Let's discuss a few key elements of
improvisation as well as the tools you need to help you ease into the creative
art of playing in the moment.
Building a Toolkit
Just as a good writer needs a large
vocabulary of words to utilize, guitarists need a large vocabulary of scales,
arpeggios, phrases and licks to work with. Throughout your guitar tuition, you
should be learning scales, arpeggios and patterns, as well as listening to and
learning improvisations from well known players. This will help you build your
vocabulary and help you to hear and
understand how some of the great jazz
players use the same building blocks to construct engaging and beautiful solos.
Work towards the long term goal of memorizing note names, shapes
and intervals all across the fret board.
Start Small
A good way to dive into improvisation
for the first time is to restrict yourself to a limited amount of notes at a
time. It can be intimidating to just start playing a melody without any sort of
definitive starting point or direction, so by simplifying your toolkit
temporarily, it will be easier to start training the improvisational element of
your playing.
Approach Notes and Neighbor Tones
It will be helpful when starting out
to become familiar with the concepts of approach notes and neighbor tones.
Simply put, a neighbour tone is any note that is directly above or below a
specific note. These can be diatonic (within the key) or chromatic (potentially
outside of the key, also known as non-harmonic tones). An approach note is when
you use a neighbour tone (or more than one)
to “approach” a specific note. The
terms are sometimes used interchangeably, but the concept remains the same.
Working with these ideas early on
will help you break out of the potential rut of feeling locked into scale and
arpeggios patterns. Again, a good way to start working with this concept is to
simplify it. Using our earlier example, try to improvise using only the first 4
notes of the major scale. This time, however, approach each note with a
chromatic neighbour tone (either one fret above or one fret below) before each
of the 4 potential notes and see what you can come up with.
Remember, these can be either
diatonic or chromatic notes, so experiment with different intervals and start
to familiarize yourself with thinking in terms of neighbour tones and approach
notes.
When starting out with improvisation
on jazz guitar, it is important to focus on building up your musical toolkit,
practicing (as always, practice makes perfect), and developing your own musical
style. Listen to great players to pick up on some melodic ideas, and never be
afraid to think outside the box when improvising.
Happy playing!
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