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I used to improvise like 3 months ago with nowhere near the knowledge i got now .but the more i know the more i hate my stuff and think î'd better work on some lines ,voice leading etc.. i just don't play backing tracks anymore and noodle over standards. But i fear i would lose confidence completely to play at all. Does it happen to you guys intermediate to stop improvising for a given periode?
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01-05-2017 07:54 PM
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I've never really stopped improvising but there was a time when I realized that I needed to get some structure and be more disciplined about it. I'm still actively working on it many years later.
Originally Posted by mooncef
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Yeah its cool tho , don't sweat it
This learning process is random and
non linear ...
You think you're getting it together ,
then realise you're poor at something
do some work on it , get it together then
same thing happens !
Its the way it is ...
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I did notice one thing , for me
At one point I had too much theory
and was getting played by the theory
I dropped it for a while and learned tunes
only
For me , a little theory goes a LONG way
Maybe just play some tunes for a while
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Amen. Last 2 days have been horrid for me too.
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The good thing is you ear is getting better. More discriminating. The bad thing is you can hear the holes in your playing as what you play is not at the level of what you can hear. So it bums you out. Originally Posted by mooncef
However, don't despair. You are right at the crossroads. Just don't sell your soul to the devil yet.... keep on the path.
There are no silver bullets, however take smaller bites. You have backing tracks in a program? If you just concentrate on II V I resolutions or turnarounds, (1625, 2516), and get a half dozen or so from the 'essential vocabulary' collection, perhaps that will give you a departure point to build your lines and phrases. You need to memorize a small arsenal that is melodic and not difficult, so you can pull them out and slap them in a tune. Then, you play off them or create lines that are similar. But, you have to walk before you can run.
Even take just the 3rds and 7ths of any chord changes of any standard an just play them instead of playing complete chords. You will be surprised at how they resolve into each other. This is the best kept secret in jazz. It provides a basic foundation or framework to depart from (you just fill in the blanks once you have established and can target the guide tones) and you will be playing lines and phrases that move through the changes, and you will be hitting the sweet spots, the resolving intervals.
Anyway, just a thought....Last edited by docdosco; 01-05-2017 at 11:56 PM.
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I like this advice. It is easy to be intimidated when listening to someone that can rattle off endless phrases. I like to think about guitar playing as a dialogue. A call and response. Sometimes it can be akin to two people trading sentences or phrases, rather than them trading full blown stories. My 2 cents anyway. Originally Posted by docdosco
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improvise with basic triads (1,3,5) through very simple progressions. Will talk to your ears more than your intellect.
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Compose some lines you don't hate.
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Prepare (mentally) the tunes you play, and constantly 'redraft' them.
Last edited by destinytot; 01-06-2017 at 06:08 AM.
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Thanks for the advice guys ! actualy what puts me off on the guitar ! it's the excess of complexity as an instrument
as opposed to piano for instance ! it frustrates me knowing that a line a learned should be also learned in all positions !
it's like the guitar is several stacked pianos and sometimes i think i should disable the root position (piano) for the lines i'm working ! because i'm so comfortable in the default II V I position ! i got some transcribed lines that are perfectly voice led !
did you guys start by composing your own choruses at first just to have something you can play and go back to when confused ?
i think i also fall in the category of having too much theory ! but i can't blame theory since it's all adding something to my playing ! recelty i learned all drop 2 chords in 1234 strings with extension and suddently started seeing the substitutions so clear between chords ! so that's a milestone for me !
I also started realy hearing clearly the common bebop language devices and i completly integrated those into my playing ! i guess the biggest issue with my improvisation is the fretboard barieer ! just too many positions ! the instrument is overwhelming sometimes ! eventhough i played etudes for ATTYA and autum leaves by ears and full voice leading !
I still gotta work the language throughout the whole fretboard range !
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At that time, I remember a lot of people giving advice. You know this stuff takes time. I suggested you find someone to play with, that doing this really helps you keep perspective, and when you do make progress, it's rewarded many times more than the way you perceive it by yourself. Besides, having that feedback, the endorphin rush, and hearing music as a means of communicating in real time, is what it's all about.
You won't know how important this really is until you do it. For now it's just another 2 minutes you spend reading another piece of advice in the mountain of overwhelming advice.
File this away, but if you can, any way you can, find two players, on any level and work on playing. Have a tune you prepare and be ready to go over it, getting to know the piece, looping a 2 or 4 measure phrase, trying melody in different parts of the neck, learning with the goal of GETTING OFF BOOK and then getting your time together. All this is scary to share with another person and really satisfying to conquer.
Did you ever find another player to work with?
David
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I got a very good jazz friend that i talk to on a daily basis , every hour ! we share everything , i mean he sends me his raw ideas i send him mine, we critisize each other ! but he's much more advanced than i am ! and lives in another city ! still he enjoys my progress , and we are planning to get together ! and have at least one standard that we know well and a Blues to jam ! Originally Posted by TruthHertz
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Great. Now try to find someone close by that you can meet with regularly. If they’re better than you, you can learn a lot and you’ll find out things you don’t even know how to ask about-just by doing. If they’re on your level, you’ll grow together…each and every time you play. If they’re just starting out, you can share what you know and the process of sharing will make your ideas come into focus. Originally Posted by mooncef
Remember, you can learn things by asking, but that’s tiny compared with what you get by doing.
