Learning to Improvise

[mtmiec]

Hello, I have been playing classical piano for ten years, but I have no ability to improvise (I'm sure that I'm among many).  After unsucessfully fooling around with jazz chords and scales, I've realized that I need help.  Mainly I'm interested in jazz improvisation, but I enjoy many styles of music.  Could anyone recommend either a good book on improvisation or a good instructional dvd that would help?  Would I be better of finding a teacher for improvisation? (My normal piano teacher for classical music can't improvise)  Thanks for any suggestions.

[oscarr111111]

This is a tricky subject to get into, the problem is that more than any other area you just have to get stuck in and learn by trial and error, you can't really take an academic route.  Its also probably the single most fun thing to learn as a musician after the initial learning curve.  Most Jazz improvisation is really more 'psudo improvisation' as really you're just playing the changes really, so it might be a good place to start.

I'd say just start improvising, play on your own and improvise with you're friends who are musicians, if you can get some sort of looping device, its much easier at first to improvise with backing.  If you want to do something fun which will help build up the right mindset and confidence then join a Rock or Funk band as keyboard player, almost any band will be willing to overlook a lot of experiance in the genre for a well trained pianist (good keyboard players are hard to find).

Also, ear training is important for improvisation.


Edit:  Also, record your improvisations and listen back to them, not only is it great fun to listen to these a few years later, but to hear what you sound like in retrospect from a critical listeners perspective will help your playing immeasurably.

Purely for your entertainment here are some of the earliest recorded clips of my playing (and my friends) that we recorded for this purpose.  https://www.soundclick.com/oscarsouth. Ok so I wasn't playing piano in these, we could barely play our instruments and the recording quality is terrible, but aside from that I think it sounds pretty good .  Enjoy.

[Petter]

I can recommend this book https://www.amazon.com/Jazz-Piano-Book-Mark-Levine/dp/0961470151
Mark Levine Jazz piano book. I learned alot from it and I think it´s a popular choice among others aswell.  Downside of it as I see it is that there´s little mention of technique. But since you played 10 years of classical I guess you don´t really need it.  .

[mtmiec]

Thanks for the advice.
  oscarr: The funny thing is that part of the reason I want to learn to improvise is because I've recently joined a funk (mostly) band, and most of the members of the band can improvise and solo to some extent.  Hopefully I will be able to pick the skill up with their help.
  petter: Thanks for the suggestion, I think I will buy that book.

[oscarr111111]

Thanks for the advice.
  oscarr: The funny thing is that part of the reason I want to learn to improvise is because I've recently joined a funk (mostly) band, and most of the members of the band can improvise and solo to some extent.  Hopefully I will be able to pick the skill up with their help.
  petter: Thanks for the suggestion, I think I will buy that book.

Theres a book called 'funk keyboards' which may be somewhat helpful.  The single best approach though is to get a bunch of recordings by funk bands with good keyboard players you admire and work out/try to emulate what they're doing.  Also remember that funk is a groove based genre, the phrase 'less is more' is very true, make sure you 'play in the pocket' and give the grooves room to breathe.

Finally, some good Hammond B3, Fender Rhodes, Electric Clav, Wurlitzer and a few analoggy synth sounds will never go amiss in a Funk band .