I LIKE ALBERT MURRAY'S PHRASE antagonistic cooperation (in The Hero and the Blues) FOR THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN protagonist AND obstacle, where obstacles (as resistance is necessary to the emergence of any form) PROVIDE THE HERO WITH THE opportunity to extend beyond "routine conceptions and achievements."

murray's phrase inverted -cooperative antagonism, would also describe what i'd find an optimal relationship between composition and improviser.

A composition can exert pressure - can focus, demand, goad, prod, incite, entice, encourage, provoke,expand, invite an improviser to invent at a more comprehensive level than perhaps on other occasions. Monk, Mingus, and Charles Moore have been, for me, influential examples of this possibility.

IN BASKETBALL, THE REAL BEAUTY OF THE GAME CAN BEGIN TO HAPPEN WHERE THE cooperative antagonism OF AN OPPOSING TEAM SUPPLIES JUST ENOUGH tension - contrariness, resistance, AS WELL AS, actual or potential,chaos - TO CREATE AN OCCASION FOR THE KIND OF PLAYING THAT WOULDN'T BE ORDINARILY A PART OF WARM UPS, or of a routine rehearsal. A GAP ASSERTS ITSELF,INSERTED BY RESISTANCES, active with tension - a space to leap across, people on their toes... . What's next? The players have to IMPROVISE.

Tension, which literally means the tautness that results from stretching, is characteristic of coherence.

COOPERATIVE ANTAGONISM SEEMS TO ME TO HAVE ALSO BEEN a basic constructive principle in JAZZ IMPROVISATION.

A group of individuals cooperate AS AN ENSEMBLE, but each individual is, at the same time, ANTAGONISTIC in distinguishing HIMorHERSELF from other members OF THE ensemble (as well as from every other musician who's ever played), BY INDIVIDUAL COMPOSITIONAL CHOICES AND INSTRUMENTAL touch (oneself is a unique persective and assemblage). the engagement of multiple protagonists would naturally generate some tension.

individual identity is also defined thanks to the contrasting tendencies of other voices. each musician's clarity and distinctness (an antagonism) augments and clarifies, by contrast, the concurrent moves, ideas & sounds of the other musicians.

INSTANCES OF COMPETITION, OF MUSICAL PRESSURE, ARE SETTINGS WHEREIN MUSICIANS MAY EACH EXPAND CREATIVELY BEYOND THEIR PREVIOUS, AND POSSIBLY HABITUAL, THRESHOLDS (AS NO TWO VOICES ARE THE SAME AND NO ONE CAN ACTUALLY BE SOMEBODY ELSE, "BEST" HAS TO HAVE A PRETTY LIMITED & RELATIVE MEANING IN THIS CONTEXT. THIS IS WHERE COMPETITION MAY INVERT ITSELF FROM AN ORIENTATION TOWARD WINNING & DEFEATING INTO AN OCCASION WHEREIN EACH INDIVIDUAL MIGHT RIDE THE ATMOSPHERE OF CHALLENGE TO FURTHER SUCCEED AS ONESELF).

THIS IS A COOPERATIVE antagonism: ensemble/individual conflicts are INTEGRATED as EACH IMPROVISER CHOOSES compositionally IN REFERENCE TO THE OVERALL SOUND OF THE ENSEMBLE.

THIS IS ALSO RITUAL: drama; ENACTMENT OF ORIENTATION & ATTITUDE.

going a little further TO THE DISPOSITION OF SOUND ARRANGEMENT IN SO MUCH AFRICAN AND AFRICAN DERIVED MUSICS, the common application of interlocking & contrasting RHYTHMS, CALL/RESPONSE, MUSIC/DANCE, SOUND/GAP COMES ACROSS TO ME AS PERHAPS YET ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF THE WORKING PRINCIPLE OF COOPERATIVE ANTAGONISM, where very often intruments relate by means of how they differ (while in reference to a composite sonic image), rather than homogenize, and with just the appropriate attention, each part clarifies the others - there's an expanded space between assertion and accomodation, (like moving from 2D to 3D): even the silences (the gaps!) are set on fire.

It might also be called SWINGING., (,. - #@^ ...aS if this musical syntax itself leans toward an ambiance that nurtures the kind of tension that is concurrent with relaxation...and this also refers to improvising and to drama and & ... .

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