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I have a problem, I don't quite understand HOW TO PRACTICE JAZZ GUITAR IMPROVISATION. I need advice, books, videos, journals, ...
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I think a good place to start is by studying the modes, learn the fingering and the names of the notes as you play them in each position of the major scale. Thereby learning the major and the relative minor scales as well as the fingerboard. This will not be accomplished overnight but you will be surprised at the vocabulary you will develop, notes you will be able to use based on the songs key, progression etc.
A lot of standards are in Eb, G, or C so start out learnig scales for these keys, and by the time you are comfortable with them you will see that you can play the major/relative minor scale for any key.
This was a good starting point for me, then integrate the minor or major pentatonic with these and your ability to vary the notes and their squence in your improvastion will be pretty significant. Once again this is a good starting point, but it also has a large payoff.
peace
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Hello everybody,
I think that for beginners improvising is at first a question of scales. Major scale and the different minor ones. Theses should be mastered to be more creative using them. After this, the next step is to work up arpeggios and be able to play chord tones. After a while trying to understand all theses things I came up to a point where I had to free my self and play more chromatically so that the choruses don't sound boring with predictable notes.
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Great to be posting my first post here.
For me when improvising I like to use different modes and scales. If I have a chance to look at a progression before I improvise over it I look at the chords and how they react with each other. Then I can spot the II-V-I's and I can kinda map out what would most likely work and where it would work.
So I use the modes and the chordal tones/arpeggios plus chromaticism and passing tones to keep things interesting.
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I tend to stay with just the standard major scales and dance around with the modes. I usually play ii V7 I, so whatever fits with the target notes, and how Im feeling at the time is how I decide.
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I seldom do scales. I play over the chords. That way I can play within the harmonies but also against the harmonies. When you play scales you tend to play the "right" scale at a given situation. Scales gives you political correct tones and provides shortcuts to solo but for personal development you need to dig deeper in understanding of harmonies.
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Hi folks
I used to be an all out rock/classical guitarist but have always been interested in jazz and "graduated" to jazz gtr about 10 yrs ago (i'm 44). I've spent quite a lot of time and money trying to work out what is the best way to improvise. I don't have time to learn lots of modes and chord patterns etc etc, so i work off chord tones, target notes, chromatics, the odd blues scale and some major scale stuff; but the big thing is to play from the heart and be true to yourself. It's more important to get out and play, then when you get bored, challenge yourself as another contributer has done. There were some very interesting ideas in that post!
My current problem is how to get my soloing to swing! That bugs the hell outta me! 
have fun and thanks for reading!
cheers
wes
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Great reading. thanks guys...
Keep em´coming.
as for myself I use: Chromatics, all the major-modes, chord-tones and eventually and arpeggio or two.
I love the old swing-musicians so to incorporate the melody in solos is also a favourite...
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yeah scales are really great and theory opens up your avenues. But, i might be off the point here, music to me is about feeling. You can do all these marvelous things that will freak out university professors, but if someone can move me with two major chords i'll rather listen to him.
so for improvising i always try to stick to a feeling more than an idea. does that make sense?
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ARPEGGIOS!
scale playing is great and all, but when you got changes flying by at two to the bar, thinking about what scale to play'll leave you dead. seeing the notes of an arpeggio right under your fingers and then using chromatic passing tones to connect them, that's the key, especially when starting out.
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so, for improvising i've tried many, many techniques and different ways and the most efficient i've found is this: learn what sounds are related to the root of the chord. play to what chord is being played. there are certain tones that just sound stronger than others and then sound sound mysterious and unresolved, some sound awkward but lead to completely other feel. learning how a 3rd, m3rd, 4... sounds from the root of the chord then with time you can find what feel you want to play to completely shape your music and song. after a while you will be able to play whatever comes in your head.
i hope this makes sense because it's been very helpful for me.
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I think the best route is to grab a method and dedicate yourself to it. There is more than one method, but I think the Berklee series books by William Leavitt are just great. The reason I advise this (and I don't know how long you have been playing) is that there is a lot of continuity in learning a method. As time goes on you can embrace other approaches, but to start following every path at the beginning of a players career is risky. It just gets confusing.
