In this talk, Professor Sarath will reflect upon his experience in Fall 2016 in Seoul and at the International Sori Festival in Jeonju, South Korea, in which he participated as performer, speaker, and Founder and President of the International Society for Improvised Music (ISIM). ISIM was invited to convene cross-cultural improvisation workshops and performances, under the direction of komungo virtuoso Jin Hi Kim, that brought together musicians from diverse backgrounds. The Joenju event was the most recent ISIM cross-cultural improvisation workshops and performances in a series that began, with Nam Center support, at U-M in 2011. The combination of performances and scholarly presentations raised many questions and also yielded important insights about the challenges and opportunities of improvising across wide-ranging cultural boundaries. Contrasting conceptions of time, form, sound, rhythm, texture, interaction, the relationship of innovation and tradition, and the spiritual function of music are among the issues raised. He will discuss a number of these issues and also emphasize the importance of this work in creating unity in a world riddled by division and conflict.

Ed Sarath is Professor of Music, Interim Director of the Center for World Performance Studies, and Director of the Program in Creativity and Consciousness Studies at the University of Michigan. He is founder and president of the International Society for Improvised Music and active worldwide as performer, composer, recording artist, author/scholar, and change visionary. In addition to his book Improvisation, Creativity, and Consciousness (SUNY 2013), the first to apply principles of an emergent worldview called Integral Theory to music, he has published six other books as author, co-author, and co-editor and numerous articles in journals spanning a wide spectrum of disciplines. He has performed and recorded with top names in jazz and contemporary music across the globe, and his recording New Beginnings features the London Jazz Orchestra performing his large ensemble compositions. He is a fellow of the American Council of Learned Societies, MacDowell Arts Colony, and National Endowment for the Arts (in both performance and composition).

Event cosponsored by the U-M Center for World Performance Studies