Abstract

Cecil Taylor's Unit Structures is fundamentally a conjunctive, polyvocal expression: between music and text, composition and improvisation, individual expression and collective enunciation. This essay analyses aspects of Taylor's polyvocal expression as an ongoing series of productive assemblages that queer conventional notions of rhythm by reconsidering the very concept of rhythm in Deleuzo-Guattarian terms. In order to enact this move, I develop Deleuze and Guattari's concept of ‘supple segmentarity’ to theorise Taylor's propulsive, gestural language as a continuation of – rather than rupture within – the logic of elastic temporality that flows through many Afro-diasporic musical practices.