose/poetry.

This culminated in an open rehearsal of a multidisciplinary performance of "Six-Party Talks" on May 7, 2009 at CNMAT (Center for New Music & Audio Technology) in Berkeley, California. I've yet much to learn about multidisciplinary improvisation and hope to come back and refine this piece, giving more effective parameters for the improvisers and clarifying the purpose of the piece for myself as well, so that the piece can be more succesful. Below is what I had in mind, as of the May 7th open rehearsal.

How can 6 different personalities, of various artistic disciplines, each with his/her own set of vocabulary, interact and converse in an effort to reach an agreement artistically? In the same way that the 6 countries, of various cultures and national identities, come together for the Six-Party Talks in an effort to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue, the improvisers strive to reconcile their artistic differences so that they can create a coherent piece together. In doing so, each improviser can take on the identity of a nation, to supplement his/her own personal vocabulary with what he/she knows of the country's politics, culture & history.

We tried three rounds of this piece in the open rehearsal, approaching it a different way each time (following an agenda/road map that outlines the talk, having a moderator dictate who may "talk" and as a game-piece with the improvisers calling the cues). Click here to watch the third round, the game-piece approach.