pre-learnt lines- do you guys improvise in that way?

[rafapak]

hi

I read an article recently in which a guy said that he improvises on the basis of stuff that he learnt and memorised earlier. Do you guys also improvise by the use of lines learnt earlier by heart?

any comments will be appreciated

[drobniuch]

80% if You want or not are froem pre learned stuff like licks.. how much from you is in it depends on how much you practice NOT with books.. in jazz it's difficult now

[oilywrag]

I think that you can come up with a line thats cool when practising, but,you should try and let the line evolve in a live situation,just let your ear and fingers lead you,

Cheers Tom

[derek]

Originally Posted by rafapak

hi

I read an article recently in which a guy said that he improvises on the basis of stuff that he learnt and memorised earlier. Do you guys also improvise by the use of lines learnt earlier by heart?

any comments will be appreciated

Everyone starts out like this. I have not ever heard of anyone being able to speak a language, and jazz is a distinct language, without learning words and phrases by rote.

I don't use very many 'lines' at all, but I do improvise using concepts, specifically triads/triad pairs and superimposed pentatonic scales. It is essentially my 'linear concept'. I don't play lines out of them per se, but I do see the way the dots are connected because of how much I have practiced these concepts.

There is just too much material to deal with and this is my way of simplifying things, not being particularly smart. I have worked and continue to work exceedingly hard on them.

[mr. beaumont]

absolutely. there's nothing new under the sun--everybody has done this.

you've got to practice a tune to be comfortable with it, and, in the process of gaining that comfort, you're gonna find things that work over certain situations.

we're all just re-combiners of information--12 notes. The trick is to never make it sound as such--everything should be tweakable on the fly--so the ideas are stock, not the actual sequence of notes.

I've actually had students take a tune and write three solos for it. Then, we play the tune, and they can call upon any piece of any of the solos at any time. If you do this enough, you build a big vocabulary, big enough so that when you speak, you never re-combine the words the same exact way.

[franco6719]

I really think you have to know some of the essential vocabulary (including more or less "standard" licks or licks from the greats) in order to play around with or jettison the vocabulary.

[saponsky]

This is so nice to know, I always thought that everything was made on the fly. What would I do without this forum?

[rafapak]

thanks for replies!

[mr. beaumont]

Originally Posted by saponsky

This is so nice to know, I always thought that everything was made on the fly. What would I do without this forum?

You just have to be able to "recombine" on the fly.

Think of it this way--if you practice blowing over a song 100 times, some ideas are gonna stick.

Now, just as you'll be dead in the water trying to think about what clever scale you can play over a change while playing the song, you'll never cut it trying to reach back into memory and pull out fully formed licks note for note too. The trick is to have done all the legwork so that you can play in the moment, and let stuff you've practiced a million times naturally bubble to the surface...

[franco6719]

Originally Posted by saponsky

This is so nice to know, I always thought that everything was made on the fly. What would I do without this forum?

Yes, I still fall into this mental trap sometimes where I beat myself up thinking: "Don't play that. Don't play anything. Everybody knows you will play THAT! It's too simple. It's not spontaneous. You stink."

It's not quite true though. It's your brain that plays those games.

[franco6719]

Originally Posted by oilywrag

I think that you can come up with a line thats cool when practising, but,you should try and let the line evolve in a live situation,just let your ear and fingers lead you,

Cheers Tom

This seems to be the most truly improvisational approach. You can practice lines, scales, chord tones and eventually you try to follow whatever wants to sort of push itself out from all out that as you listen to a tune.

[Little Jay]

Listen to Charlie Parker solos and astonish yourself about how often he plays the same lines and repeats himself! (and still manages to sound great btw). Same goes for Wes, Grant, Kenny..... for all players I guess. (And I am no exception).

Wes Montgomery albums with different takes of the same song are also nice, you can realy hear that he plays more or less the same solo sometimes! Not exactly the same, but the same outline with some nice variations.

[gordon]

practicing scales, chord tones, triads, licks and stuff will certainly help you get somewhere. but you can get further doing solfege, which will help you identify intervals. then you should thoroughly study the fretboard to be able to translate those intervals from your brain to the guitar. and eventually, you will be able to play melodies by ear, without guessing anything. Then (or at the same time, as a part of your practice regimen) you should sit down while listening to music without your guitar and sing some random lines over it. Once you get there, add the guitar and sing the lines while you play them.

