I'm excited to give a conference talk on my translation of Ernst Ferand's book on the history of improvisation in European music at the 2025 meeting of the International Musicological Society this July in Valencia, Spain. I've been working on this project in mostly monk-like solitude for well over a year now, so it will be a joy to share it with the world. The abstract is below.
I'm keen on talking about this thing, so reach out if you or your institution would like to host me!
An Alternate History of European Music: Translating Ernst Ferand's Die Improvisation in der Musik
In his 1938 book Die Improvisation in der Musik, the Hungarian scholar and music educator Ernst Ferand (1887–1972) presents nothing less than an alternate history of European music. Through groundbreaking readings of primary and secondary sources, Ferand reconstructs a forgotten network of improvised practices that were central to the early development of European music (from plainchant, to Medieval organum and discant, to Renaissance counterpoint and instrumental dances). Further, Ferand shows that even after the advent of notation, written and improvisational practices coexisted for centuries, their creative friction generating new forms and genres.
More radically, by engaging with the field then known as “comparative musicology” (what we would now call ethnomusicology), Ferand identifies numerous transcultural parallels between improvisational practices. In particular, he suggests that improvisational evidence supports the controversial “Oriental hypothesis” that the music of the Medieval and Renaissance periods was profoundly influenced by Europe’s neighbors to the east. For Ferand, improvisation is not the domain of non-Western “others,” but rather a universal human activity whose relative independence from notation makes it an ideal medium of intercultural musical exchange.
Finally, Ferand argues that the eventual decline of improvisation in European music isolated this tradition not only from the influence of other cultures, but also from the generative springs of musical praxis itself. Accordingly, his history of improvisation is also intended as an intervention in the field of music education, in which he argues for a return to improvisation-informed pedagogy as a way of revitalizing musical life and reconnecting theory and practice.
In this talk, I will present some of the major themes of Ferand’s book, outline its intellectual and historical contexts, and discuss some of the challenges and questions I have encountered in the course of translating this important work of scholarship.
I'm keen on talking about this thing, so reach out if you or your institution would like to host me!
An Alternate History of European Music: Translating Ernst Ferand's Die Improvisation in der Musik
In his 1938 book Die Improvisation in der Musik, the Hungarian scholar and music educator Ernst Ferand (1887–1972) presents nothing less than an alternate history of European music. Through groundbreaking readings of primary and secondary sources, Ferand reconstructs a forgotten network of improvised practices that were central to the early development of European music (from plainchant, to Medieval organum and discant, to Renaissance counterpoint and instrumental dances). Further, Ferand shows that even after the advent of notation, written and improvisational practices coexisted for centuries, their creative friction generating new forms and genres.
More radically, by engaging with the field then known as “comparative musicology” (what we would now call ethnomusicology), Ferand identifies numerous transcultural parallels between improvisational practices. In particular, he suggests that improvisational evidence supports the controversial “Oriental hypothesis” that the music of the Medieval and Renaissance periods was profoundly influenced by Europe’s neighbors to the east. For Ferand, improvisation is not the domain of non-Western “others,” but rather a universal human activity whose relative independence from notation makes it an ideal medium of intercultural musical exchange.
Finally, Ferand argues that the eventual decline of improvisation in European music isolated this tradition not only from the influence of other cultures, but also from the generative springs of musical praxis itself. Accordingly, his history of improvisation is also intended as an intervention in the field of music education, in which he argues for a return to improvisation-informed pedagogy as a way of revitalizing musical life and reconnecting theory and practice.
In this talk, I will present some of the major themes of Ferand’s book, outline its intellectual and historical contexts, and discuss some of the challenges and questions I have encountered in the course of translating this important work of scholarship.
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