Improvising (Demonstrational Video)
Mar 16, 2009 Development Zone, Songs, Videos
This is not a lesson to help you learn how to improvise. This is a picture into how I use improvising as a practice habit and development skill. For me personally, the thought of only playing what other people have already put to music sounds boring. I like to do my own things and make music that is unique. This is why I enjoy composing and arranging. Improvising helps me come up with new ideas.
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I improvise all the time. I clear my mind and just let the music flow with what feels right at that given time. But, I’m always paying close attention to what I’m communicating, when the song needs “breathing room”, and when change needs to happen.
With this approach, I can discover some passages and different licks that I really like. I then develop and memorize them. Sometimes, I may use just one passage from an improv to enhance an arrangement Or, I may be hopeful of what happened, and try to use it as a main theme to a new song.
One thing that is helpful when improvising is to record yourself. This gives another opportunity to analyze your playing, figure out the passages that worked, and remember what you actually played!
This video is an example of a blind improvise that I did during a practice session last night. I’ll use this video to analyze what I’ve done, decide what I liked and didn’t like, and probably use it to develop a new song one day.
Tags: improvise, improvising, video
The Ladder Drill (Instructional Video)
The primary goal of the ladder drill is to assist with developing hand independence.
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Desire for Departure (Demonstrational Video)
A lot of people have been asking me how Desire for Departure is played. One day, I do hope to release the notation for it. But for now, this is a live demonstration of my composition, Desire for Departure.
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This is a solo version of the song. When originally arranged, I had the instrumentation in mind. Since the song is largely repetitive and doesn’t rely on tune variations/additional embellishments to enhance the arrangement, the gradual speed increase is intentional to create tension and interest in order to keep it from dragging. Normally, I would not recommend this approach.
The secondary purpose for showing this demonstration is that hand independence is used throughout the song. I am sure that I will be referencing this video in future posts discussing the advantages of hand independence.
For a full-version free download of what appears on my CD release, please check out the listen section to the right
Tags: Demonstration, live, playing, video