SIMPLISTIC IDEAS THAT ENCOURAGE IN IMPROVISATION IN MELODIES AND HARMONY.
(See also post 263 . 270 and 83. A SCALE OF CHORDS ORIENTED IMPROVISATION METHOD VERSUS SCALE OF NOTES OR CHORDS OF A SCALE.)
In order to improvise one has to be daring and under the flow of a kind of joy.
The educational system of classical music which is based on reading scores is not appropriate for creating improvisation abilities.
1) BIOWARE WITH SUBCONSCIOUS SINGING ABILITIES IS THE BEST "INSTRUMENT" AND STARTING ABILITY. he most important and also simple idea in melodic improvisation, is that the improvisation must be created at first or at least as well (but usually better than what in an musical instrument) in singing or whistling which will dominate the instrument playing even if later no singing or whistling is heard.
The living bioware is always a better musical instruments than a rigid hardware musical instrument or even digital musical instrument.
1.1) COMPOSITE PRACTICE OF IMPROVISATION , REMIX-ADAPTATION OF A SONG AND INSTRUMENT PLAYING.
The central idea is of course that the versatility of improvising on many musical instruments is based on the ability to internalize and perceive mentally and emotionally the musical sound and improvise rather than the ability of concentrating separately to technical skill of geometric patterns of playing for each particular instrument And one of the simplest ways to perceive musically harmonically , melodically and chromatically, all the universe of the 12-notes is the chromatic tonality (as in post 263) (see post 258 that improvisation is at least at 2/3rds an internal feelings and intellect meditation process rather independent from the musical instrument played! The 2/3ds are of course the mental perception of the musical sound and the feelings-emotional perception of the musical sound, and not the geometric instruments pattern of the musical playing! And one of the simplest ways to perceive musically all the universe of the 12-notes is the chromatic tonality (as in post 263) ).
3)THREE TYPES OF VARIATIONS: TRANSLATION, INVERSION EXPANSION. A 2nd simple idea in melody improvisation is that of the 3 types of variation: 1) translation b) inversion 3) contraction/expansion. The translation is to repeat the same melodic theme lower or higher in the scale. once or many times. This may involve deforming the exact intervals of the theme, but it creates a sense of repetition and at the same time of changes. The inversion is to make the ascending melodic theme descending but same pattern theme and vice versa. Again this may involve distorting the theme. The inversion makes the sad happy and vice-versa. Finally the expansion/contraction is the idea that chromatic intervals (2nds of 1 or 2 semitones) will create a kind of chromatic dissonance and tension, the melodic intervals (3rds major or minor) will create a sense of melodic feeling, and larger harmonic intervals of 4th, 5th of 8th a feeling of harmony. The simple idea is to wave sadness and joy or serenity and anxiety by waving from short size intervals to larger type of intervals and vice-versa. The theme itself contracts or expands as we substitute its intervals of 5th/4th with 3rd or 2nd and vice versa.The guitar or other string instruments with fingerboard (fiddle) or fretboard are helpful in this idea .
(See also post 263 . 270 and 83. A SCALE OF CHORDS ORIENTED IMPROVISATION METHOD VERSUS SCALE OF NOTES OR CHORDS OF A SCALE.)
THE KEY-WORD HERE IN THE 4TH GENERATION DIGITAL MUSIC FOR THE MUSICAL-THEORETIC IDEAS OF THIS POST (AS FAR AS MORDEN SOFTWARE FOR MUSIC MAKING IS ) IS MELODY-SEQUENCERS
THE TERM SEQUENCER MEANS HERE A LOOP OR RHYTHMIC CYCLE OF A MELODIC THEME THAT IS VARIATED INTERACTIVELY BY THE USER IN A MELODIC SEQUENCER.
THERE MANY GOOD SOFTWARE PROGRAMS FOR THIS COMPOSITION AND IMPROVISATION LIKE FUGUE MACHINE, YAMAHA MOBILE SEQUENCER, THUMPJAM ETC. ALAO ARPIO AND ARPEGGIONOME FOR GENERAL ARPEGGIOS ALTERNATED WITH MELODIC IMPROVISATIONS
In order to improvise one has to be daring and under the flow of a kind of joy.
The educational system of classical music which is based on reading scores is not appropriate for creating improvisation abilities.
1) BIOWARE WITH SUBCONSCIOUS SINGING ABILITIES IS THE BEST "INSTRUMENT" AND STARTING ABILITY. he most important and also simple idea in melodic improvisation, is that the improvisation must be created at first or at least as well (but usually better than what in an musical instrument) in singing or whistling which will dominate the instrument playing even if later no singing or whistling is heard.
The living bioware is always a better musical instruments than a rigid hardware musical instrument or even digital musical instrument.
1.1) COMPOSITE PRACTICE OF IMPROVISATION , REMIX-ADAPTATION OF A SONG AND INSTRUMENT PLAYING.
