Musical improvisation, according to conventional wisdom, is about the moment: the spontaneous, realtime, and unforeseen in the course of performance. However as research by Benson (2003), Lash (2011), and Peters (forthcoming) has shown, improvisation can also occur throughout processes of “preparation” in instrumental practice, group rehearsal, and even organization and presentation. In my experience as a composer-performer, the connection between these “out-of-time” constraints and “in-time” creation can be more radical still. Offstage and onstage improvisation may not only be analogous but continuous—woven together in a long-term improvisation that comprises many performances, pieces, and/ or life itself. The presentation will explore this notion by way of two examples: My solo Groundwave Rondo is a series of pieces for contrabass and “tape,” each version of which is made (as often as possible) on the way to the gig. While in the train, I improvise for fifteen minutes with an AM radio and record it. The radio signal is obliterated by interferences from the train motor, overhead cable, and onboard electronics, turning my receiver into a sort of synthesizer which can be modulated by turning the frequency dial. The recording is played back unedited in the concert—without my having heard it—and we perform a duet together.

Derek Bailey’s The Barcelona Chronicles, a series of recordings made in 2005, documents the legendary guitarist’s “new approach to his instrument, whilst dealing with the complex and progressive limitations caused by Motor Neurone disease.” As muscular dege- neration reduced his left-hand mobility and made holding a plectrum impossible, Bailey developed a new, sparser way of playing using his thumb. “Here was someone for whom obstacles were occasions for necessary creativity.”

Christopher Williams is a wayfarer on the body-mind continuum. His medium is music. As a contrabassist, Williams has collaborated with Derek Bailey, Justin Bennett, Compagnie Ouie/Dire, Charles Curtis, LaMonte Young’s Theatre of Eternal Music, Robin Hayward (Reidemeister Move), Hans W. Koch, and dancer Martin Sonderkamp; and with composers such as Chris Adler, Benjamin Carson, Charlie Morrow, Ana-Maria Rodriguez, Marc Sabat, and Erik Ulman. As a curator, he organized over 70 concerts of contemporary and experimental music in Barcelona between 2003-2009 with Associació Musical l’Embut. He currently co-curates Certain Sundays, a monthly salon in Berlin, and participates in the Berlin Improvisation Research Group.