yips on improvisation

[evil_revolution]

wowness

umm yeah

you guys rock so tips on improvisation would be greatly apreciated, like making riffs and stuff

love daniel

[Wrong Robot]

take the song your playing on, run through all the scales associated with the chord changes...or find a general key that works with all the chord changes.
anyway, run through all the notes that theory wise are allowable to play, then keep those in mind and do whatever you want.

[rickbass]

Originally posted by evil_revolution
...you guys rock so tips on improvisation would be greatly apreciated, like making riffs and stuff

love daniel

Whatever you do, listen to as much and as many styles of music as possible.

It's even better to listen to it and to play it as well. This helps to give you a larger "vocabulary" you can draw on.....(how many van Halen fans realize they're actually listening to classical music when Eddie takes a guitar break???)

If you like a particular style of music, check out the roots of that music and learn from it (George Harrison was playing pure country licks on early Beatles stuff).

Just don't ape one particular bassist's playing. That's not how they got where they are.

[Bruce Lindfield]

Originally posted by Wrong Robot
take the song your playing on, run through all the scales associated with the chord changes...or find a general key that works with all the chord changes.
anyway, run through all the notes that theory wise are allowable to play, then keep those in mind and do whatever you want.

This won't always work - lots of songs change key and you have to be aware of this. Also - if you aren't aware of what chord you are playing over and where the harmony is going, then your note choice could sound wrong or at best "unconvincing".

Somebody who knows what they are doing can make notes that shoudn't work, sound right in context and somebody who doesn't and is not confident about what they are doing, can make a note that is theoretically "correct" sound very weak indeed!

If we're talking about "making riffs", then these can often include chromatic notes (possibly passing tones) that are unrelated to the key or any scale, but just sound right in context.

So - one of the classic techniques of the great Sax improvisors is to "preface" a riff or pattern with a note, a semi-tone away - either above or below. So if you keep in mind your target scale or chord tones you can actually "surround" them with quite a few chromatic notes and get away with it, if you know what you are doing and can take your listeners with you!

[fhodshon]

learn the melody.

try to play through the changes in one position.
modes really help here.

learn the melody.

work out the chord shapes in one position.

and then,

REALLY learn the melody. a lot of your great players use the melody as a springboard.

f

[Nancy-Boy]

i learnt to play bass by improvising..okay not the best way..but fitting bass line around commercial songs for me worked..thus i have become known as an accomplished improvisor...

When I improvise i listen to the piece through once listening to the drum rhythms and the chordal progression and how the melody follows the rhythmn section...

I just play with the song and u get to know in different styles where to song is going and i can usually hit the chords bang on witohut listening to the song before..work on scales and use slide to move from chord to chord before goin straight to notes without using gliss..Slapping and popping is a great way to get a groove on the improvsation side and useing doulbe hand tapping is very interestig as wall.. ..

Good kluck

[*ToNeS*]

Originally posted by Nancy-Boy
i learnt to play bass by improvising..okay not the best way..but fitting bass line around commercial songs for me worked..thus i have become known as an accomplished improvisor...

really? never heard of ya.

[Bruce Lindfield]

Originally posted by *ToNeS*

really? never heard of ya.

Didn't "placebo" write a song about him?

[*ToNeS*]

Originally posted by Bruce Lindfield


Didn't "placebo" write a song about him?

so he's the arse-widened sexual plaything that inspired Brian Malko to pen that song? fancy

[Bruce Lindfield]

Well...they never mentioned his well-known, accomplished improvising skills?

[*ToNeS*]

somehow i still think we have the right guy

[Jontom]

Learn as many solos or melodies as you can on bass. They can be cello parts, guitar riffs, trumpet or sax solos, all that matters is that you are learning the relationship between the chord progression and the melody, which is at the heart of developing your ear and your knowledge of music theory.