Hi my friends, I started a topic with this "theme" My focus is to start improvising with few basic elements, for those who do not have much knowledge about harmony but want to jam with a band or at church. I plan to add one to two lessons per month on this subject.
Improvisation is a composition in real time, usually on a line where there is already a melody then the mission to compose another tune and it is necessary to have the "ingredients" or elements in hand. For this reason in the beginning "compose" simple melodies within the same hue and of course, the more you practice and learn, we acquire more information to make more complex sounds.
My suggestion to start in the world of pop improvisation is to form a firm foundation, learning the major scales: diatonic and pentatonic, which is only higher at the beginning, it's enough for fun.
Put them "at the bottom of the fingers" or study them daily in order to "skim" through it smoothly, without having to "think" a lot.
A simple exercise to start the study of improvisation is related to the famous "Greek modes", but I'll try to simplify to be easy to understand and initiate its creation. I'll number the notes of scales and calling them "grades":
Em “C” maior – C D E F G A B - notes
I II III IV V VI VII – grades
With such a line II-VI-I in C (C major) chords are: (II) Dm - (V) G - (I) C, with the help of a keyboard or the any other way you find easier, use these chords progression (when they go on repeating it in a circle), II-VI-II-VI-II-VI-II-VI-II-VI ... in the form of 4 / 4 so you have a baseline to start improvising with the pentatonic scale:
I - II - III - V – VI (IN THIS CASE IN C MAJOR C - D - E - G – A)
Start playing at minimum to improvise: I - II - III - V - VI - I (VIII)
C - D - E - G - A - C D - E - G - A - C - D E - G - A - C - D - E
G - A - C - D - E - G A - C - D - E - G - A C - D - E - G - A - C
Now in quarter notes and eighth notes then.
Now follows a good exercise that has a very interesting result and should be run at different speeds.
STARTING UP IN THE FORM D1 (Low D)
D - C - D - E - D - E - G - E - G - A - G - A - C - A - C - D. .. Go through the entire register of the sax.
AS DOWN STARTING IN D3 (Middle D)
D - C - A - C - A - G - A - G - E - G - E - D - E - D - C - D. .. Play in different inversions through the entire register of the sax.
To start you have stuff for fun, apart from these exercises, turn on your creativity, start writing other "standards" and be sure to learn playing this in all keys.
Marquinho Sax
