What goes through your head during improv?

[mikeyes]

Manlymandolinist asks what goes through your head when you are improvising?

In a general sense, I think it depends on your level of skill. You can't expect to think of improvization, good or bad, if you don't know the tune and you don't have the level of skill to produce what your head is singing. While a lot of cafe members are able to go from thinking of the tune to fingers (or even bypassing the thinking part at the highest levels) most of us are still in various learning stages. Learning improv takes a lot of time listening and working on various technical skills until they are automatic. In the mean time you can't expect to be left out of all the fun of sessions or jams so your best bet is to learn the tunes cold. Once you have the tune, you can play it in turn or in group. No one is going to be upset if you just play the tune, in fact if the thirteen banjo players who proceeded you managed to play every lick but not the tune you will be a breath of fresh air.

As your skill level develops and especially as you listen to the music (a lot) your improv skills will also develop. The advice given above is very good and you will be able to utilize all of it as you come along.

In manlymandolinist's case he does know the tunes so the issue may be more one of performance anxiety. It is very hard to relax when everyone is looking at you and you just know you don't have an unusual or interesting lick or variation to the tune. (Or for a variety of other reasons for that matter.) If the group is friendly enough, just give it a shot or better yet, start the tune. If you do the latter, you can relax a little more and do better the second time around.

Another aspect of dealing with performance anxiety is to know the tune so solidly that you can play it in your sleep. That way an automatic tune will come out and after a while you will see that you are able to relax more. Learning to relax is on big step to beating the performance stressors.

It is all part of learning to play in jams and sessions. BG jams are particularly hard to start in because you are in the spotlight. (Irish and OT sessions are group endeavors and a lot easier.) I find that I have to warm up to the group a little before I can play that way. By that I mean get into the music, relax in the process, and then start to chop a little or even (quietly) play along with the solo player, especially if he plays banjo. Once I have a little confidence, I can play on my own. I may look a little stupid at first by refusing an early solo, but most people just think I am shy.

After a while you will get the hang of it.

[Coffeecup]

if you hit a note that doesn't sound right, don't hit that note next time around.

Read somewhere else - if you play a wrong note once it's a mistake; play a wrong note twice and it's jazz.

[Patrick Sylvest]

Ya' can't go wrong with melody.

Check out on Mandozine, Tim O' Brien's arpeggios. Work on them awhile, like a year, then see what happens when you start to think about improv.

and again, if you can nail the melody and drop a couple dabs of timely tremolo, everyone will think you're a mando genius!

[MikeEdgerton]

Read somewhere else - if you play a wrong note once it's a mistake; play a wrong note twice and it's jazz.

That used to be somebody's tag line here.

[Jim Nollman]

Practice until it becomes an obsession. So even when you watch TV, your mandolin sits on the couch beside you, and you pick it up every 20 minutes or so to play some combo of notes.

Eventually this obsession starts to bear fruit, it gets easier to learn something new, you can actually play the right notes to a tune without having to think where they lay on the fretboard. Your ears and fingers are connected with no brain between them. And you don't ever have to look at the instrument, even when playing in some strange key like C#.

In some ways, the practice is related to touch typing although with the dimension of musical coherence added on. And when you can improvise a melody the first time you hear it, not just without any bad notes, but with logic and flow, you know you're on the verge of a breakthrough. I have been noticing lately that i improvise a tune quite a bit differently when I already know the melody, than when i don't. And I often prefer the unknown version better than the well trodden path. Give me another 10 years of playing a few hours everyday, and maybe I'll have figured it out.

[ManlyMandolinist]

Great, thanks for the advice everyone. I've isolated a few things to work on.

1) I didn't know any of the tunes at all. I'm pretty new to bluegrass. I'm going to rectify that ASAP.

2) I need to learn some licks to fall back on. I think the players at the jam were using a lot of prepared licks.

3) The sing/playing idea is wonderful. I'm going to practice that a lot. It'll take a while, but I'm excited.

Thanks to everyone who contributed solid advice.

[John McGann]

My mindset depends upon the style being played, but I always want to be aware of what the chord changes are (if any!) as that is the canvas upon which the notes are played, and polka dots can clash with stripes if you aren't careful

For American fiddle tunes (link to my book on creating melodic variations), I want to know the melody inside out so I can work with it. The chords are involved in the decision making, but I don't 'improvise off the chords' as much as try to develop the melody in the way a Texas contest fiddler would. "Chasing the changes" would be a dead end for me, since there aren't many chords in most fiddle tunes. Almost anyone would repeat themselves over the course of a set of fiddle tunes playing that way...

