I’m glad to see more people being exposed to the music of Hermeto Pascoal and avant-

garde music in general. I think it’s a concept of creating music that is far too often
overlooked. To answer the first question, the essential components are rhythm, melody,
and harmony. I think they are listed in that order for a reason. The reason being that
rhythm is not necessarily more important than melody and harmony, but that if you play,
or in this case improvise, certain rhythms with purpose and intention then you can
experiment with more unconventional melodies and harmonies using those rhythms. I
believe all styles of music always have the three basic elements, even avant-garde
music such as Pascoal’s. Being a musician that primarily plays “jazz” I have played very
avant-garde styles of music as well. I’ve come to the realization that styles such as free
jazz, and avant-garde jazz just use harmony in a different way. While a style like
classical, more traditional forms of jazz favor more conventional harmony, avant-garde
music favors dissonance. Avant-garde music always has melody as well. Melody can be
both precomposed as well as spontaneously composed, or improvised. Many times
avant-garde music uses melodies that are purely improvisational. Many people think it
sounds completely random or disorganized but the musicians are constantly listening to
each other and creating melodies based on what the other musicians are playing using
certain patterns, shapes, and scales.