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Improvising at the piano is something i've always wanted to be able to do. All of my classical musical training has taught me about playing more accurately, reading symbols on paper, handling music with greater complexity — culminating in the ability to sight-read from sheet music. But all of that seems like fake musicianship when i watch and listen in fascination as someone improvises. When i sight-read, it's just a reproduction of precomposed music, like reading a book aloud, but when good musicians improvise, they are truly expressing themselves through their instruments.
So for most of my life, music has been about translating symbols into actions. It's a highly technical activity, almost like mental calculation. To be able to sight-read, i just had to learn to think faster. More notes? Think faster! More sharps and flats? Think faster! Read faster, move the fingers faster, pay attention! It's a whirlwind of mental activity, and it's exhausting. When i'm calculating that fast, there isn't much time to imagine what it would sound like. I'm too busy translating. And without the sheet music, i'd be lost. What do i do? If it takes 99% of the available brainpower just to play the notes, how could one possibly also decide what notes to play with the remaining mental capacity? It takes me ages to make most decisions. Choosing from a restaurant menu with two dozen items might take me five minutes — but there are 88 keys on the piano keyboard, i have ten fingers, and a couple of beats go by every second.
I'd gaze with envy across the chasm, from the ranks of the dull, uptight automatons on my side with classical sheet-music-based training, far across a gaping divide to the crowd of relaxed, cheerful musicians who were brought up to play by ear, whose melodies flow from their hands as easily as speaking. Somehow they had a magical intuition that let them play the musical ideas in their minds directly through the instrument, as if it were an extension of the body. I had musical ideas, sure; i could hear and play back music in my head; but it stayed locked up in there because i had no idea what to do with my hands to reconstruct what i could hear in my head.
How did they get that magic? i would wonder. And how can i learn it?
On and off over the last couple of years i've been trying to learn how to improvise, in a few different ways. I took some jazz piano classes from the music department at Berkeley; i took a few classes from a private instructor; and i've spent many a spare moment at the piano. I have a piano keyboard right next to my desk, so it's literally within arm's reach whenever i feel like distracting myself from work. At first i would always reach for some sheet music to play from — either because it was so comforting to play something i already knew well, or because i enjoyed the mental challenge of sight-reading something new. (A few years ago, i met Don Knuth at a conference, and he casually invited me over to his house to sight-read concertos with him. I declined, in abject terror at the stupendous difficulty of the task and the idea of disappointing someone i held in such great respect. Today i question my timidity; surely nothing bad could have come of it, and i would have enjoyed spending time with him.)
But other times, the thought of playing something i'd already played dozens of times seemed boring, or sight-reading felt like too much effort, or i reminded myself that i really wanted to learn to improvise and should just try it. In the classes i had been advised to start simple, using only a few notes, or a simple scale, or a simple fixed chord progression. And that's where i started.
That's where i still am, actually. I've been messing around at the piano for a while now, but it's pretty much the same idea. I go to the piano, pick a dumb chord progression, and play it over and over while trying to dance a melody around it that doesn't sound too corny. I'm not sure it sounds like much. But i've noticed that it's starting to feel a little different.
It's not that i'm developing an intuitive ability to play whatever sound i want out of the instrument. It's kind of the opposite, actually. It's more like, i play randomly on the instrument until i hear something i like; and then eventually, at some later point, i recall there's this sound i like that my fingers vaguely remember how to play. And i think, okay, that might fit here, and off they go and do it. In a way, instead of learning to play whatever i imagine, i'm learning to imagine what i know i can play. So it's not really like what i thought it would be at all. And yet, the imagining and the playing are just starting to blur together, so it's becoming less clear which direction things are going. Am i playing what i hear? Hearing what i play? Hearing what i imagine? Imagining what i hear? Am i really making anything up or am i just replaying bits and pieces of stuff i've heard? I don't know. Maybe i'm just fooling myself into liking the limited subset of sounds that i can make. But it's starting to feel more like expression, somehow.
I wonder if this is what it feels like to people who "really" know how to improvise.
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2006-01-05 10:39 am UTC
The more I practice something, the more it seems to vaguely surface somehow when playing, so I figure I just need to learn as much as I can and practice them all roughly equally to gain the level of expression I'm looking for. Choosing what things I play and practice will determine my style, as they will show up more in what I play.
Writing music on paper or in my head is always different than then music I can just play because both contexts seem to limit my expression in a different way.
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2006-01-05 11:31 am UTC
His Koln concert CD is one of my favorite recordings ever.
2006-01-05 03:56 pm UTC
2006-01-05 01:05 pm UTC
I find your post really interesting, in that I always responded to learning by ear; I will learn a piece by listening to a tape far faster than reading the music. The heard music will make patterns for me that I can remember; if I sight read I always lose the music in the effort of concentrating on the written notes. Right brain vs left??
Good luck with the improv!
