I've started attending a local jam. Many of the songs and tunes I do not know, and I am very happy to only play rhythm on those. Sometimes someone calls a song I do know, and I'd like to learn how to take a break on those. I'm looking for whatever advice you all might have about this.
I should say that I have very limited improvisational skills. When I call a tune I mostly play a break I have fully memorized. When I "improvise," it's either because I get lost and have to find my way back to the tune (which I have managed to do to my great relief a couple of times), or it's a matter of adding some little touches to the basic melody (double stops, passing notes, a little melodic run up and down a fragment of the scale, shifting the timing a little). I'm doing two things to prepare tunes to call in the jam: learning solos I pull off recordings, and taking tunes I know and spending the week picking out the melody with a few little embellishments. Little by little my repertoire is increasing, and I am learning how to pick out a familiar melody more quickly (relatively, anyway: I can work it out in an hour now instead of it taking a whole week). I'm hoping this will eventually get me to the point where I can do it on the fly. But is there anything I should be doing other than just continuing what I'm doing?
The one thing I do not want to do is be one of those players who just takes the pentatonic (or some other) scale and makes stuff up that fits the chord progression but doesn't really have anything to do with the song. I know that in some ways that's the quick solution, and that if I started doing that I'd probably learn how to swim better as time went on, but I just don't think I can bring myself to do it. It feels so unsatisfying (to me, YMMV of course), whereas even a very unadorned version of the melody is quite satisfying. Everyone at my jam is pretty respectful of the melody, and I'm very happy to stick with that style.
Thanks for any advice from you more seasoned jammers!
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