When I started playing guitar in 1975 my first teacher gave me a little orange book called the "Joe Pass Guitar Method". I don't stylistically play anything like Joe Pass, but that book gave me a sold basis for how I think about playing tunes, scales etc. I learned about the Berklee books later, and think they are great because if you have a little knowledge you can work through them without an instructor. It is all there, sight reading, approaches to improvisation, chord harmony, etc. etc. Furthermore, Mr. Leavitt has quite a pedigree of players who had to see these book in class - Al Dimeola, Mike Stern, John Scofield, John Abercromibe.
I think that these books are a great starting point.
Good luck!
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hey everyone, my first post as well...
When I first started improvising I played all pentatonic with the "blue" tone thrown in for kicks. After noodling around for a long time, that scale progressed to what I now know as the Dorian mode, and now that i know all the modes i can use accidentals from other scales to spice up a simple blues song. But now that I'm moving away from blues-rock and more toward jazz (fusion and jambands mostly) I need to work on arpeggios and such a bit more. Any more tips would be greatly appreciated!
Here's a video of stacking triads that I found really helpful, of one of my favorites, Jimmy Herring (Aquarium Rescue Unit, currently touring with Widespread Panic).
Thanks!
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I like to think in terms fo chords (basic). That allows me to have a picture in my head of where the important tones (3rd & 7th) are located. If you are just starting to improvise, use these tones for targets. Try getting to the targets with any means necessary (scales, chromatics, arpeggios, motifs, etc.....). Don't forget about the original melody because your audience wants to hear at least some bits and pieces of it. Also, if you have a picture of the chords in your head, you can see where the altered tones (#5, b5, #9 ,b9) are located. I think scales could be a good approach if you use them in small phrases and vary the the rhythm a bit.
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You could also listen one player alot and then try to emulate their playing style. Then move onto a different player etc. That might boost your pool of ideas.
Also, Mick Goodrick has some good advice on this subject. Can't remember them all, but they include: playing everything at half speed, not playing any guitar for a period of time (several days at least), as well as going for a walk and feeding some ducks...
I'd say the best (and easiest) trick is to just stop playing guitar. Don't touch it or think about it for a week. Whenever I have a break from the instrument I always come back sounding fresher and more optimistic.
I totally agree about the 'time on the instrument', but that time has to be constructive. If you're feeling stale and getting depressed, repeatedly playing mundane solos will get you down even more. Take a break!
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Tip 1 - BIAB
Tip 2 - Stop the backing track now and then and take your time to work out a melodic line or two, a new phrase. Start the backing track up again and practice your new melodic material you just wrote.
Tip 3 - Start a 'lick diary', write your favorite licks down so you don't forget them. I prefer them to be licks I came up with myself, but there are no rules; if you want to copy licks from your favorite players that's good too. In addition to or instead of practicing scales and arpeggios, do some of your technical practice using your own licks from your lick diary... I do this with a metronome starting slow and working my way up in tempo.
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Great tips so far.
I'll add a few:
1. Change the rhythm, tempo, and musical style of your accompaniment, but keep the progression the same. Your phrasing will change dramatically over the same chords as you respond to the new rhythms. Also, substitute chords in the progression to get a different feel and open up your palette.
2. Chromatics are your friend. It's what makes jazz sound the way it does. If you haven't checked it out yet, take a look at Matt Warnock's free lesson on chromatics on this site. Try approaching the intervals in an arp or scale from a semi-tone above or below and see what you get. Experiment until you hear things you like, then memorize them.
3. Experiment with double stops. Try to find the double stops that sound good over certain cycles and chords. Learn to visualize these vertically along the length of the neck. This pays off huge because you can use these as both double stops and get a chordal sound going or play the notes individually and get some interesting intervallic sounds as you ascend and descend.
4. Remember you can play the same note more than once in a phrase! It's remarkable how different and cool a simple linear scale movement or chromatic movement can be if you just play each note twice more more as you move along the scale.
Perserverance and experimentation leads to steady progress in improvisational skills.
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Choose a basic tune that you play regularly, but not so regularly that you hate it. Write out 3-5 choruses to that song, and on each pass concentrate on something new.