This ability can be activated as follows: At first listen for some weeks to nice songs preferably Jazz songs and familiarize with their melodies harmonies and techniques. Start with early jazz which is simpler and utilizes the triads of chords 1-4-5 or 1-2-5 etc.
The preliminary stage of education of the subconscious determines also the speed of creations of emotions and feelings when improvising. It is important that the speed of actual musical improvisation is not faster than the speed of creation and shaping of the emotions and feelings. In different persons it is different speed.
Then listen them with one only earphone, leaving the other ear open and sing or whistle parallel to the melodies of the song, inspired or stimulated on the occasion of the written and listened song. The whistling improvisation may nevertheless deviate not only from the listened melodies but also from the listened chords and harmony, if the feelings require so. This is an important factor of the improvisation as melodic or harmonic "errors" in whistling a melody most often turn out to be improvements of the melody based on our own memories of nice melodies and inclinations in the feelings. General rules that two parallel melodies fit harmonically together as described in post 128, require only that the number of intervals of 3rd, 4th 5th and 8th are more than 50% compared to intervals of 2nds. In addition alternating with this whistling or singing we may play on a desired instrument similar melodies. Depending on the acquired skill on the instrument, the improvisation may be poorer or same rich as the whistling. Furthemore instead of only listening to the song, if opened in a software like Audacity where its chords can be found and displayed below the waveform, we see also the underlying chords and we learn to associate the whistling or instrument playing ofthe melodies with the underlying chord progression. We keep doing it not only soa s to get pleasure but also to improve improvisation and playing skill on the prefered instruments.
The speed of conducting the improvisation may be increased if while we improvise we pretend that there is a mandarin (fruit) flying a few centimeters above the top of our head and we look and listen and conduct the improvisation from that point in air or aether rather than from our hands or mouth. The area above the top of the head is an aether center that our soul and spiritual existence is often utilizing.
The preliminary stage of education of the subconscious determines also the speed of creations of emotions and feelings when improvising. It is important that the speed of actual musical improvisation is not faster than the speed of creation and shaping of the emotions and feelings. In different persons it is different speed.
Then listen them with one only earphone, leaving the other ear open and sing or whistle parallel to the melodies of the song, inspired or stimulated on the occasion of the written and listened song. The whistling improvisation may nevertheless deviate not only from the listened melodies but also from the listened chords and harmony, if the feelings require so. This is an important factor of the improvisation as melodic or harmonic "errors" in whistling a melody most often turn out to be improvements of the melody based on our own memories of nice melodies and inclinations in the feelings. General rules that two parallel melodies fit harmonically together as described in post 128, require only that the number of intervals of 3rd, 4th 5th and 8th are more than 50% compared to intervals of 2nds. In addition alternating with this whistling or singing we may play on a desired instrument similar melodies. Depending on the acquired skill on the instrument, the improvisation may be poorer or same rich as the whistling. Furthemore instead of only listening to the song, if opened in a software like Audacity where its chords can be found and displayed below the waveform, we see also the underlying chords and we learn to associate the whistling or instrument playing ofthe melodies with the underlying chord progression. We keep doing it not only soa s to get pleasure but also to improve improvisation and playing skill on the prefered instruments.
The speed of conducting the improvisation may be increased if while we improvise we pretend that there is a mandarin (fruit) flying a few centimeters above the top of our head and we look and listen and conduct the improvisation from that point in air or aether rather than from our hands or mouth. The area above the top of the head is an aether center that our soul and spiritual existence is often utilizing.
The central idea is of course that the versatility of improvising on many musical instruments is based on the ability to internalize and perceive mentally and emotionally the musical sound and improvise rather than the ability of concentrating separately to technical skill of geometric patterns of playing for each particular instrument And one of the simplest ways to perceive musically harmonically , melodically and chromatically, all the universe of the 12-notes is the chromatic tonality (as in post 263) (see post 258 that improvisation is at least at 2/3rds an internal feelings and intellect meditation process rather independent from the musical instrument played! The 2/3ds are of course the mental perception of the musical sound and the feelings-emotional perception of the musical sound, and not the geometric instruments pattern of the musical playing! And one of the simplest ways to perceive musically all the universe of the 12-notes is the chromatic tonality (as in post 263) ).
2) CONVERGENT SEQUENCES OF NOTES TO MELODIC CENTERS: It helps a lot for the improvisation of melodies to have the idea of STEPWISE GLISSANDO in the sense of scanning all notes in pitch linear order sequence of the scale that the instrument is tuned, so as to find the one that you will stay longer (melodic center as note of the simplicial sub-melody) or even correct to the melodic center if the melody is somehow already known. Instruments like piano, Celtic harp, or diatonic pan-flute are very helpful in this. The guitar or other string instruments with fingerboard (fiddle) or fretboard with the usual tunings are not much helpful in this but they are helpful in chromatic stepwise glissando. Exception is the 3-strings fretboards with tuning open major chord (e.g, Panduri, Bouzouki, Lyra see posts 252, 254 , 264) that there is the same easiness: The 2nd and 3rd voice of the melody can be played in the 3 strings and the melody of 1-2 octaves most often can be played in one only of the 3 strings! While in classical music's melodies the central entity is the melodic theme in improvisational music melodies the central concepts seem to be "convergent sequence of notes to a melodic center or note o t he simplicial sub-melody" Of Course the melodic center or note of the simplicial melody is a note sounding much more time that the neighboring notes.
