Anyone like to improvise?

Hi. I have always had a desire to be able to sit at the piano and just play - without knowing what I will play. It seems to be a daunting task, but since I found a great teacher who was classically trained before becoming a professional jazz pianist, I have made some progress. When I don’t feel like practicing I sit at the piano and play a simple chord sequence - for example Fm7, Bbm7, Cm7, Fm7 - and find notes and phrases that sound good to me.

 

Does anyone else improvise or plan to learn how to? It would be good to share ideas.

131 replies

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    • Ken_Radford
    • 2 wk ago
    • Reported - view

    After looking through some of the partimenti.org web pages that Maria kindly posted and watching the tonebase interview with John Mortensen I decided that I have to learn how to improvise fugue. I bought John’s book Improvising Fugue - A Method for Keyboard Artists and am currently practicing simple rule of the octave (RO) in seven major and parallel minor keys. I will not move on until I can play them all at a decent tempo without any errors.
    I am doing this in addition to learning jazz improv and I have set a goal to be proficient in fugue by June 9th 2032 (yes, that is 6 years.)

    Any ideas, suggestions, tips, and so on will be appreciated. 

      • Ken_Radford
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       “…advanced players like yourself…” 😂 Thank you for the compliment Peter, but that is not what I would say about my level. Maybe when I am improvising fugue in 2032…

      When it comes to speed, for me, less is more.

      As you point out above, we have to be very careful from whom we take advice. 

      • Mom, fitness instructor, lover of music
      • Michelle_Russell
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       My teacher teaches how to improvise fugues; he does this primarily through zoom (unless you happen to be in Portland, OR) since not many people teach this skill. Here is an article from 10 years ago when he was more active in this world of teaching improvisation. We also had an artist at our chamber music festival last year who was doing her doctoral research on teaching improvisation to classical musicians. I haven't checked in on her since last year, but this might give you another place to begin looking for resources.

       my teacher says that if anyone ever says "finger exercises" I should turn around and run away as fast as I can! And also, though there are techniques and drills which help, speed comes with time and patience. Some people (my son, for instance) have more of a natural ability to play quickly, but our initial practice should not be for speed. I've coached gymnastics and/or been a personal trainer for nearly 40 years, and it has been my experience that those who begin slowly, learning the form and technique first - these are the ones who end up being the most efficient in their learning process. My vocal teacher reinforced this yesterday, since I'm needing to learn a new song with less than a week's notice: beginning slowly and methodically aids the learning process and, in what seems like a paradox, makes it more efficient. If you just jump right in and try to sing the song without all the initial prep work (he calls them 'layers of learning'), it typically results in tension which you then have to take extra time to untrain! 

      • Ken_Radford
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       Thanks for the information Michelle. I am going to speak to my teacher about improvising fugue at my lesson tomorrow and see what his thoughts are. He is a classically trained jazz performer so I believe he will be able to help me. If not, I will be looking for an additional teacher.

      • Peter_William
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       Thanks for the response!. Yes I wanted to ask you earlier. Your son is quite a fabulous pianist! I saw some videos.. :-) . Your info on gym is quite similar to mine in tennis.

      With fast playing there may be a method that concert pianists have that got them to ridiculous speeds. I have seen pianists play scales flawlessly  at 180bpm to the sixteenth note and so was wondering. how do they practice? from slow speeds  at 60 bpm to 130 bpm and above.. ? is it even possible for older beginners ? So many questions .. :-) 

      • Peter_William
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       Unfortunately I am not able to attend the session with David Chang - happening soon.  It would be wonderful if anyone can ask him. His scales and Chopin Etudes are stunningly fast. There is a video of him demonstrating it on the internet with Garrick Ohlson watching and saying " that was very good ! !".. just imagine how good it would have to be to get that kind of a compliment.

      So if you do attend this webinar.. could you ask? I am away from the piano for the next few days.. 

      • Ken_Radford
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       I will not be at that livestream so won’t be able to ask.

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