If I'm playing jazz, the approach is more open- I could expand and play off the melody for a whole solo, or create a new melody based on the chord changes. In jazz, you tend to have many more chords (as well as key centers), so that approach still allows you to play things specific to that particular composition...there is also more variation in rhythmic phrasing; where fiddle tunes are streams of eighth notes mostly, in jazz, you try to actually play rests as well to make the phrasing more speechlike.

...I think getting away from "licks" and thinking about the qualities that are unique to each tune (the specific basic melody and changes) lead you to more satisfying and diverse soloing that is an extension of the actual composition you are playing (I know 'composition' sounds high-falutin' when we talk about fiddle tunes, but there you go). IMHO.

[Stephanie Reiser]

This business of improvizing for participating in a BG jam fruitfully has plagued me as well. To the degree of it being so much work/anxiety that sometimes I leave the mando home and just bring the guitar, which I do better improv on (and know more chords on).
But recently I have been having a thought: During a tune, instead of sitting there chopping away at your chords, try adding tremolo if it is a slower tune, and softly work out the melody until it's your turn for the break. Even if you only get part of the melody figured out, this is a building block. Sure, it is fun to play the chords when it isn't your turn, but usually there will be another one or two mando players there for that job. Work on the melody while the song is going. Most bluegrass tunes are not that hard. I will practice what I am preaching this sunday at the local monthly BG jam. I probably won't do that well, again, but I will try this and see what happens.

[Dan Johnson]

I just try to figure out what's going on (And suck air)!

There's some books you can read, (Derek Bailey's Improvisation being one) and a lot of musicians whose main business is improvisation... George Lewis being one whom I admire... And what I've found is that improvisation in that respect is something kind of different than the improvisations that most bluegrass players would identify with... But it has gone a long way to inform my approaches to all music...

Oh yeah, I try to remember that advice: "Play loud, so when you make a mistake we can all share in it!"

[MikeEdgerton]

...Oh yeah, I try to remember that advice: "Play loud, so when you make a mistake we can all share in it!"

Excellent.

[Kevin Briggs]

I generally am trying to stay in step with the band and to play things that fit the music. ideally, we'll collectively latch onto a theme of sorts and go from there. A lot of the tim, however, I'm just trying very hard to add to the song in a positive way. I typically start out playign the melody and then will build in intensity from there. By the end of the break, I could be playing anyting. The big thing I just keep thinking is, "Does this fit the music and am I being too obnoxious."

[ManlyMandolinist]

...I think getting away from "licks" and thinking about the qualities that are unique to each tune (the specific basic melody and changes) lead you to more satisfying and diverse soloing that is an extension of the actual composition you are playing (I know 'composition' sounds high-falutin' when we talk about fiddle tunes, but there you go). IMHO.

Is it possible to do this quick enough for a fast bluegrass song? Is that why learning scales/patterns is important, so you can use them quickly & automatically when the melody calls for them?

I like the idea of using the melody & embellishing it... but I can't imagine being able to do it fast enough for the quick tunes.

[farmerjones]

John Hartford said, "Style is based upon limitations."
We can start out using clip-art licks, until our vocabulary or pallet increases.
If not, that's an individual limit.
I know i have speed threshold as well, past that it's just gone. That's my limit. Anybody can only do what they can do.

To turn John's words around, let's say you could play infinately fast and have infinate avenues of improvisational skill. You could play any style, because you are infinate. Not realistic, but it helped me to understand his statement.

It makes me appreciate Ronnie McCoury and Chris Thile all the more.

[Mike Bromley]

Johnny Gimble, when asked the exact same question:

"I try not to think at all."

and

"I was thinking how much a shame it is that you all have to sit here and play rhythm."

Yup! I've found that a dorky blank stare, emptying your head and simply fumbling, er, "feeling" your way through, while listening intently, seems to work best. Otherwise the clutter of all the second-guessing becomes a real pain in the patoot.

[Susanne]

I don't know any licks. I suck at scales (I just know what notes to play in a particular key, if it isn't like A flat or something). I just play around with the melody, go up and down a bit playing something that suits to the chords. I guess the only thing I think of when improvising is whether to go up or down.

[John McGann]

Is it possible to do this quick enough for a fast bluegrass song? Is that why learning scales/patterns is important, so you can use them quickly & automatically when the melody calls for them?

