| The abiltity to improvise is within the reach | | | | hand. It can consist of three keys pressed |
| of everyone who wants to develop this skill. | | | | down as you probably already know: |
| You can start to improvise in a way that will | | | | |
| give you and others the benefits from this | | | | C-major: C3 E3 G3 |
| art. Let's see what good improvisational | | | | |
| skills involve! | | | | The numbers indicate that you play the notes |
| | | | in the third octave, that is, the octave to |
| What is improvisation? | | | | the left of middle C. Now I will give you a |
| | | | sparse amount of notes to use to create a |
| Many people have the notion that | | | | "dinner" worth eating, that is, worth |
| improvisation is the ability to create | | | | listening to. |
| something out of nothing. Well, you can | | | | |
| improvise in a kitchen too. Creating a | | | | Notes to use: C4 D4 E4 |
| fantastic dinner out of the things you can | | | | |
| find around. | | | | Now it's time to improvise, or rather, |
| | | | compose! |
| However, note that there has to be some sort | | | | |
| of material to use, like a potato or a carrot | | | | Press down the C-major chord with your left |
| hanging around. I haven't heard of a chief | | | | hand and try to come up with nice melodies |
| creating a dinner out of nothing yet. | | | | just using the three melody notes in your |
| | | | right hand. What can you do to create |
| Let's apply this principle in your piano | | | | variation with just these three notes? |
| playing! Here are the two ingredients that | | | | |
| will create and make your improvisations into | | | | 1. Vary the order of the notes. |
| something worth listening too, in other | | | | |
| words, music: | | | | 2. Vary the length of the notes. |
| | | | |
| 1. Your ability to find the notes you want to | | | | 3. Vary how hard you press down the notes. |
| play on your piano. | | | | |
| | | | 4. Use other means that you will find out as |
| 2. Phrases, scales and fragments of melodies | | | | you play. |
| that you have memorized in your mind or in | | | | |
| your fingers that can be reused and changed | | | | You can develop this exercise by moving the |
| to create new music. | | | | chord and melody notes up one step resulting |
| | | | in a new chord and new notes to improvise |
| 3. The ability to compose music out of the | | | | upon: |
| before mentioned assets. | | | | |
| | | | D-minor: D3 F3 G3 Notes to use: D4 E4 F4 |
| I would like to start with the third asset. | | | | |
| The ability to compose music out of the | | | | I will give you one more position one step |
| material you have at your disposal is the | | | | up: |
| most important skill. You can actually use | | | | |
| just a few notes in order to create something | | | | E-minor: E3 G3 B3 Notes to use: E4 F4 G4 |
| musically worthwhile. | | | | |
| | | | You can try playing these three chords |
| Some pianists or other instrumentalists can | | | | improvising a while on each step with the |
| have the ability to play a lot of patterns, | | | | following order of the chords: |
| scales and licks at a tremendous speed but | | | | |
| this doesn't secure that they can create | | | | C Dm Em Dm C |
| music from this material. | | | | |
| | | | Yes, this is a kind of Genesis for your |
| I think that it is a good thing to only use a | | | | improvisational skills as this easy exercise |
| sparse amount of notes in order to develop | | | | will force you to actually compose music and |
| the skill to actually compose music as you | | | | not only rely on flashy complicated scales, |
| improvise. Like some good blues guitarists | | | | patterns or licks that might hide the lack of |
| do. Take B.B. King for example, messing | | | | music in the improvisational efforts. |
| around with just one note at times! | | | | |
| | | | I would suggest that you work both on |
| Here is a first example for you to use as a | | | | learning scales, patterns and licks and on |
| beginning of your improvisational endeavors. | | | | the even more important art of composing |
| | | | music out of very easy melody fragments so |
| You will play a C-major chord in your left | | | | that you will develop into a better musician. |