Open Ears, Open Mind
introducing improvisation to our skill set
A few notes and ideas from Andy Scott
A few notes and ideas from Andy Scott
I’m sharing some ideas that I use when teaching at the Royal Northern College of Music, on Music Courses and in one to one lessons. Ideas that may be considered and adapted by you.
It’s all music!! For me performance, composition & improvisation all merge.
Improvisation – what is it? Expectation – jazz? It’s developing an understanding of music, and confidence not having to reply on having notated music in front of you. Improvisation isn’t necessarily jazz – it could be playing a melody that you hear, it could be textural, sounds, it’s reacting in the moment, it opens up levels of interaction with other musicians, and we can all do it!
Ears, listening & having the confidence to move away from the music stand;
Warm up with some Call and Response.
Find the pulse. Limit note choice initially. Can we sing it? If yes then we can play it.
Making the connection between what we hear and what we play. This is what all levels of improvising musicians are aiming for, it’s an on-going process.
Unlocking the door…..
Sing a melody (out loud or in our head) and try and play it.
Take a 3,4 or 5 note fragment/motif from a piece of music that you are working on.
Which key is it in? What are the intervals? What is the time signature and rhythm?
Then think numbers i.e 1, 2, 3, 2, 1. Or; b3, 4, b3, 2, 1
Practise away from the instrument thinking what the notes are via numbers in different keys? Then go to your instrument and play it. This process saves playing incorrect notes initially, so no having to undo finger memory. Hear/sing the notes in your head.
This may be too challenging, initially for an inexperienced musician, therefore the call and response approach is a good place to start for everyone.
Importantly, the approach via numbers clearly outlines the necessity of understanding your keys and scales!
Scales (in order of learning); chromatic, whole tone, diminished (s/t & t/s), major, major pentatonic, natural minor, harmonic minor, melodic minor, minor pentatonic, blues scale.
Modes; a lot are derived from major, harmonic and melodic minor scales.
Associated arpeggios (1-3-5); augmented, major, minor, diminished.
Associated chord tones (1-3-5-7); major 7 #5, major 7, dominant 7, minor 7, half diminished, diminished.
This is a gradual learning process and depends upon the experience level of the student. The fundamentals of scales, the building blocks of Western music are crucial in general and in relation to improvisation.
Practise practicalities; the sheer number of scales may seem overwhelming, in which case I suggest limiting our aims on a daily basis i.e. learn a major scale and the relative natural minor. The next day learn the harmonic and melodic minors. On day three learn the related arpeggios. This is just one example, it all depends on how much practise time is available to you and your aims. Either way, we want to come away from a practise session feeling that we have achieved something, as opposed to feeling overwhelmed!
Feel and Groove
What style of music was your call & response?
As musicians we find ourselves in different musical settings; from classical, contemporary, light, jazz, funk, folk, latin, the list goes on……
We need knowledge of different musical styles, which for me comes via listening, and enjoying!
Playing in certain ensembles may hugely help our understanding of styles, such as a big band.
Via lots of listening we absorb the feel and groove of different styles of music; the lightness of bossa nova, the clave pulse of salsa, the soul of blues, the vibe of Motown, and sometimes the sense and use of swing.
There are books that will guide you in terms of learning to understand and employ the swing style/idiom, which are useful, but really for me it’s all about listening to swing music.
As a saxophonist who plays contemporary classical, jazz, funk, latin styles of music, there are physical and mental changes that I need to be aware of when playing in each setting.
For example; in a classical music setting I’m aiming to make notes even, similar weight of sound, matched. Classical saxophonists tend not to use subtone, jazz and improvising musicians do. My lower jaw stays still in classical, and moves when playing jazz. This helps achieve ‘ghosted notes’ (i.e. notes that maybe have 50% of the volume and presence than notes around it). Articulation – different for different styles. Vocalisation and phonetics help me to achieve the feel that I’m after.
An example, West Side Story – Cool. Even quavers in the melody may result in a ta-ta, ta-ta, whereas this should be swing quavers, vocalised maybe as doo-da, doo-da. The long-short triplet effect/approach (doo = 2/3rds of the triplet, da = 1/3rd). This is simplistic, to have a great swing feel we need to absorb the groove via listening.
Inflections associated with feel and groove;
We’ve spoken about ghosting notes.
Scoops – i.e starting a note flat and bending up to it. Big Band notation.
Lip trills, phat, glissandi….
Articulation
Rhythm when improvising;
An exercise with a student maybe to take a rhythm (from a piece of music on the stand, or via call & response) and assign different pitches to the same rhythm.
Move this rhythm around as a unit. i.e. 4 quavers starting on beat 2 of a 4/4 bar, then starting a quaver later, and so on.