2006-01-05 03:55 pm UTC
2006-01-05 04:41 pm UTC
notes on my background for those in the discussion who don't know me... and also for Ping, who i haven't seen in far too long and who might need an update about how much the musical dimension of my life has changed lately:
-started classical piano at age 7
-stuck with it until the age of 16, when i got to that point where you have to make the call about whether or not you want to get really really serious about it
-decided i didn't
-had a gaping music-sized hole in my life for about 6 months
-finally decided to fill it with bass guitar
-have been happily thumping away on the bass ever since (11 years and counting), mostly in rock/folk type bands
-over the last 4 years or so, have become a lot more involved in projects that require me to jam and/or play songs i don't actually know very well (if at all)
so yeah, when i switched from piano to bass it wasn't just a change of instrument - it was a total change of musical style and performance context and mindset. i think my classical training was a real help (especially starting out) because i already had a good ingrained grasp of basic concepts like scales and time signatures and such (and it's easy to forget how valuable and tricky that stuff can be - until you try explaining it to someone who doesn't have any!).
what i didn't have was a sense of how music is actually constructed (whether in classical or rock or any other genre). my classical training included some theory (not as much as most programs, but whatever) but somehow it was never really related back to real life and real music in any way that i could actually use.
so when i started out on bass, i was in a situation where somebody could put a chord chart in front of me, and i'd diligently move from the E minor chord to the G chord, but never with any sort of sense of how those two chords related to each other and why they sounded good together. in a way it was kind of like reading sheet music and limiting myself to the notes on the page (although even at that point i was starting to do a bit of improvising - a little fill or passing note going from that E to the G, for example).
then a funny thing happened. i started playing with more different people in more different settings and it fundamentally changed the way i experience music. somewhere along the way something just clicked into place and now i hear songs more in terms of the overall shape - i have kind of an intuitive sense of what the chord changes are (and how i would play through them if i had to).
it's not something i deliberately worked towards (or even consciously knew i needed) but now it's always part of the way that i hear things - i'll hear something on the radio and just know that "oh, that progression is just good old 1-5-6-4 again." obviously if it's something more complicated i don't always get it right away - i've still got a lot to figure out. but once i've got the basics, then that opens everything up for me to improvise using the notes and tricks that i do know (and there aren't enough of those, but i'm working on it...).
so for me that's a huge component of my "musical intuition". and the good news is, it can be developed. even if you're not actually aware that's what you're doing. :)
2006-01-05 05:53 pm UTC
Return to the mind of a child...where you "play". Those mud pies never looked like pies at all, and the songs of a child wander from key to key. Eventually, the sculptor or the musician emerges.
Can you play in a way that makes you laugh?
2006-01-05 06:05 pm UTC
A reference
Ping, I can relate to that, being in a similar situation. It seems that a preponderance of the eye over the ear hinders the ability to feel what one plays, and it's really difficult to correct, once ingrained.
I found an online book; it's not about improvisation, but rather about learning to play the piano in a classical setting. However, it has a rather unusual approach, and the author talks enjoyably on a number of subjects.
Fundamentals of Piano Practice, 2nd Edition
2006-01-05 06:13 pm UTC
2006-01-05 06:22 pm UTC
On the other hand, on piano where one actually has to memorize which notes to play for each key, I'm hopelessly out of my element in everything but C maj, A min, D maj, F maj, and G maj.
2006-01-05 06:17 pm UTC
Left brain, meet right brain!
That's so strange. I grok things in a completely different way. I look at a measure of sheet music and I have to "hear" it before I can play it -- I can stagger through it, trudging each individual note at a time, but it's even slower and more tedious.I think of it as a kid learning to read. The analogy soesn't work for everyone, but it kind of does for me. At first, when I was sightreading, I would basically be sounding out each individual "word" as I went. D.....o.....g....DOG! Now I don't bother with each individual bit, I just look at a measure and hear the music in my head as if I had just read a sentance.
And by "now," I mean, when I'm in good musical shape. I haven't practiced sightreading in a year or so, so I'd probably have to start out back at the sounding-it-out stage.
The other drawback is that it takes a second to look at the music that way -- for every measure. If I get the music at the same time as the rest of an orchestra, there's no way I'll be able to keep up by the sheet music alone. However, I can take my cues from what I hear, and I pick up on the themes an patterns of music very quickly. I can usually "predict" what's coming next.
On the other hand, if I hear something being played first, it's a magic ticket to understanding for me. I memorize very quickly (my karmic reward for how difficult it is for me to learn things through sheet music...), and once I know how something is supposed to sound, if it's within my abilities to play I can get it pretty quickly. Mind you, all of this is for violin, which I trained in for 6 years and have continued with on my own, not piano, on which I feel extremely resticted.
I love improvising. The most fun I've ever had, musically, was when I was playing electric violin with a jam band in Portland. It's liberating for me to be able to get away from the constraints of having a set "part" and to really let go.
That all being said, I am extremely impressed and envious of your ability to tear through sheet music the way you describe. That is so far out of my abilities to do, and I have been trained (well, they tried...) classically. And here's the funny part: I've always felt that that's the thing that kept me from being a "real musician." What good does it do me to be able to play my own little noodlings if I can't read a sheet of freakin' music?
2006-01-05 06:24 pm UTC
I've always been better at playing music by ear than by sight.
