Improvising Thematically: Introducing "Melodic Imitation"

franamico

Have you ever been asking yourself: "How can I develop my solos building up ideas in a more, thematic way?"

Some people like to talk the "call and response" method but, in my experience, very little time is spent on how to practically teach your brain to do that step by step.

So here there are 3 main techniques you can use to develop your solo thematically:

1) Imitation
2) Extension
3) Fragmentation


In this short article, I'll introduce the concept of imitation.


Step 1: Choose an easy rhythmic and harmonic setting (e.g., 4/4 , G7)

Step 2: Choose a very short melody (3-4 notes) and play it over and over.

Step 3: Create a variation of the original melody using the same rhythm and melodic curve (if you don’t know what a melodic curve is, just write the notes of your melody down and then join them. You’ll immediately see what your curve is).

Step 4: Play the new melody 4 times then play a new set of notes (still same melodic curve)

Step 5: Now choose a chord progression (e.g., II V I or an easy standard) and practice imitation throughout the harmonic progression. You can play the same set of notes over all changes or decide to change notes in different areas of the tune (e.g., AABA)

There you have 5 easy steps to start working on your thematic soloing. In my next article I’ll introduce the concept of “Extension”.