People always say you can’t ask a wrong question. Well you can get some answers with that. But you can make lots of mistakes from playing, and in each one of them is an encyclopedia of knowledge when you figure out what you need to do. That actually becomes easy and fun when you’re working it out on the guitar. Good luck
David
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When I have this down-days I take a piece of Bach or Pat Metheny and play it over and over. Then I take a phrase from Bach and play it across Mixolydian or Altered scale
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When I started studying jazz, I found all this unknown theory interesting. Up until that point I had really just used my ears, seeing the notes I heard in my head on the fretboard. About a year into the studies I felt my playing just plain sucked. Something was seriously wrong. The emotional reward it used to give me was gone. It dawned on me that this newly acquired theoretic framework had become a limiting box. Paths I would normally take wasn't available any more as they didn't fit into the theory. Acquired theory, that is.
It took some time, but the theory eventually became framework I could use as I pleased. Not telling me what's right or wrong. More knowledge will never hurt, quite the opposite. Just give it time to sink in. And let your ears trump knowledge
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Took me a long time, but eventually I got to where I could sing with my hands. Anything I heard or thought would just come out on the fret board immediately, my improvs just happened without much thought at that point. But you also fall into the trap that you feel you must try a million things within the measures you have allotted, in hopes that the next time around it is not so improved. It was cool, I could often play a song correctly the first time I heard it. I wish I could still do that singing my hands thing pro-efficiently. I'm retired and have some serious nerve damage getting worse every year for the past decade. My brain just no longer has that connection.
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I think everyone's afraid of improvising, and if they're not they should be!
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Theory can provide rationale but it's all post-hoc. And it doesn't speak to phrasing which is as important, if not more so, than note choice. The only option I think is to emulate one's masters. Listen, copy and integrate. I'm not advocating slavish adherence but recognition of the forms that move you. It's hard work but worth the effort.
(edit) I'm working on a Wynton Kelly tune at the moment. Piano, sax, trumpet, bass. All good stuff.Last edited by deselby; 01-11-2017 at 09:49 PM.
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I've been rolling on Jeff Schneider's you tube lessons. Really good at breaking things down to the basic building blocks. Check it out, might get you out of the rut. We all go through the "I just suck at this" phase, but you just have to keep working it.
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A general idea that helps a lot of we who perform regularly is to think of your playing as two levels of effort.
The first level is what you can already do comfortably, error free... the second is when you take it up a notch.
The strategy on stage is to conserve your musical energy and focus it with musical judgement. You use the first level as your basis from which you shift to the second level when the moment is right.
You may shift up for a whole set, or a whole song, or just a solo, or just some phrases of a solo, or even just part of a phrase. You use your intuition to assess when the musical moment is present... and shift up and down accordingly.
This strategy supports offering your best improvising to the audience with the greatest confidence. It takes the load off of the execution focus and puts it on identifying the appropriate second level periods with your musical judgement and intuition. As a side benefit, it keeps you in audiation mode and makes each performance different.
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Improvising, even WITH a new-found critical ear certainly isn't going to hurt anything. In fact it's a necessity. Should always be a PORTION of your routine. Improvising without thinking so much is a great test of what devices/exercises/work have actually been internalized.
If you've never actually experienced that moment where a lick or abstract device you've been working on suddenly comes out of your instrument without "thinking". Just wait. It's great. You look down at your fingers, and say "I just heard it, a moment before, and it I just came out". I'm a little jealous, just thinking of it. Later it's not so much surprise , but that's cool too , because it answers what you're original post is really getting at.
The MOMENT I'm describing above answers all of these questions, and will hopefully give some direction, as well, about how to think about practicing generally. If you're not having these moments for a long time, you're probably working on too many things at once.
Be patient. Eventually, you want to arrive at a different understanding of practice, and even concepts of who you are as improviser-versus-student. The IMPROVISER isn't thinking so hard about things "in the shed", maybe one or two basic ideas they want to include or aim for, but not the same way you do when you're really shedding something.
The STUDENT then, can listen back to that improvisation and, without judgment, choose something which needs work and aim at shedding it. "Without judgment" is an important part too. Don't allow the student to be judgmental of the improviser. They really "need" to be separate entities. The student sometimes gets a little entitled with thinking of the number of hours put in etc.
From my experience, "incremental" improvement is mostly manifest in BREAKTHROUGHS, as opposed to gradual, linear progression of improvement. Be patient.
Anyway, sorry. Too long.Last edited by matt.guitarteacher; 01-14-2017 at 09:25 AM.
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One approach you might try is to slow down and create one good line at a time. Take your mediocre line and make changes to it until it is good. Record it. Play it back. Improve it some more.
Spend some time doing this type of composing in addition to just letting 'er rip.
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Yes 'slow improvising' is great advice, Lennie Tristano and Warne Marsh advocated something like this. Originally Posted by Jonzo
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I played a dinner party last night, solo and completely improvised for about 80 minutes--playing a Godin nylon through a Phil Jones Cub--not comfortable, I forgot my cushion that raises the guitar, and I couldn't find the truss rod adjustment key (it's actually a 4 mm allen wrench, I think) and the action was a bit too high.
No matter. Picked a few Beatles tunes, a Hank Williams number, a few standards,and a large *free section*. A couple people were really appreciative, and the host really dug it and was listening intently.
Here's the thing I find every time I play out (limited to a few times a year): repertoire doesn't matter: it's background music for conversations, and nobody really notices the music, generally, until it stops and only then something is amiss.
Therefore, you can pretty much play whatever you want, just keep it steady and moving along. I.e., don't get overly concerned and start thinking too much. That's when you will fuck up. At least true in my case.
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