At the end of rehearsals with the entire ensemble at Joe's Garage, another week was spent with smaller groups of the Ensemble Modern at UMRK. Each evening featured what I would call a 'directed improvisation'. Unlike an improvisation in which musicians spontaneously think up what they play, these are compositions in that each musician was given instructions before hand, both written and verbal. Then Frank would direct the musicians using hand signals and gestures. It looked as though Frank was playing the Ensemble like an instrument.
When recording unnamed pieces, it's often up to the engineer to note [for housekeeping purposes] a tentative title on the spot. I noticed the resemblance of the primary motif to the melody of "For He's A Jolly Good Fellow" and thus named the file Jolly Good Fellow thinking that an appropriate title would be given to it later. Funny how these things stick.
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