How do you practice improvisation?

[countrymath]

This topic is to discuss ways of learning improvisation.

I basically analize a piece, mostly etudes and impromptus, and them I improvise over the harmony and on the main ideia. Like on schubert impromptu in Eb, with the scales in triplets going down and up.

[pianowolfi]

I often start with a theme or motif (an original one or one by another composer, or from a song etc) and try to develop it, transpose, enlarge it, find a counter motif for it, build it up, imitate, reverse and mirror it etc. You can start with really short themes or motifs and play just a few bars, and then successively expand it.

[Derek]

For me, typically I do not have anything concrete to start with. Every so often I feel like starting with something slightly more concrete such as pulsing chords + melody, arpeggios with melody in the middle, whatever. But even that is not truly concerete.

My best improvisations start literally randomly. I'll play a handful of notes, and after a reasonably short period of time I will "cache" what I played, and then modify it somehow, allowing it to develop as it wills. My conscious decision is only one of "observation" and feeling where I want the music to go.

When I do stylistic improvisations, there's much more drawing upon works from the past, and I'll use a lot of familiar patterns, melodic idioms, etc. in conjunction with the "randomness" and "caching" mentioned above. Every so often this produces something nice, like the "short schubertian."  The vast majority of the time though, my best stuff starts when I have no pre-conceived notions of how my music ought to sound.

[ted]

The only truthful answer for me is that I do not practise it at all. Indeed, I struggle to grasp how improvisation can be "practised" in any of the usual senses in which the term is used. It either occurs or it does not, put it that way. I could not sit down and say, "This playing I am going to do will not be real improvisation but practice improvisation", in the same way people do when they practise pieces as contrasted with performing them.

Improvisation for me arises from my whole brain, the totality of my musical experience of playing and listening, and possibly more importantly, the whole of my life experience. It is a complete yoga, as it were.

If what you meant was do I practise specific movements, playing forms, rhythms, harmonies and other technical components, then of course the answer is yes but that is not improvisation itself.

If you meant do I begin improvising with definite directions the answer is yes, in recent months I have, but usually only in very general terms. For instance, during a long walk to the beach this morning I conceived a possible new general form for the next improvisation. But these notions are very broad, very flexible, and do not normally extend downward to specific cell detail, melody, or anything like that.

I like to be constantly surprised and delighted. Although many improvisers claim to know absolutely everything which is going to happen, I myself could not imagine a more pointless or dreary exercise.

[point of grace]

I often start with a theme or motif (an original one or one by another composer, or from a song etc) and try to develop it, transpose, enlarge it, find a counter motif for it, build it up, imitate, reverse and mirror it etc. You can start with really short themes or motifs and play just a few bars, and then successively expand it.

but does it come naturally from you? because if you have to think about all those things while you're playing i think it's kindda difficult!! and if you have to think about and plan those variations it would be no longer an improvisation!!! (though you said many good ideas!) just an opinion

[Derek]

If you listen to pianowolfi's music. I think it is easy to conclude that yes it does come naturally to him   I'm not sure it is actually possible to improvise while thinking about all the component parts of music. There's an inverse relationship between imposition of thought and the resulting quality of an improvisation. It's kind of like doing the jumble in the morning newspaper. When I first glance at it, I can get the first few words right away and then I get stuck on the last one because my conscious brain is arrogant enough to try to step in front of my subconscious brain and take over, and then fails miserably at the task. My wife and I try to do the jumble in reverse order to empirically prove that yes, the conscious part of the brain does in fact suck at some things. (in other words she'll start at the bottom one and often get stuck at the top one, I'll start at the top and often get stuck at the bottom).

[pianowolfi]

Another thing, basically an exercise that I find really helpful to practice for improvisation: try to play exactly those notes and sounds that you imagine in your head. What helped me a lot in developing this ability was aural training, learning all the intervals, sight singing, music dictation etc. (Often the teacher had us sing improvised melodies on four or eight measures or she would give us the first part of an eight measure melody and we had to repeat it and then find a second half to it.)  Also here you can start at a very easy level. Imagine single notes and then play them. Try all sorts of intervals and then proceed to simple melodies, chords and so forth.

[Derek]

Another way to look at it is---anything you know you want to be able to use during an improvisation must be practiced at some point. If you've never played piano before, practice will be required to become familiar with scales and chords.   When you're unfamiliar with many of them, improvisation will feel slow and awkward and perhaps not flow very well. But once you're familiar with them and can move everywhere, it no longer will feel like practice because all of the new things you produce will be consequences of melody and rhythm and harmony rather than finally becoming comfortable with X arpeggio or X scale or X technique.

For totally free improvisation, being familiar with some basic scales, chords, etc. will be enough practice.

If however you're interested also in imitating styles, or if you're interested in careful treatment of themes (e.g. Pianowolfi's approach), then it is clear that more types of practice are in order. The cool thing is---even these things, once practiced, will eventually become so automatic that you will not be thinking about them consciously while playing (at least, that's my impression, correct me if I am wrong about your approach pianowolfi)

There are so many techniques, modes of thought, approaches to improvisation that there just cannot be a single method for doing it. You have to find what you like best and work from there. In my case, I ended up liking pretty much every approach I've ever heard of with improvisation, but so far the "totally free" side seems to bring out my best.


...to put it yet another way, anything that can be objectively described can be practiced. "the baroque style."  "generic common practice era harmony."  "boogie woogie."   "major and minor arpeggios."   "fugal improvisation." (that one, regardless of baroque or modern style, definitely is not something that can happen right off the bat!....not with me anyway).   What cannot be practiced is just "how to make your music sound good." In other words, one cannot sit down and decide to make an overall improvement in quality to one's music.  It is too complex to pin down what exactly would constitute improvement.  However, that's probably the main thing most people (I would think) are interested in: making GOOD music. Anybody can learn to churn out the patterns of a style. But to make music interesting, moving, fascinating, etc.  how do you practice that?  It must be experience, and evolution, and feedback from peers that really helps.