2006-01-05 06:58 pm UTC
As far as improvising, I've never been much at it. But once, I was practicing in a fairly public room here in my dorm, but it was around 2am so few people were around. A guy came in and struck up conversation. He sat at the second piano and we improvised together. For about 15 minutes straight, we just played off each other, picking random notes that sounded good - rarely full chords, more just single notes, but with both hands. It was lots more fun than I would've imagined. He was about the same level I was, so it wasn't intimidating, it was just fun.
But I could never sit down, improvise and have it turn out like Moonlight Sonata. I, too, envy those who can.
Anonymous
2006-01-05 07:23 pm UTC
The music plays the band.
Interesting discussion!It sounds like you are exploring the classical/jazz border (although the reader/ear divide exists within jazz too). The best description I've heard: the goal of classical players is to play the instrument/part perfectly, the goal of jazz players is to play the instrument/part identifiably. In other words; you might question Miles' technique, but you'll know it's him (or someone imitating him).
Musical improvisation is reaction. The IO is different. Instead of sheet music > brain > fingers > ears it's ears > brain > fingers > was the recorder on? Compositions are conclusions, improvisations are research. Getting sound habits into your hands is data gathering (initial research), following implications comes next (there the challenge is breaking those habits, constructively), and any conclusions are grounds for further research.
Now that you are getting comfortable playing in a subset sandbox, try coloring outside the box. Work on improving your 'error handling'. Play a 'wrong' note once in a while, and then correct it in the rest of the phrase. Play every note out of meter, while retaining the feel of precise time. Play the same melody over and over, with different harmonies. Play the same note over and over, with ever changing dynamics. Improvise with recordings of famous speeches that you have never heard before, attempting to capture the rhythm and mood, harmonizing the tonal implications of the speaker. The more time you spend making aesthetic decisions in real time, in reaction to external events, the easier improvisation becomes.
I've also noticed that the most instruments I learn to play, the bigger my ear gets.
Theory: George Russell
Mechanics: Mark Levine
History: Music Is My Mistress by Duke Ellington
Piano: Art Tatum
Bass: Jaco Pastorius
2006-01-05 07:57 pm UTC
If I'm looking for one (or for an abstract visual art piece for that matter, same idea) I look at a specific thing. Sing the ocean the way it is right now, looking at it, sing the story of two people's interaction, sing the sadness of a difficult day. It's all there.
Can you hum or whistle? It might help to start improvising away from the instrument that you were trained on, then move back to it when you have gotten more used to it.
2006-01-05 10:26 pm UTC
Improvisation
Its fascinating to read your description of what improvization feels like to you on the piano, because it is very similar to how improvization feels to me in social dance. I try random things, more often than not they don't work, but the things that do sometimes stick a little bit and come out again and again in different combinations.2006-01-07 09:11 pm UTC
Anonymous
2006-01-10 05:31 am UTC
you got me thinking... and out came a song
see Arpeggio in D, a little three chord ditty (http://dig.csail.mit.edu/breadcrumbs/node/66) which has a little song I wrote the evening after I read your piece here, and a little bit about how I learned what I know about playing piano and guitar, and about sharing music in the Web.-- Dan C.
Anonymous
2006-04-10 08:33 am UTC
Re: you got me thinking... and out came a song
Thanks. I know the name, but haven't made a point of listening to his recordings yet.Anonymous
2006-07-25 02:05 pm UTC
Learn to improvise is easy if know music harmony.
To learn jazz improvisation you have to know very well music harmony. Melody building has rules. You have to learn these rules. Improvisation means real time composing.You need several years of training to learn improvisation. You have to drive your fingers with your mind and not to play random ( wrong notes ).You have to play the notes you want or feel but they must respect harmonic rules.
I am building some sites about jazz improvisation e music harmony. There I teach for free how to improvise.
http://www.musilosophy.com/jazz-improvis
I am dedicating my life to music improvisation.
I graduated alsofrom Saint Cecilia music Conservatory in Rome.
Visit http://www.musilosophy.com.
Thank You very much! IMPROVISING is like TALKING.
Anonymous
2006-11-15 12:12 am UTC
http://www.iwasdoingallright.com/jazz_im
There are also some ear training tools:
http://www.iwasdoingallright.com/tools/e
Anonymous
2007-06-05 03:46 pm UTC
Anonymous
2007-07-07 06:54 pm UTC
excellent!
good work
Anonymous
2007-09-03 01:22 pm UTC
=(
I can improvise to my hearts content, and extemporise and also replay music exactly by ear - but i can't sight read at all and i hate it!!I guess i'm the complete opposite of you.
Anonymous
2007-10-07 03:52 pm UTC
Hey
hi,good site :) Whish you good luck!
Anonymous
2007-10-11 12:37 am UTC
Thank you
.Anonymous
2008-01-26 03:01 pm UTC
Good site!
Nice site!Thank you
Anonymous
2008-04-10 04:01 pm UTC
What i can find on this forum ? I new here
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Anonymous
2008-04-12 01:25 pm UTC
What can God never see?
Hi!Without taking into account the issue of establishing a stone by God, which he won't be able to pick up, how do you think, may be something in this world, what can God never see?
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