Improv Rutt

[MarimbaGuitar]

Hey guys, I'm sure as musicians you've all experienced rutts in your playing where you dont seem to be getting any better or any worse for a long time, just kind of staying the same. Right now, I'm in an improvisation stalemate. I know all my major modes very fluently. But when soloing, it just feels like for the past few months, all of my soloing has been pretty bland, or at least I feel. Is there any scales, or tips, or tricks anybody can give me to elevate my improvisation? I have a pretty solid grasp on theory, so you dont have to dumb anything down too much, but anything would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

[marcwhy]

With whom are you studying? What does he/she say?

[MarimbaGuitar]

Im studying with no one if you mean it in the sense of like a guitar teacher. The only time I get to talk to a guitar mentor is at a yearly jazz camp in my area. I just try to pick as much as I can up off the internet.

[JimBobWay]

Guitar is so seductive, right? We all felt that rush and still do every time we play well. But like every other pursuit there are times of growth, times of intense mastery and times when things just don't seem right.

I worked at a music conservatory for years and had access to many musical instruments, and when I would start to feel my guitar muse slacking I would grab one and focus on it for a while, and a week or so later I would find myself applying what I learned from that to my guitar work, sometimes with song-producing results.

And over time I learned to play piano well enough to fill in some music theory gaps that had troubled me - so that's one approach that I can recommend. I'm sure there are many others, pick one that works for you.

[Kyyry]

Originally Posted by MarimbaGuitar

Hey guys, I'm sure as musicians you've all experienced rutts in your playing where you dont seem to be getting any better or any worse for a long time, just kind of staying the same. Right now, I'm in an improvisation stalemate. I know all my major modes very fluently. But when soloing, it just feels like for the past few months, all of my soloing has been pretty bland, or at least I feel. Is there any scales, or tips, or tricks anybody can give me to elevate my improvisation? I have a pretty solid grasp on theory, so you dont have to dumb anything down too much, but anything would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

I know what you're talking about and I'm going through the same problems. I find myself running up and down all these major scale fingerings without any musical ideas. Here's what I've figured out to help me out of this rut.

a) If you don't have anything musical to say, just stop and listen. Try to hear some lines in your head and play them afterwards with the guitar. You can also try to sing the lines while you play them. This develops your ear and you also have to stop for a breather once in a while. This is actually good since guitarists often tend to unmusically fill every space with a lot of notes.

b) Try to learn some licks from your favourite players. Learn phrases that you like and learn to apply them to different chords in different keys. I think that Jazz musicians particularly get wound up with the theory of all, but if you listen really closely, you can hear that many people use the same licks in their improvisation. Sooner or later you'll learn to adapt your favourite licks and make them your own.

I used to think that jazz is this overly complex music that you can't play without excessive theory knowledge but the more jazz hear, the more positive I become of the concept that jazz just has it's own vocabulary and if you learn that vocabulary it will make things a lot easier. I don't think you need another trick or another scale to make your playing sound interesting, you just need to listen to what you hear - on records and in your head.