The subject of rhythm is huge, and could be top of the page here, as we may choose any notes that we like but if they don’t have rhythm…..
Pick up notes/approach notes
Imagine that you’re about to start an improvised solo, and you’re thinking of playing the major 3rd of the chord/key that you’re in on beat one…. How about adding some approach notes, maybe rising chromatically to reach your target note, or playing a tone or semitone either side of your target note (enclosure), think about the rhythmic approach.
We need to put all these ideas into practise……
Choice of tune/chart/melody is very important. We don’t want to put people off improvisation by choosing a piece that has complex chord changes that don’t give us enough thinking time.
Find a backing track that allows you to vamp around one chord. Explore the chord via long tones (don’t always start on beat one), then via the associated chord tones (1,3,5,7), then via your 3,4 or 5-note motifs that you’re now used to playing and hearing. Try out some call and response over the one chord/feel/groove.
Let’s move onto pieces that have a limited number of chords to improvise over, this may be a pop song, folk song, or a specific jazz standard.
How do we generate our ideas when improvising?
Listening and transcribing
There are logistical challenges to spending hours and hours transcribing, let’s be realistic. Yes, do this if you’re a jazz student at music college because you’re meant to be spending your time doing this. In the real world though….
It’s all music!! For me performance, composition & improvisation all merge.
Improvisation – what is it? Expectation – jazz? It’s developing an understanding of music, and confidence not having to reply on having notated music in front of you. Improvisation isn’t necessarily jazz – it could be playing a melody that you hear, it could be textural, sounds, it’s reacting in the moment, it opens up levels of interaction with other musicians, and we can all do it!
Ears, listening & having the confidence to move away from the music stand;
Warm up with some Call and Response.
Find the pulse. Limit note choice initially. Can we sing it? If yes then we can play it.
Making the connection between what we hear and what we play. This is what all levels of improvising musicians are aiming for, it’s an on-going process.
Unlocking the door…..
Sing a melody (out loud or in our head) and try and play it.
Take a 3,4 or 5 note fragment/motif from a piece of music that you are working on.
Which key is it in? What are the intervals? What is the time signature and rhythm?
Then think numbers i.e 1, 2, 3, 2, 1. Or; b3, 4, b3, 2, 1
Practise away from the instrument thinking what the notes are via numbers in different keys? Then go to your instrument and play it. This process saves playing incorrect notes initially, so no having to undo finger memory. Hear/sing the notes in your head.
This may be too challenging, initially for an inexperienced musician, therefore the call and response approach is a good place to start for everyone.
Importantly, the approach via numbers clearly outlines the necessity of understanding your keys and scales!
Scales (in order of learning); chromatic, whole tone, diminished (s/t & t/s), major, major pentatonic, natural minor, harmonic minor, melodic minor, minor pentatonic, blues scale.
Modes; a lot are derived from major, harmonic and melodic minor scales.
Associated arpeggios (1-3-5); augmented, major, minor, diminished.
Associated chord tones (1-3-5-7); major 7 #5, major 7, dominant 7, minor 7, half diminished, diminished.
This is a gradual learning process and depends upon the experience level of the student. The fundamentals of scales, the building blocks of Western music are crucial in general and in relation to improvisation.
Practise practicalities; the sheer number of scales may seem overwhelming, in which case I suggest limiting our aims on a daily basis i.e. learn a major scale and the relative natural minor. The next day learn the harmonic and melodic minors. On day three learn the related arpeggios. This is just one example, it all depends on how much practise time is available to you and your aims. Either way, we want to come away from a practise session feeling that we have achieved something, as opposed to feeling overwhelmed!
Feel and Groove
What style of music was your call & response?
As musicians we find ourselves in different musical settings; from classical, contemporary, light, jazz, funk, folk, latin, the list goes on……
We need knowledge of different musical styles, which for me comes via listening, and enjoying!
Playing in certain ensembles may hugely help our understanding of styles, such as a big band.
Via lots of listening we absorb the feel and groove of different styles of music; the lightness of bossa nova, the clave pulse of salsa, the soul of blues, the vibe of Motown, and sometimes the sense and use of swing.
There are books that will guide you in terms of learning to understand and employ the swing style/idiom, which are useful, but really for me it’s all about listening to swing music.
As a saxophonist who plays contemporary classical, jazz, funk, latin styles of music, there are physical and mental changes that I need to be aware of when playing in each setting.