[princeplanet]

Originally Posted by Little Jay

Wes Montgomery albums with different takes of the same song are also nice, you can realy hear that he plays more or less the same solo sometimes! Not exactly the same, but the same outline with some nice variations.

Really? Which ones? I'd be interested to hear that.

[brian329]

Originally Posted by princeplanet

Really? Which ones? I'd be interested to hear that.

I have the Complete Riverside Recordings box set. There are dozens of multiple takes on those recordings.

As far as individual records, the following have multiple takes of some songs

Full House
Boss Guitar
The Wes Montgomery Trio
Bags Meets Wes
Groove Yard
George Shearing and The Montgomery Brothers
Cannonball Adderley and the Jazz Poll Winners

[bako]

If you got together with friends and everyone recited from memorized speeches of great thinkers, perhaps paraphrased and prepared one liners, well that would be a truly strange evening.

Listening to the musicians that you are playing will always expand you beyond your prepared material if you let it.
Playing is best when it reflects who we are, what we feel in the moment and our ability to interact in a band, in my opinion.

[Meggy]

Originally Posted by mr. beaumont

You just have to be able to "recombine" on the fly.

Think of it this way--if you practice blowing over a song 100 times, some ideas are gonna stick.

Now, just as you'll be dead in the water trying to think about what clever scale you can play over a change while playing the song, you'll never cut it trying to reach back into memory and pull out fully formed licks note for note too. The trick is to have done all the legwork so that you can play in the moment, and let stuff you've practiced a million times naturally bubble to the surface...

Very well put, I agree totally with this!

[franco6719]

Originally Posted by gordon

practicing scales, chord tones, triads, licks and stuff will certainly help you get somewhere. but you can get further doing solfege, which will help you identify intervals. then you should thoroughly study the fretboard to be able to translate those intervals from your brain to the guitar. and eventually, you will be able to play melodies by ear, without guessing anything. Then (or at the same time, as a part of your practice regimen) you should sit down while listening to music without your guitar and sing some random lines over it. Once you get there, add the guitar and sing the lines while you play them.

Flash Gordon is ALIVE!

That's the true method though.

[merseybeat]

I love this topic! and yes 80% of what I play is from my tool box! But having recently put Pat Metheny's version of "all the things you are" on a continuous loop I realized that 80% of his improv on this track is totally "on the fly". So if you want to play like Pat you gotta get experimental! See you all in 20 years! lol.

Eddie

[plasticpigeon]

I'm a big Wes fan and have a few albums with alternate takes, and generally I have been amazed at the variety between takes. However the feel of the solos are usually similar. It is like he had some kind of general form planned out but the way it was padded out was spontaneous. He even says in an interview that every song has it's own form, shape and its own set of changes or something like that, which hints that he liked to play certain songs in certain ways, and doesn't just leave it to pure spontaneous inspiration. I am a terrible jazz musician but trying to get better and without transcribing and playing and trying to internalise the vocabulary of the players I like, I would be totally lost. I am also a poor guitar player, but I am not worried about that as I think if I work on trying to improve my ears and create the sounds I like in my mind or by singing I will eventually be able work out how to transfer those ideas to the instrument. I am still trying to find an approach to playing that I like and I am sure it is very personal to the individual.

[lao ce]

It is hard to answer how much I play canned stuff. I do practice lines but I don't really try to memorize them. Since for me it is exciting to play someone's line, sometimes I decide to use a couple over a night then... usually I forget it because I get carried away. But a few shorter lines (5-10) stuck with me over the time and I use them here and there.

For me usually it is not hard to come up with lines on the fly and make them musically pleasant and jazz-wise acceptable for the listener. It is harder for me to come up with lines what are NOT pleasant (i.e. "interesting"), and to have a global concept for a song what suppose to be the theme of my play. In short my weak is the drama and the global structure.

What I play is mostly my own stuff. But let me explain what "own stuff" means to me. When I analyze someone's lick I try to find why it sounds good. A good start or ending, or a rhythmic variation, a hot repetition, or even a simple thing such as emphasizing an interval can be exciting for me. These are what I am looking to build-in and combine, short syllables. So my own stuff coming from others and I only blend it into my play.

Finally since I play standards mostly, many of my turnarounds in intros and endings are canned solutions. They sound great, much better than what I can come up with ever. Many people knows them (musicians and audience) so it is a winner when you start and end a tune with a rock solid stuff. If the intro and the ending is right then half of the battle is won.