Improvising Over This Masquerade
In this lesson we discuss some general improvisation concepts that can be applied to This Masquerade and also any other jazz standards you are working on.
Always remember that your solos do not need to start of complicated. It’s nice to play simple melodic idea to start your solo and then state the same idea again to develop a motive.
Rhythm and syncopation are two of the most important components of jazz. Starting your phrases off the beat and anticipating the changes gives the your solo a sense of forward motion.
Try harmonising a scale into triads, then break up the triads into arpeggios and incorporate fragments of the scale into your improvised lines.
Understand that you will make mistakes. Even professionals make mistakes. The key is learning how to deal with them. When your ears tell you that you have played a note that doesn’t sound good, treat it as a chromatic approach tone. Usually, the note on either side of the note you played will sound good, if not great!
One of the problems with the blues scale is that when starting out with improvisation, students tend to get stuck playing the blues and never deviate out of it of the scale. The key to avoiding this is to play fragments of the blues scale intertwined with notes from other modal scales that relate to the chord you are playing over.
Related Lessons
We apply left hand voicings, two handed voicings and look at ways we can voice the vamp for the intro and outro to the tune.
The melodic minor is an exotic sounding scale and the modes of the melodic minor are used extensively in jazz improvisation.
We introduce the major modes, explaining what they are and where they come from. These 7 modes play a fundamental role in improvisation.
Practice Tips
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Stating a simple idea using just one or two notes.
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Start phrases off the beat.
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Triadic Shapes in improvised lines.
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The are no wrong notes.
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Use the blues scale sparingly and intertwine with notes from modal scales.
- Leave space after an improvised idea. Sing, hum, or whistle a response outloud, and then try and play this on the keyboard. You are the instrument... not the piano ;)
This was great tutorial on improvisation. I would like to see more tutorials on improvisation because the end result really is becoming a good improviser for myself and maybe many other students, Thanks hayden for this one.
Hi George, thanks for the comment and sure thing, I will create similar tutorials for the other jazz standard lessons. I hope you are transcribing your own lines because this is the most effective way to learn to improvise. When you transcribe a line and transpose it around a few keys… you not only absorb the notes but also the rhythm, phrasing and articulation which you then have at your disposal when you come to take a solo. Also remember to practice improv with the iReal Pro app. If I can help with any of this just let me know 🙂 Cheers, Hayden
AGREE !!! MORE ON THIS TOPIC PLS..THNX
Brilliant course Hayden! Please provide us with more lessons on correct use of modes to create phrases. On 15:36 the melody you were singing incuded an F, which sounded even better than Eb, with your improvisation, in my opinion. Thanks again for this valuable source of information!