Do you know anybody who seems like they can play any song and change it a little bit to make it sound even cooler? Have you ever heard a musician who plays a solo while the rest of the band plays along in the background? Playing music without the notes of the solo being written out is called improvisation and is a practice that often defines jazz music.

First, how does anybody play music without the help of the notes written out in front of them? The answer is simple: We don’t know for sure. To some it comes easy — to others, not so much. Some people have a seemingly unexplainable talent for listing to a piece of music and improvising over top of it while others who are otherwise very talented musicians can’t function without music.

Some people who improvise don’t need any music at all while others have something called a lead sheet in front of them. A lead sheet has the main melody of the song along with the names of the chord changes and where they occur. By watching this, the person improvising can construct melodies of their own based on the chords.

Can improvisation be taught? Yes it can but it’s important to start simple. Go online and find a lead sheet of a slow song that you enjoy. Each of the chords listed are based on scales so if you see a “C” listed, that is based on the C Major scale. As you’re just beginning, only use the first 5 notes of the scale for each chord and simply have some fun. Try to construct a melody using the five notes and then when the chord changes, construct a melody that is based on the new chord.

As you get better, you can use more notes, make your melodies more complicated, and possibly even use a few notes that are outside of the chord. Remember that the most important part of improvisation is to not plan out your melody too much. This should be fun so try something new each time and if sounds terrible, laugh it off and try again.

What’s the secret of good improvisation? Those who seem to have a talent for it understand that a lot of music has chord changes in very predictable patterns and for that reason, those who improvise a lot can hear those changes. Like everything else, artists who are naturally talented at improvisation have also practiced it a lot. Don’t forget that anything in music, regardless of your level of natural talent, will take a lot of practice.

If some have a natural talent for it, is improvisation something that can be taught? Yes it can! If you know somebody who seems to have a natural talent for improvisation while you struggle, don’t get frustration. Some people’s brains are simply wired for improvisation while others are better wired for reading music off of a page. The world of music needs both types of musicians.

Improvisation is truly one of those musical skills that should come not so much from a piece of paper but from inside of you. It’s an opportunity for you to express yourself as an artist. Have fun!

How Does Improvisation Work?

Can I Learn to Do It?

There are main 3 ways in which a pianist can use improvisation in their playing:

- Melody
- Harmony
- Rhythm

If you understand how these areas work, and know how the original is supposed to sound, then you can learn how to improvise them. It’s like acting or doing a comedy sketch, you really need to know how to play the music correctly before you can successfully improvise with it.

Melody Improvisation

If you are going to work with melodic improvisation you can either decide to play most of the original music and only keep a few familiar phrases to identify the piece, you could play around with improvising just the odd group of notes here and there, or you could create something in the middle. Listen to what you’re playing. Does it still sound good? Is it still recognizable as the melody you’re supposed to be playing?

Harmony Improvisation

Here you have greater scope to improvise because the melody line will carry anything that you change in the harmony and still leave the listener feeling that they heard the tune they expected to hear. You could add more depth to the base line, or remove the base line. You could add a counter melody that works with the main melody. You could use the basic harmony chord structure and improvise this using such things as passing notes and suspensions to create a completely different sounding harmony that was originally composed.

Rhythm Improvisation

With rhythm improvisation you can play around with different styles of rhythm. Perhaps your romantic love theme could turn into a dance tune by quickening the pace a little. Cover artists often use this technique in order to put their own mark on a song made famous by another singer.

Apart from these structured forms of improvisation that deal with music already composed, you can also improvise using your knowledge of music themes and structure to create something completely new - a real time composition. This allows you to create a new melody line with harmony as you play and each time you sit at the piano to use this free form kind of piano improvisation you will compose something original.

