Hi Greg,

Working on improvising phrases and on phrasing (not exactly the same thing) is an essential part of my practice routine. But I don’t usually try to save or remember anything! What I do is this: I take a musical device (for example a scale, or an arpeggio, …) and I improvise a phrase, say two bars long. Then I immediately evaluate what I just played. If I like it I may play it again one or two times. If I don’t like it, I try to find out why, and I try to improve it until I am satisfied (or at least, less dissatisfied!).
Doing this daily for weeks and months in a row will eventually train your fingers to find nice phrases while improvising live. Mind you, the purpose is NOT to build a repertoire of reusable licks! The purpose is to learn how to improvise nice phrases in a given genre.

A completely different story is when I am composing something. In that case, I will play something and write it down (in standard music notation) or I’ll record it with my old little Zoom H2n that I keep handy. Or I may first write down a phrase that is in my head and then play it to evaluate if it does sound the way I imagined.
The difference is that in this case you need to be able to evaluate your composition as a whole, so you obviously need to keep track of things.

Hope this helps.

Good question Greg,
If I’m exploring quite a few options when improvising phrases/passages etc. I’ll often record the options using my DAW (in my case Ableton Lite) prior to that I used my Boss Loop Pedal and saved the options for playback as a reminder.
I’ll often find that my original choice of improvised passages in a melody are superseded in preference to later creations when I listen back to the recordings.
I guess we’ll all have slightly different ways to remind ourselves of the on-the-spot creations, those are just mine.

Richard

That’s a very good question!
Like Richard I often record my ideas into my DAW. And all my playings and showcases are saved there as well as in my video software. When I re-watch them I see what I have played.
I also use Guitar Pro to tab my licks. But this takes (as for me) too much time.
Additionally I have a small booklet to write down interesting chord progressions, ideas and theory stuff or light bulbs.
And with regular practice I try to build up a lick/scale/chord repertoire.
And last I have started to improvise over backing tracks, to create my own or remember ideas from Brian.
You might have to find out for yourself which the best way for you.
Denise

Nice question, Greg, and interesting how others approach this!

As I write, actually, I’m working on an improv for one of Brian’s lessons. Like others, I try various ideas over two or more phrases onto my DAW – once I’ve found one I like, I take a short close-up video of me playing it; my short-term memory is crap lately, and I easily forget exactly what I did and how I did it.

Once my improv is sorted, I practice the whole thing, with Brian’s lesson, until I’m ready for a take.

Best wishes 😎

Pen and paper are your friends. As soon as you like one of your licks, write them down.

Carmine

I have been trying to find the best way to do it myself!

If I’m noodling (usually on an acoustic guitar) and come up with a riff, a phrase, or a chord progression I like, I record them to Voice Memos on my iPhone. If I’m composing a song, I record some ideas to Voice Memos and sometimes record a close up video of how I play them. It’s amazing how many times I recorded something to Voice Memos and then had no idea how I played that! 🧐

When improvising with an electric guitar, I record what I play often in my DAW and then listen back to it. If I like something, I try to re-create it again and again. Over time the phrases may change and morph into something else so I just record the latest take before wrapping up the session.

Repetition = muscle memory. I found that if you love the guitar, repetition and determination always pay off. I am 62 and am still struggling to learn pieces, arrangements and licks that I couldn’t handle 20 years ago. There is no easy way through it but through it. Good luck.

John

Over the last year or so I have started using Guitar Pro to write down and remember musical ideas. I’ve become a big fan. It definitely has a learning curve, but with a bit of effort and regular use, I’ve become fairly comfortable with it.

At various times I’ve tried keeping notebooks or using Voice Memo or similar apps, but they just never seemed to work for me. My handwriting is terrible, so that makes notebooks problematic. And with Voice Memo, I found it hard to keep things organized to the point where I could easily find things I’d been working on, say, a week ago.

But with GP, things are nice and organized in folders and I can call up a piece of music in seconds and be working on it.

I’ve been doing a fair amount of transcribing also, and I couldn’t imagine doing that without Guitar Pro now.

I find that once I’ve got something down I’m unlikely to forget it if it’s any good. It’s the new ideas that are the challenge.

I’m a Mac user and use their whiteboard app Freehand to splatter all the ideas I get from the internet into three categories, Theory, playing and (guitar) maintenance. It’s a big stress reducer.

If I find something cool online that I don’t have time to work with (which is often) I just copy the url and paste it into my Freehand ‘music’ board so I can spin it up in the morning with a double click. When I’m working with it I can put all my notes alongside the link.

It’s been a game changer for me. Attached is my current Freehand > Music page. It changes every day.

This is not quite on the topic of remembering musical ideas as you come up with them, but there may be some helpful info here. This popped up in my YT feed just after I read this post.