I like the idea of using the melody & embellishing it... but I can't imagine being able to do it fast enough for the quick tunes.

You have to be able to do it slowly before you can do it fast; then you can increase the tempo (a metronome is great for this). This doesn't happen overnight.

I went through a phase of composing melodic variations on tunes, so that I'd have definite things to play that were based on the tune itself. If you think about it:

• Composition is improvisation, but off the clock (i.e. you can use an eraser, go over and refine things until they are what you want)

• Improvisation is composition on the clock, so there is another level of terror . Everything you know or don't know comes into play here, and there's no eraser, you are in the moment.

Option #1 helped me a lot (and still does); having worked out things on tunes improved my improv and helped me develop things to play that were relevant to the tune itself, rather than "gee, it's in D, here's my other D lick" type approach. If you create 4 or 5 passes through a tune and memorize them, you can start juggling the order you play them in, and it leads to a more integral approach to "freestylin'".

It's not THAT much more work, and it really can make a difference.

[Don Stiernberg]

While we're quoting Johnny Gimble, let's not forget this one, also pertinent to any discussion of improvisation:

"I never play anything the same way ONCE!"

This was uttered in response to another fiddler who had just performed a recorded Gimble solo in front of the maestro and wanted to know what he thought. Johnny didn't recognize the solo because he plays different ones every time...

[woodwizard]

Yup! I've found that a dorky blank stare, emptying your head and simply fumbling, er, "feeling" your way through, while listening intently, seems to work best. Otherwise the clutter of all the second-guessing becomes a real pain in the patoot.

Yup! me too!

[Jim Nollman]

What we have here is some improvised words of wisdom about improvisation written by some of the best mandolin improvisers on the planet. This thread would make a worthy entry point for newbies to the Cafe.

[MadisonBRG]

Best advice I’ve received when you don’t know the tune, or can’t pick the melody by ear on the fly:
1. Run a scale or play part of a fiddle tune that you know to get to the note in the chord progression or a complimentary note. So when the song changes from to I to V (Say G to D), get to the same note on your scale (while making it sound like music…).
2. Get a handful of licks and turnarounds that resolve from the V to I (ie, the end of the lick). It won’t matter what you play before that, you can sell anything if it resolves strongly to the root.
3. Keep going to the jam. While the Bluegrass songbook is large, even newbie players have played most of these tunes before, numerous times . You’ll get a bunch of cracks at them.

[bobby bill]

I read somewhere that Jethro said not to even attempt to improvise until you knew all the chords. This is probably more helpful for the jazz-style music that Jethro often played with lots of chord changes.

I also recall reading several years ago, I believe on David Grisman's web site, where he stated that he did not improvise. He merely embellished the melody. He seemed somewhat dismissive of the importance of improvisation, stating that it was just real fast composing (as Mr. McGann notes above) and that "nobody pays to see an artist paint real fast." Of course, a lot of people would give up the notion of improvising if they could just embellish like Mr. Grisman.

[James P]

((("I hope nobody here's heard Don do this song...")))

[Bob Stolkin]

All of us that play with others encounter this problem, regardless of level. Yes, the best thing is to actually learn every song possible, but it's inevitable that we often find ourselves knee-deep in an unfamiliar tune.

One thing to also think about is the importance of timing in soloing. Many folks (myself included) tend to focus like a laser on note selection, but (especially in fast tunes), this can result in nice melody choices that come just a hair late, or strung together in a way that may make a neat melodic idea, but fails because rhythmically it's not right.

Personally, I'm usually more impressed with the folks in a jam that may keep it very simple melodically, but make interesting "statements" during their solos with timing. This is applicable whether using double stops, chords, or single notes. I've heard just about every possible melodic combination there is, but when it's delivered rhythmically in a fresh way, that's what gets my attention.

[ManlyMandolinist]

These suggestions are fantastic. Thank you so much, everyone. I've been practicing these for a few hours today and not only am I improving already, but I'm having so much more fun.

I got pretty discouraged before, thinking that improv is just stringing together pre-learned licks. The perspectives that many of you have given have renewed my faith that there is "something to be said" in improvisation, and not just training your fingers to rip through patterns. Practicing playing expressively is lovely.

Thanks again to everyone who contributed.

[Laird]

Related question: I practice fiddle tunes all the time, imagining that I'll borrow phrases from them and stick them into a jam. When the time comes, though, I can't really extract the phrase from the song I learned it in! It's locked in midway through a particular order. Any suggestions would be appreciated.