Related Guides
Exhibit Sources: Film & Performance
Databases
- Academic Video Online This link opens in a new window Academic Video Online delivers more than 67,000 titles spanning a range of subject areas including anthropology, business, counseling, film, health, history, music, and more. It includes documentaries, films, demonstrations, and other content types. Films in the Boston University Libraries catalog are licensed to Boston University for educational and research use only, for BU students, faculty, and staff.
- Kanopy This link opens in a new window Kanopy is a provider of documentaries, training films, and theatrical releases available as streaming video. Clips from the videos can be embedded in presentations or shown in class. Films in the Boston University Libraries catalog are licensed to Boston University for educational and research use only, for BU students, faculty, and staff.
- Music & Performing Arts (Audio & Video Collections) This link opens in a new window Music & Performing Arts' collections include American Music, Classical, Contemporary World, Jazz, Popular, Smithsonian's Global Sound, Ethnographic Sound Archives, American Film Scripts, Asian American Drama, Black Drama, North American Drama, and Theatre in Context. Search results include links to the full text of the Garland Encyclopedia of World Music Online (1997-2001), with additional audio examples.
- OntheBoards.TV This link opens in a new window OntheBoards.tv is a collection of videos of full-length performances by artists working in dance, theater, music and other forms. Performance are filmed in Seattle, Portland, Austin, and New York. The aim of OntheBoards is to "introduce audiences to artistic innovators who are defining the future of dance, theater and music."
Selected Films
- Monteith and Rand (streaming, Academic Video Online) Elliot Norton interviews Suzanne Rand and John Monteith, the comedy and improvisation duo who are performing at the Wilber Theater.
- The Otrabanda Company and its Mississippi River raft revue (streaming, Academic Video Online) "The experimental theater group Otrabanda cruises down the Mississippi River, setting up in various towns, performing its own blend of theater, vaudeville and improvisation to people who live along the shore. Many in the audience have never before seen live theater.
- Hothouse - a showcase of works of improvisation (streaming, Academic Video Online) A compilation of Performance Space 122 live recordings of improvisational dance and music pieces by performance artists.
Exhibit Sources: Selected Improvisational Theater Companies and Collectives
- The Second City The Second City has been bringing the funny for over 60 years. We began in 1959 as a small comedy cabaret and have grown to become the first name in improv and comedy, with theaters and Training Centers in Chicago, Toronto, and Hollywood.
- Improv Asylum Improv Asylum is a comedy theater featuring improvisation and sketch comedy (think Whose Line is it Anyway? meets Saturday Night Live!).
- BATS Improv BATS Improv is a professional theatre company and an artistic community that cultivates and innovates the craft of improvised theatre through engaging, playful, creative performance and training.
- Improv Everywhere Improv Everywhere is a New York City-based comedy collective that stages unexpected performances in public places. Improv Everywhere aims to surprise and delight random strangers through positive pranks. Over the past 19 years, we have staged hundreds of projects involving tens of thousands of undercover performers.
Exhibit Sources: Jazzomat Research Project & Database (University of Music Franz Liszt Weimar).
The main aim of the Jazzomat Research Project is to investigate the creative processes underlying jazz solo improvisations with the help of statistical and computational methods. The overarching goal is to explore the cognitive and cultural foundations of jazz solo improvisation. To this end, the Weimar Jazz Database, a comprehensive and representative database of jazz solo transcription is being built up, and an open-source Python Library, the MeloSpyLib is developed for analysis purposes.
- Weimer Jazz Database Contains transcriptions and analyses of 450+ jazz solos by Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, Benny Goodman, Branford Marsalis, Louis Armstrong, Wynton Marsalis, and more,
- Weimar Jazz Database (Downloadable Version) The Weimar Jazz Database is currently contained in a single SQLITE3 database file
Exhibit Sources: Images
- Associated Press Images Collection This link opens in a new window Associated Press Images Collection is a searchable collection of recent and historical photos from the Associated Press, plus AP graphics, articles, and brief sound clips.
Exhibit Sources: Podcasts
- BBC: The Listening Service: Improvisation Tom Service considers the art of musical improvisation. When pianist Lenny Tristano first recorded free improvisations in 1949, his record company didn't want to release them. Today, Free Improvisation is a well-established genre. But can improvising ever be "free"? Tom discusses with musician and writer David Toop and improvising bassist Joëlle Leandre.
- Improv Nerd Improv Nerd is a comedy podcast is a live interview show hosted by Jimmy Carrane, a well-known improv teacher and former host on Chicago Public Radio.
- The Improv Chronicle If you love improv then treat your ears to a podcast about improv every two weeks. Lloydie speaks to people about issues in improv be they operational, social or artistic. With a wide variety of voices from across the world, this improv podcast has nuggets of gold for new improvisers and seasoned pros alike.
- Improvised Music Agenda Podcast Hosted by Huw V Williams, he chats to fellow musicians about life and music within the jazz and improvised music world.
- That's How I Remember It Toronto improvisers take YOUR favourite movie and re-tell the story through improv.
- Mischief Improv Follow the start of an improv team in Chester, England. David Escobedo has been performing improv since 1995 and has directed/produced 100's of improv shows ranging from Long Form to Short Form, and from Street Performances to Happenings. This podcast will give you the Warm-Up's, Exercises and some of the challenges that arise from promoting, producing an improv team consisting of many people who have never heard of improv before!
- When Last I Left When Last I Left is an improvisational storytelling comedy podcast about… well, that’s up to you! We won’t know until you tell us—so make it good! Navigating through listener-submitted plot points and rules, Jenny Curtis, Chris Porter, Micky Shiloah, and Kuali'i Wittman have to make up a story on the spot that begins with a small social faux pas and ends in a major cataclysmic event.
