Rosenberg Academy

Hi,

I'm trying to apply Stochelo's recipe, assembling his licks but the result sounds "cut and paste" to me. I'm not sure that I do this with much efficiency. Could I have examples of licks (measures) extracted from "Minor Swing" and "Les Yeux Noirs" which do combine well ?
Did some of you experiment with some licks ? How do you build your solos using only these tools ?

Joel

It is supposed to sound cut and paste. This is exactly the point! Just keep making combinations, it doesn't matter how far reached it all may seem. This is just the way to train your brains to combine different licks and phrases in different ways and to see them separate from the solo you took them from. If you keep this up, trying new licks from new solos (now from Daphne for example) it will become second nature and improvisation will start to evolve naturally.

Just make sure you take 15 minutes each day to just mess around on your guitar on a song. See if you can play licks on the fly without preparing them in an order beforehand.

Next month we will expand the improv course (we shot them but I need some time to write them down in an orderly fashion).

Thanks Christiaan,

So for now the goal is to extract any lick on a dominant 7th chord and play it on another dominant 7th chord, same for major and minor chords ?

Don't put any restrictions on yourself. Do whatever you think sounds nice: try stringing licks together, invent your own little licks to connect two of Stochelo's licks that otherwise wouldn't connect. Transpose licks, alter licks, turn them around, play them while you're hanging upside down from the ceiling. You get the idea...

The more creative you get with them the more you will get in the mind set of "improvising" and that is the goal!

Thanks for your inspiring answer. I hope that next improvisation course will help to get more of the picture.

Joel

Hi Amund,

Your explanations are a great help. I'm playing jazz for some years but when it comes to improvisation, I never feel enough self-confidence. I've practiced scales and can play them on the fly but as Christiaan explained, there is a very few music in scales and before I came here, I did not want to learn licks and I asked myself to many questions about improvisation.
I hope to watch your "Minor Swing" improv in a video someday.

Thanks and good practice,

Joel

Dear friends,
In order to improvise well I don't need first to exercise on the scales? to know each scale or scales of one song all over the guitar in order to map the licks?
I will very appreciate your help, honestly I am very frustrated because every time i learn some lick i dont feel comfort where exactly I am located on the scale,
I am thinking to start working hard on each scale before I get started with the licks, It is OK?
Thanks Moosh

Stochelo never practiced any scale and frankly neither did I. Stick to practicing the solos here and follow the advice in the improv course and the improv section of the forum and you will get there. Just know this is a long process (couple of years at least) and progress will be slow. Just work a bit on it everyday.

If I may , when I learn a line I try to visualise the chord shapes under the line, like a blue print if you like.So whenever I see that chord or chord progression I know that line fits strait over the top in that position.Hope this makes sense.

I spent a lot of time practising scales because I thought you needed them to play jazz. When i joined this site and started learning licks and parts of the solo's it hit me one day that this site's approach is the same way I learned to play blues/rock. I learned that style by learning licks and solos not by playing scales. Now when i practise improv. I get out a chord sheet to a gypsy jazz tune and play licks that fit over the chords and parts of Stochelo's solos and try out a few of my own ideas. I think all that time I spent playing scales was a waste of time. I could have been playing music instead of mind numbing scale exercises. Playing scales might loosen up the fingers a bit but learning licks will do the same and you have something useful you can use in a playing situation.