For example; in a classical music setting I’m aiming to make notes even, similar weight of sound, matched. Classical saxophonists tend not to use subtone, jazz and improvising musicians do. My lower jaw stays still in classical, and moves when playing jazz. This helps achieve ‘ghosted notes’ (i.e. notes that maybe have 50% of the volume and presence than notes around it). Articulation – different for different styles. Vocalisation and phonetics help me to achieve the feel that I’m after.
An example, West Side Story – Cool. Even quavers in the melody may result in a ta-ta, ta-ta, whereas this should be swing quavers, vocalised maybe as doo-da, doo-da. The long-short triplet effect/approach (doo = 2/3rds of the triplet, da = 1/3rd). This is simplistic, to have a great swing feel we need to absorb the groove via listening.
Inflections associated with feel and groove;
We’ve spoken about ghosting notes.
Scoops – i.e starting a note flat and bending up to it. Big Band notation.
Lip trills, phat, glissandi….
Articulation
Rhythm when improvising;
An exercise with a student maybe to take a rhythm (from a piece of music on the stand, or via call & response) and assign different pitches to the same rhythm.
Move this rhythm around as a unit. i.e. 4 quavers starting on beat 2 of a 4/4 bar, then starting a quaver later, and so on.
The subject of rhythm is huge, and could be top of the page here, as we may choose any notes that we like but if they don’t have rhythm…..
Pick up notes/approach notes
Imagine that you’re about to start an improvised solo, and you’re thinking of playing the major 3rd of the chord/key that you’re in on beat one…. How about adding some approach notes, maybe rising chromatically to reach your target note, or playing a tone or semitone either side of your target note (enclosure), think about the rhythmic approach.
We need to put all these ideas into practise……
Choice of tune/chart/melody is very important. We don’t want to put people off improvisation by choosing a piece that has complex chord changes that don’t give us enough thinking time.
Find a backing track that allows you to vamp around one chord. Explore the chord via long tones (don’t always start on beat one), then via the associated chord tones (1,3,5,7), then via your 3,4 or 5-note motifs that you’re now used to playing and hearing. Try out some call and response over the one chord/feel/groove.
Let’s move onto pieces that have a limited number of chords to improvise over, this may be a pop song, folk song, or a specific jazz standard.
How do we generate our ideas when improvising?
Listening and transcribing
There are logistical challenges to spending hours and hours transcribing, let’s be realistic. Yes, do this if you’re a jazz student at music college because you’re meant to be spending your time doing this. In the real world though….
Please see the pdf of one chorus (16 bars) of a solo that Dexter Gordon played on the classic tune ‘Blue Bossa’. Ignoring the two bar pick up into the start of the chorus for now;
Look at the choice of notes and rhythm over the Dm7 chord – enclosure, delayed resolution to the minor 3. Check out the rhythm and pick up notes in the next bar, Enclosure again in the Em7(b5) and A7 bars, Bb7 bar, beautiful chromaticism and rhythm…. Having transcribed, we now want to analyse, listen (number one as ever, for sound and inflections, and everything!) and develop our own practise ideas.
Please note, I haven’t referred to the blues scale particularly. Whilst useful initially, as a starting point when improvising over a blues (as roughly speaking the notes included in a blues scale may be applied over the full 12-bar sequence), it shouldn’t be relied upon too much in terms of stifling our musical vocabulary and ideas. It’s a great safety net which is why it is used so extensively!
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So Far
Please see the two sheets of music that comprise the score to a piece that I wrote, called ‘So Far…’. There is also a demo of me playing this with piano on YouTube.
This piece is an opportunity for a classically-trained musician to improvise within a notated piece of music. There are no chord symbols, and you don’t have to change your sound stylistically in the improvising section.
My suggestion is to sit at a piano/keyboard and play the chords in the improvised section, one at a time, with the sustain pedal. Find notes that you like the sound of over the harmony. How do certain notes make you feel, why do certain notes resonate with you more than others? There isn’t a right answer, it’s subjective, so have the confidence to believe in your ears, gut feelings and emotions.
This approach with ‘So Far…’ makes us think. We are in effect becoming the composer and in turn the improvising musician.
My suggestion is to sit at a piano/keyboard and play the chords in the improvised section, one at a time, with the sustain pedal. Find notes that you like the sound of over the harmony. How do certain notes make you feel, why do certain notes resonate with you more than others? There isn’t a right answer, it’s subjective, so have the confidence to believe in your ears, gut feelings and emotions.
This approach with ‘So Far…’ makes us think. We are in effect becoming the composer and in turn the improvising musician.
So Far - C treble clef
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So Far - C bass clef
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So Far - Eb
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So Far - Bb
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Concluding, for now……
We’re scratching the surface here of the wonderful world of improvisation.
I hope that some of the above ideas are of use to you.
Happy listening!
Andy Scott