Any piano player can learn to improvise using the above techniques but in order to perform an improvisation that’s fresh, but it takes practice. If you use melody, harmony or rhythm improvisation methods then you need to practice to ensure that you don’t fall into the trap of playing the tune the way it’s usually played. If you’re going to free form improvise then you must know how to bring a melody and harmony together with a rhythm in order to create something that sounds as if it’s always been that way. You are making it up as you go along, but the end result needs to sound flawless and that takes hours of free form practice in order to ensure that you don’t bring discord into the music by using a combination of opposing chord - unless, of course, that’s your intention!

For wonderful courses in improvisation and other related subjects please go to Improvising & Other Good Stuff!

Copyright June 17, 2011 by Duane Shinn. Do not use without permission!

Improvising on the piano involves several factors, but the most notable factor is the creation of a new melody while using the same chord progressions. In essence you are composing a new song, but the new song uses the same chords in the same order as the original song. Improvising is used in all genres, but it is most used perhaps in jazz, where a new melody is created several times in one song. Typically the lead sax or trumpet player will improvise for a period of time (on the same chord changes), then another member of the group will improvise for a period of time, and so on.

Arranging a song is somewhat different: you might keep the same melody, or alter it to some degree, but you might use different chords and different styles in the process. It’s a little bit confusing at this point, because the same type of thing could be happening in improvisaion. One musician will see it one way, and another musician another way, but that’s as it should be — it creates an endless flow of new and exciting music.

Improvisation (also known as improvising) is the act of making something up as you go along — an act with which we all have a little experience. Remember playing House or Doctor as a child, letting the game go wherever your mind would take you? That was improvisation. No rules, no boundaries, just the limitless potential of your imagination.

Similarly, musical improvisation is the act of “writing” (creating it as you play) a song while performing it, a technique found most often in jazz and bluegrass (but can be traced back to renowned classical improvisers like Handel and Bach). Of course, it’s a little more complicated than an imaginative children’s game. Though improvisation is a highly creative and flexible technique, it requires great skill on the part of the musician. A musician involved in an improvisation must have a detailed knowledge of chord structure and complicated scales and modes. The musician must also have an intuitive ability to structure a song on the fly; great improvisation thrives on its ability to sound not improvised but rather wholly composed. That illusion, the ability of a song to seem anything but spontaneously made up, is part of improvisation’s allure.

There are two basic forms of improvisation: structured improvisation and free improvisation. Structured improvisation, though a contradiction in terms, is the most common of the two. In this form, musicians will use a pre-determined series of chord changes, usually held down by the rhythm section, as the song’s base. The lead instrument in the improvisation (sometimes also pre-determined) then have the freedom to create new melodies and harmonies from these pre-determined chords. The flexibility of this improvisation form is dependent on the flexibility of the chord changes, and the musicians involved must be able to play exactly what they hear in their heads, as some complicated changes may not allow for large deviations.

If we were to improvise on a song such as “Billy Boy”, for example, we would follow the chord progressions of the song, but make up a different melody for it. Some musicians choose to stay fairly close to the melody by using neighboring tones and half-step slides and so on; other musicians feel free to completely abandon the traditional melody and make up a new melody entirely.

In addition to songs, many musicians in the jazz and rhythm & blues tradition improvise endlessly on the 12-bar blues, which has a chord progression using only the I, IV and V chords (also known as the “primary chords” of a given key) of whatever key the musicians are playing in. For example, if a jazz group was playing in the key of Bb, the improvisations would be based on the I, IV and V chords in the key of Bb: namely Bb, Eb, and F.

Of course musicians also add extra notes to chords such as the 7th — especially in the blues — and sometimes also change the harmony somewhat from time to time. But the recurring theme always reverts to the I - IV - V formula.

Free improvisation, on the other hand, is far more like a game of House or Doctor — it has no rules. Instead of focusing on harmony or melody, free improvisation focuses on the feeling and texture of the music and the way the instruments complement each other. This form tends to be far more experimental and rarely adheres to one style or genre or music — it is, quite simply, what it is.