Pat Wictor

In my musical life, I’ve given a lot of energy to exploring both composition and improvisation.   Like most people who do both, I keep trying to deepen my understanding of compositional and improvisational theories, approaches, and craft.  In the end, I still find both quite mysterious.   There’s no formula you can follow to come up with good songs or good improvisations.  (You can try it, but it ends up sounding, well, formulaic.)

Everyone in the world is an improvisor and a creator.  We all do it.  We all have to make stuff up in response to the demands of life.  We whip up meals that weren’t there before, make conversation that wasn’t there before, and create things in our jobs that weren’t there before.  Improvising music is just a subset of what we do in life - it’s making up musical stuff.  Sometimes we like what we made up so much that we want to keep it - that’s composition. If it’s got words and singing, you can call it a song.  (People who know a lot about this stuff often have their own strong opinions about it, and might have a different way of talking about these things.)

I love both strands.  The planning and the spontaneity.  I like the craft of songwriting, exploring structures of composition, and - when I find it! - the satisfaction of a well-composed melody and well-written lyrics.

Tomorrow  (Thursday September 12, 7:00pm ET) I’m the featured artist on “Inside the Song,” a streaming-only performance and conversation with host and songwriter Tina Ross, and I’ll be playing and talking about some of the songs I’m most proud of having written.  I hope you'll join us - click “Watch Online”:  https://folkproject.org/mec-events/pat-wictor

I also like the spontaneity and surprise of making up music on the spot, where the idea is NOT to plan.  Doing it in public, it’s risky - but at its best, it can be transcendent, exhilarating.  

I spent many years concentrating on songwriting, and in the last ten years have also spent a fair amount of time on improvisation.  Recently, I co-formed a group called Kaleidoscope, with three friends from the vocal improv community - Deborah Latz, Jesse Goldman, and Jeannette Miller.  We do fully improvised a cappella vocal music.  And we’ve got some concerts and appearances coming up:  September 28 at the Hudson West Festival in Jersey City, and November 1 at Folkus Music in Brooklyn, NY.   We’re also working on more concerts for next spring.

Next summer I’m also teaching a vocal improv workshop, July 6-11, 2025, at Swannanoa Traditional Song Week, in North Carolina.  

More recently, I’ve been exploring how to bring composition and improvisation together.  Jazz musicians have been doing it for years.  But doing it in my own way, in my own voice, with my own approach, in music that is rooted in blues, gospel, and folk music vocabulary and forms, is a different kind of thing.  That’s a journey still in its early stages, and I’m excited to see where it goes.  (Stay tuned.)

How do planning and spontaneity work in your life?  Do you try to balance them, or do you lean more towards one than the other?

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Ears and Eyes:  What I’m Listening to and Reading

What I'm Reading

Ward Farnsworth, The Practicing Stoic:  A Philosophical User’s Manual  
https://tinyurl.com/mzckak3a

Reggie Harris with Linda Hansell, Searching for Solid Ground:  A Memoir  
https://tinyurl.com/3yyh48ej

What I'm Listening to

Chess Blues, 1954-1960
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nm4myjrBWhE

Jamaaladeen Tacuma, Hotel Le Prince
https://jamaaladeentacuma.bandcamp.com/album/hotel-le-prince