Try lots of leading tones on this one, melodic 4ths on that one, octaves over here, as fast as you can play for a few bars, as slow as you can play for a few. On one chorus use a tritone sub for every dominant chord, on the next use it for none of them. Have a chorus where you hit no roots, and one with nothing but blues scales, but not from the corresponding chord. (Over the C at the beginning of All of Me, try B blues, then try G, then try E, then try A.) Once you have written out this many options, read through them a few times. They'll all be your ideas on some level, which will make it easier to integrate the ones you like when you hear them in a song context. (And yes, you'll need BIAB or Aebersold if you don't have someone else there with a guitar.)
Once you've finished your first song, start another. It gets quicker and easier, and you'll find that coming up with fresher ideas on paper will translate now only to new "stock licks" but also to more varied improv, just because it will get your brain moving in new directions. Also, learn to sing along with your favorite jazz solos. This will help your sense of melody and your phrasing. So now that I have dispensed sage advice, I have once again revealed to myself a hole in my practice regime of late. If you'll excuse me, I have to find a pencil.
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Listen. Listen, listen! Then play. That is how you learned to talk; by copying your mother. Are you considering when you hold a conversation whether this word or that is an adverb, an adjective, a noun? No. The same for improvisation. The scales and arpeggios are tools. Play beautiful music. Learn where the beautiful sounds are on your instrument. It takes time, but the journey is worth it.
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I'm Jules - I joined this forum today - some brilliant advice above!!
Thanks to you all , I'm inspired again!
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When I first started out in jazz, my teacher John Baboian from Berklee, would just assign me one tune a week (or maybe two weeks if it was necessary) and he would say "learn this tune so we can play it together next week without the Real Book" (or something like that). Back then, there was no BIAB or Aerbersold backing track available, so I just taped myself comping as best I could with a metronome in the background. Then I would play over that constantly to the point to the point that I had melody and chords memorized and just experimented with scales, etc..
Eventually, this way, I ended up getting many of these tunes embedded in my ears and, after playing them with other students in ensembles etc., I started to get better at the thing.
Improvisation seems to be a mixture of learned patterns and sequences that work over certain progressions, scale fragments, arppegios, lines borrowed from elsewhere and occasional rhytmic-melodic spontaneity.
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Someone (I’m sure) will question this but, it seems essential to me to know without thinking, the whereabouts of every note on the neck if I'm going to translate the theory into real time improvising. That stuff we learn about what works when and where, which notes with what chords, isn’t very helpful if one doesn’t know where to put it when one plays. In other words say I want to hit the third because it works for playing over a chord change then I don’t want to be going, ‘oh, where’s a D?’ and have to try and work that out as I play since I might want to play a little chromatic up to it or an enclosing phrase round it. If I don’t know where the note is then I’m likely to play somewhere (semi-) random which may yield a nice surprise but usually doesn’t. However if I can see the note I want to go to then I can apply the stuff I know and make my fingers paint the sounds round the target note with form and control using the patterns I've learnt, the sounds and phrasing ideas I hear as I play.
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I've started to get into Jazz recently, but I've had a lot of problems with improvising. I understand the basics what you're actually supposed to do when you play, although I'll not claim to be a master, but when it comes to actually playing and applying what I know I have a lot of trouble, well, playing. I was wondering if anyone had advice, or if anyone else had this problem and how they got past it. Thank you in advance!
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Yes, I do, although sometimes it's less than productive as we start soloing right after I learn the melody and chords, plus there is only a short thirty minute lesson. I generally don't have a lot of time to ask questions, and I also tend to be a bit awkward around people, so it makes it a bit harder. He tries to explain the basics of soloing, though, but I feel like the message he's sending isn't exactly the right one as I am getting, so when he does explain it I'm not exactly sure how to put it into action.
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Everyone has that problem when they start so you're not alone.
What specifically are you doing in these lessons? I mean, what songs, what scales, what arpeggios? What do you practice at home? Etc...
Improvising music is so easy anyone can do it, but not necessarily very well.. Improvising GOOD music on the other hand takes a lot of time and practice to learn. A LOT of time! It will take quite a while before developing the skills and confidence to even begin sounding good.
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