improvisation

Let's say you find some nice chords which you play repeatedly with your left hand, and you wanna improvise a melody over them with your right hand, how do you know what notes too choose from with your right hand?

Basically something that are in a relationship with the chords you use
So if you hit a C-chord, its sage to hit notes in the C-Scale! ect..
I think Pianohama got a good Topic about this, its around here somewhere Look it up

Andrew, Pianohama, You and everyone here is so helpful. Im so glad I joined the forums.

Depending on your chord progression. For example, if you are playing I-IV-V in the key of C, you’ll have C/F/G chord. In this case, you have many different improvisation options on how you can approach this progression. The most basic one is to play the C major Pentatonic. The notes are C/D/E/G/A. You can also choose to improvise using the C major scale, C/D/E/F/G/A/B.

The more advance technique is to use combination of modes. You can start by using C Mixolydian – C/D/E/F/G/A/Bb, but you have to be careful when the chord changes to G major. You have to avoid hitting the Bb, and in this case, you can switch to G Ionian, which is just a G major scale; G/A/B/C/D/E/F#.

If you are just vamping on two chords, I minor and V. Let’s say E minor and B. In this case you can use many different modes depending on the tonality, mood and feel that you are trying to achieve. Some of the scales and modes available are E harmonic minor, natural minor, melodic minor, Dorian, and Phrygian, etc.

It’s important to study all the scales in order for you to improvise efficiently. The more tools you have, it’ll allow you to paint with more color.

Yoke Wong
Take Your Piano Playing To The Next Level
http://www.pianomother.com

Thank you for your input, Yoke. It's very welcome.

Thomandy wrote:Basically something that are in a relationship with the chords you use
So if you hit a C-chord, its sage to hit notes in the C-Scale! ect..
I think Pianohama got a good Topic about this, its around here somewhere Look it up

That's a jazz way of thinking about improvisation, where you use scales and modes based on what key you're in. I think it's great, but it doesn't quite work if you start thinking you should be using an F major scale when the song is in the key of C, because it will add a B flat that doesn't exist. Of course you can get around this by thinking of the different chords as individual modes, but that's an awful lot of theory to undertake, so I'm going to recommend a simpler, more classically based method of thinking about improvisation to start out.

I think the best way of thinking about it is that your melody is founded on the harmony; that is, if you're playing a C-major scale, the most important note(s) of your melody are C, E and G, because they're the foundation of the harmony. If your most important notes were F and A, then you should probably be using a D-minor or F major chord to harmonize, unless you want a juicy jazz chord.

That does not mean your melody has to be locked into the notes of your harmony, but that's your foundation. Using notes outside of the chord actually lends quite a bit of flair and color to the melody, but over-using them, or using them in places of rhythmic stress, tends to result in a mismatch between the harmony and melody. If you want to understand the theory, look up non-harmonic tones for some understanding of different ways to decorate the melody using notes that are not part of the chord. Some common techniques include using the tone between the keys in a scale pattern (playing a run of C-D-E-F-G where the chord notes fall on the beat), or "flipping around" a note (D-F-A, with A usually on a beat)... all sorts of stuff. Just think of the melody as one end of an elastic band, and the chord as the other. You can certainly stretch the melody to places it doesn't naturally go to (notes in the chord), but it will always want to return to its notes. If you want to linger in places where it doesn't want to go, you're going to have to move the chord somewhere else.

Hope that's helpful.

Very helpful. Thanks.

Hey guys.

Check this clip out, it helped me out alot while I was learning!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y62ClfhyM1k

Nice clip. Did you actually sign up for his piano course - or just use the tips in that video?

Rayman wrote:Nice clip. Did you actually sign up for his piano course - or just use the tips in that video?

Just that clip, it explains the most important thing about the melody-making part of improvisation, which is tension and release. = )

pianohama wrote:

Rayman wrote:Nice clip. Did you actually sign up for his piano course - or just use the tips in that video?

Just that clip, it explains the most important thing about the melody-making part of improvisation, which is tension and release. = )

Would be too complicated for me. I've found an easier clip for very basic improvisation:



(the first example in this clip is a joke, it's getting interesting from minute 2)

I see what you mean Frank. That made a lot of sense to me.

Thomandy wrote:Basically something that are in a relationship with the chords you use
So if you hit a C-chord, its sage to hit notes in the C-Scale! ect..
I think Pianohama got a good Topic about this, its around here somewhere Look it up

I also think so.

I see we have a new member here, Welcome athurart09