George Lewis, 105-106

Spontaneity is an important value for improvisers working in both Eurological and Afrological forms, though the definition of spontaneity certainly differs according to tradition. Following Cage, Schwartz and Godfrey (1993, 92) affirm that the result of a musical experience created through indeterminate means is meant to be "immediate, spontaneous, and unique: a ritual celebration, not a fixed art object bounded by predetermined relationships or notational straitjackets."

Notions of uniqueness and the unforeseen, however, are hardly unique to Eurological indeterminacy. Saxophonist Steve Lacy observed that "you have all your years of preparation and all your sensibilities and your pre- pared means but it is a leap into the unknown" (quoted in Bailey 1992, 57). Many commentators have identified the uniqueness of an improvisation as a highly prized goal among African-American improvisers. Berliner (1994, 268) quotes the trumpeter Doc Cheatham, whose work straddles the pre- and postwar eras, to the effect that Armstrong and others of comparable creative ability would "play fifteen or thirty differ- ent choruses, and they would never play the same thing.... Every time they'd play a tune, the solo would be different." A similar sentiment was expressed with Coltrane's amazement at how Gillespie could play the introduction to "I Can't Get Started" differently every time (Berliner 1994, 269).

Despite the statements of these and other highly experienced improvisers who have gone on record with their experiences of uniqueness and discovery, a number of composers and theorists working in Eurological music have asserted a quite different view of the same music. The cognitive psychologist John Sloboda (1985, 141) maintains that jazz improvisers use "a model which is, in most cases, externally supplied by the culture." Lukas Foss has asserted that in improvisation, "one plays what one already knows" (quoted in Cope 1993, 127).

This viewpoint, which has attained the status of conventional wisdom in some circles, is similar to Schwartz and Godfrey's claim that "Cage's indeterminacy should be distinguished from improvisation, in that the latter is directed to a known end" (92). Cage's own statement that "improvisation is generally playing what you know" leads naturally to his opinion that improvisation "doesn't lead you into a new experience" (quoted in Kostelanetz 1987, 223).