January Challenge Questions

[DaveW]

So, this is the first time I’ve tried to do this kind of improvisation and I have a few questions.

When I’m playing the 1 – 4 – 5 progression should my improvised licks stick strictly to the number of beats per measure or is it ok to just stick with the beat (rhythm) even if the lick runs longer than the 4 beats per measure?

It seems when transitioning from one chord to another it sounds best to finish the previous lick on the root note of the following chord. Does that sound right or is my untrained ear just wacked out?

Thanks!

Dave

[Dieter]

Hello Dave,
There are no fixed rules here when improvising. The blues classics often simply lengthened or shortened bars as they saw fit. And I think that’s how you should go about it – trust your ears, I don’t think there’s anyone here on the forum who will criticize you for that.

Dieter

[Billy]

Hi Dave, I’m getting into this stand alone stuff myself, had my 1st attempt at it for the last challenge and now im trying to improve on it for Jan’s challenge.
What I did to start off with was pick the 1 4 5 chord progression then added a short lick between each chord change, once that had been established then expand or embelish the licks to see what changes it makes to the sound and feel, the whole dynamics of the piece can alter just by adding one note or indeed taking one note away so the piece feels/sounds fresher during the 2nd pass…
Im thinking if it soumds good to my old ears then it will sound good to someone elses ears.

..Billy..

[sunjamr]

Good question, I’ve been pondering the same thing. I think the trick is to clearly identify what is the call and what is the response. I have concluded there are lots of ways to do it.

(1) The easiest way is to stick with 4 beats for both the call and the response. In the key of E, play 4 beats of shuffle (the call), then 4 beats of lead (the response), then 4 beats of shuffle, then 4 beats of lead. That’s your first 4 bars of a 12 bar blues. Just keep going in this manner. A good non-shuffle example is EP187. And EP131 is a great example using only 2 chords.

(2) Another way is play the call using a strum (or whatever) over beats “1 and, 2 and, 3”, then play a short response over “and 4 la lee”.

(3) EP058 uses a 2-bar call, followed by a 2-bar response.

(4) EP065 uses a call on beats “1, 2, 3, 4, 1”, and a response on “2 la lee, 3 la lee, 4 and”.

As for lengthening some of the bars to 5 beats or whatever, even though a few of the old time blues guys occasionally did it, it sounded like rubbish then, and it still sounds like rubbish. It’s almost never done now days for good reason.

Sunjamr Steve

[Martin W]

Yep I’m with Steve on this one , whatever you decide to play it has to fit the measure , or it will sound odd ,that’s not to say you have to fill each bar to the brim a few rest beats are always welcome and usually change the dynamics of a progression.

Martin

[DaveW]

Thanks for the ideas guys. Some good things to keep me going.

Dave

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