It is important to be able to connect all the ideas gained by the previous exercise pools, so the improvisations sound fluently. That is why these next few experiments focus on connecting and continuing musical ideas.
1) This exercise is a solo adaptation of David Dolans 'musical pingpong'. Sarah Stiles also mentions it.
In the solo version the first half of a sentence in a certain style is played. Next, there is a stop and time to think about an ending. The ending is then played without writing anything down. This process is repeated several times. This way there are different endings created to this first half.
I discovered that by creating room for thinking, more and different possibilities are created and added to the active vocabulary. Often I would not come up with these sentences when improvising without stopping. This way the brain has the time to process the ideas learned during previous exercises. It is also possible to actively choose one of the ideas from the previous exercises and apply it to this one.
Pingpong based on material (see images) from the second movement of Sonata no.1 by A. Schnittke
2) It is also possible, as violinist Henning Kraggerud suggested, to compose eight bars and just keep playing. A lot of the exercises so far are quite short. This exercise challenges the player to keep coming up with musical ideas without second-guessing themselves. I think it is a good idea to use some of the ideas from previous exercises in the first eight composed bars. This way the player trains himself to continue the material previously studied without stopping. This is important, because when improvising on a stage one must be able to think quickly.
3) Copy the music of the piece that is the base of the improvisation and cut phrases and motives out of the score with scissors. Make a new puzzle and invent links in between the different puzzle pieces. Do this in lots of different ways. Clarinetist Kari Kriikku describes this experiment as starting from the micro musical material and then going to the macro musical material. This exercise helped me to learn how to connect the different ‘words’ I learned into a sentence. Also, the player starts creating sentences that he maybe wouldn’t have improvised intuitively.
4) Collect some of the elements from the previous exercise pools that worked well. This can be certain motives, a certain modulation, some typical style characteristics, rhythms,... Then try to improvise freely whilst using this collection. It is also possible to do this exercise in a certain tonality. This way the player starts using the separately learned elements based on a composition in one improvisation. This is a first step to later combining the vocabulary of two pieces in one interlude.
