Creativity within constraint? Perspectives on notated performance

This paper examines performers’ notational practices and seeks to uncover the creative possibilities of intensive engagement with notations of varying ‘specificity’. Nicholas Cook (2013) challenges the assumption that complex music is creatively restrictive and suggests that complex notation can serve as a stimulus for interaction between musicians and score. I argue that all notation can serve this function, even the most ostensibly ‘straightforward’ music. Several case studies from my fieldwork are presented, where I document clarinettists working with notation of various styles and degrees of ‘specificity’ – from the ostensibly ‘minimal’ to more conceptually and technically challenging musics – and trace the creative decisions that are made. Through close analysis of rehearsal and performance footage, semi-structured interview material, and performers’ non-diastematic markings in the score, I seek to unpack not only the problems and limitations, but also the potentialities that the score can generate.