3)THREE TYPES OF VARIATIONS: TRANSLATION, INVERSION EXPANSION. A 2nd simple idea in melody improvisation is that of the 3 types of variation: 1) translation b) inversion 3) contraction/expansion. The translation is to repeat the same melodic theme lower or higher in the scale. once or many times. This may involve deforming the exact intervals of the theme, but it creates a sense of repetition and at the same time of changes. The inversion is to make the ascending melodic theme descending but same pattern theme and vice versa. Again this may involve distorting the theme. The inversion makes the sad happy and vice-versa. Finally the expansion/contraction is the idea that chromatic intervals (2nds of 1 or 2 semitones) will create a kind of chromatic dissonance and tension, the melodic intervals (3rds major or minor) will create a sense of melodic feeling, and larger harmonic intervals of 4th, 5th of 8th a feeling of harmony. The simple idea is to wave sadness and joy or serenity and anxiety by waving from short size intervals to larger type of intervals and vice-versa. The theme itself contracts or expands as we substitute its intervals of 5th/4th with 3rd or 2nd and vice versa.The guitar or other string instruments with fingerboard (fiddle) or fretboard are helpful in this idea .
4) HARMONIC CYCLES For the harmony and in improvising at the level of chord progressions, the corresponding idea is a linear order of chords (major/minor) in sequential harmonic relation ,in other words that their roots are consecutive notes in the cycle by intervals of 4th. Given a melody in a diatonic scale or in chromatic tonality of a diatonic scale, when improvising almost randomly with chords, there is also a similar idea of stepwise glissando by chords either in diatonic pitch linear order of the roots or in the harmonic progression of their roots by 4ths ,which latter is quite faster than the diatonic stepwise glissando, especially when we are searching for the major chord (or minor chord) among the 3 in a diatonic scale that fits the current state of the melody. Once the right root or middle of the chord is found we tweak to major or minor (sometimes diminished or augmented) till it fits well to the melody.
Other simple ideas to compose chord progressions involve the harmonic triad of major chords in a diatonic scale 1-4-5 and also the chords of a diatonic scale as enhanced by chromatic tonality (see post 263) Other simple ideas involve triads of harmonic pairs of chords in various relations like chromatic , melodic harmonic.
IMPROVISATION METHOD BASED ON A SET OF CHORDS AND MELODIC LINES BRIDGING THE HIGHEST NOTES OF EACH OF THEM. APPLICATION WITH STRUMMING WITH CUATRO, CAVAQUINHO, UKULELE , HARMONICA VIOLIN, WINDS ETC
The application idea is that when the chord is realized with a voicing on the highest 4 (or all 4) strings , we create melodic lines on the highest string bridging the highest notes of two succesive chords. Because of a inherent phenomenon of the human sound perception , when we are strumming and chaning the chords with in-between such melodic lines, the musical perception clearaly heres a melody, which is that of the highest notes. If it was not the highest notes the melodic lines would be more often lost in listening in the strumming.
Such chord-bridging melodic lines use a last small part of the previous chord duration and a small initial part of the new chord duration. During the rest ofthe time there is strumming of the chord or a achord arpeggio or variations of small melodic themes inside the chord by intervals of 3rd or 4th/5th. Thus melodic-harmonic variaonions. While when bridging two succesive chords there may be melodic themes variations by intervals of 2nd 3rd or 4th/5th (thus chromatic-melodic-harmonic).
This technique utilizes the simplicity of the information of the set of chord and translates it it to a simple information about the partition of the types of variations of simple melodic themes with the time placement and duration of the chords.
With this technique we may create simplicial counter-melodies parallel to melody.
Such chord-bridging melodic lines use a last small part of the previous chord duration and a small initial part of the new chord duration. During the rest ofthe time there is strumming of the chord or a achord arpeggio or variations of small melodic themes inside the chord by intervals of 3rd or 4th/5th. Thus melodic-harmonic variaonions. While when bridging two succesive chords there may be melodic themes variations by intervals of 2nd 3rd or 4th/5th (thus chromatic-melodic-harmonic).
This technique utilizes the simplicity of the information of the set of chord and translates it it to a simple information about the partition of the types of variations of simple melodic themes with the time placement and duration of the chords.
With this technique we may create simplicial counter-melodies parallel to melody.
It applies verty easily when utilizing a chromatic harmonica (see post 274), but also a violin (especially marked at a particular diatonic scale, so that we can identify chord-triad shapes on it after a convenient tuning) and finally also on a diatonic wind.
