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I would be more nervous about playing something I’d carefully memorised because I know either my anxiety or my memory will cause errors. I would be less nervous just winging it.
If in doubt just play play a loose version of the melody with some embellishments, it will sound great and the audience will like it better than some super-hip complicated solo. Or you could just play some basic bluesy kind of riff, the audience will probably love that too.
Is it a tune with really complex changes? I suppose that would have a bearing on the matter.
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05-06-2018 07:50 AM
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Haha me too.
Originally Posted by grahambop
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Yeah, we don't even know the situation...is it a one tune feature? Every song?
In the end, it's the OP''s gig, not ours. If he wants to keep the gig, he needs to do what he needs to do to sound good.
Re: rather wing it than play something composed--
Definitely! I think that's why I'm drawn to jazz.
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It sure helps mine. Originally Posted by cosmic gumbo
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I suppose that one can hear if a solo is already worked out depending what is played and how. But if you are performing for an audience - it's for them - not you. It either sounds good or it doesn't.
Your average listener - if they even tolerate jazz - would rather hear well executed music in the jazz language than somebody doodle-farting around because they lack improvisational skill.
I was a college musician and was featured on one up-tempo big band tune. I was not ready to improvise yet but I did, at least partially. It wasn't that great let me tell ya. A classical professor let me know as much. He was right.
If I want to hear free jazz, or just outside playing, it needs to sound good. It should not sound like amateur hour crap. If it does, and I went out of my way to attend, I'm never coming back. And if I paid I'm pissed. Is that what we want from our audience?
Music is about sound, not philosophy.Last edited by Jazzstdnt; 05-06-2018 at 11:21 AM.
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Yeah that said, I think philosophically, it is also quite possible to overstate the amount of clear blue water between improvisation and composition too.
The more you compose good jazz lines the better you will get at making them up and the better you will get at improvising.
In fact if you go to Barry Harris’s improv classes, he dictates variations for the class to play. It’s basically going through the process of composition- at tempo!
I have a student composing lines in this way at the moment and he’s coming up with some great stuff.
And if he plays them on a gig - great! It’s better than just copying someone else’s solo or licks. That really isn’t jazz.
(Though it can be a useful prep for learning to play jazz)
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(Sorry Wes :-))
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Another way of looking at it.
You are going into a meeting, interview, sales pitch or whatever.
If you don’t prepare for that situation with some material it won’t go well.
Of course, things might not go as planned. They may not want to hear your prepared speil all the way through. They might ask questions you didn’t expect.
But not having that plan is not an option. Most would agree that failure to prepare is preparing to fail.
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Does it sound like jazz? That’s the most important thing for the audience. You might be surprised how many solists work out what they’ll be playing ‘off the top of their heads’ every night.
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The thing is jazz improvisation is a process, not a philosophy, and you've got to do it all the time to keep your ears, brain and chops working in snyc.
Joe Puma once described it to me as a muscle; you've got to keep exercising it to get good at it.
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One interesting thing was that I spent an entire summer working on improvising on Giant Steps at 160bpm, just playing patterns I worked out.
Then a friend called me up to tell me about a jam session they were having at a club, so I figured this would be the perfect time to test out my Giant Steps chops.
When I got on the stand, I could play Giant Steps okay, but when they called a standard or even a blues, I had a lot of trouble, for the first time in my life.
IOW, by just playing Giant Steps patterns at that fast a tempo, I was actually hurting my ability to improvise, rather than getting any benefits, because I wasn't exercising that 'muscle' of EAR, brain and chops. I was leaving the pre-hearing element out of the process, and only using my brain and chops.
It literally scared the hell out of me, and I never went back to that type of thing again.
Only playing written out solos is similar to that, and unless the OP keeps 'exercising that muscle', especially in live performance, it's going to get 'flabby', and he'll never improve.
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Valid point; if one uses a crutch it can become very difficult to break free. Originally Posted by sgcim
So his time would be better spent getting comfortable improvising instead of practicing a transcripted solo.Last edited by jameslovestal; 05-07-2018 at 02:59 PM.
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Yeah, but nobody suggested he - or any other developing jazzer - do that. Originally Posted by sgcim
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If you've got something to say, what difference does it make if it's written down or off the cuff? Most people will tell you a rehearsed comedy routine is usually funnier than improvised comedy, but there is nothing more rewarding than a great improvised line. IMO, confidence in mastering the material will make whatever you play sound good, because you've, more or less, already worked out what you want to say.
Last edited by zigzag; 05-08-2018 at 08:26 AM.
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Schuller's book on "Swing Music" discusses this point...a lot of Big Bands didn't really appreciate or encourage open-ended soloing. Glenn Miller had a SOUND that was arrangement-driven...and he didn't have much appreciation or tolerance for what an independent-minded soloist might come up with. Shaw or Goodman were looser....Basie the loosest, in his early band days.
This was a big part of bop and the turn to small-group jazz, I think. Waiting for an 8-bar solo, every other night, might make a good soloist, impatient or frustrated.
But even in small group jazz, people have their tendencies or pet phrases.
I recently saw Ricky Ford live, and his playing blew me away. I found a youtube clip of him playing the same tune from about 5 years ago, and there was a lot of overlap...maybe not exactly the same. Still... very impressive. ( A jazz club has opened up literally 200 ft. from me....Roy Hargrove and Donald Harrison are scheduled....good times !)
Jan Garbarek or Jaco Pastorius strike me as musicans who really take a lot of chances and do not repeat themselves, even in their patterns, very much.
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Joe Pass joked about musicians taking the solos they had recorded on albums and duplicating them in a live performance. He called it embalming their solos...
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I don’t think they always had much choice! Originally Posted by cosmic gumbo
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Thanks for the great discussion.
I wound up improvising a solo - didn't write it out - linking several preplanned licks with arpeggiated and scalar passages. It worked out well.
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Yay! Jazz is saved! Originally Posted by Thoughtfree
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I just did this... the reason I do it is to incorporate newly learned improvisation devices into my playing. If I learn a "canned" solo to the point that I can perform it on stage then those devices start showing up in my real improvisations... Here is a canned solo where I'm incorporating triplets before the downbeat of the next chord and playing just chord tones of the next chord.
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