Vertical Improvisation Lesson

In this lesson, I'm going to talk a little bit more about vertical improvisation.

Horizontal vs. Vertical Playing

Most of the stuff we did just now in "Love, That Man" was playing blues scales across several chords. In other words, that was horizontal playing.

Now, let's look at how you might play if you really wanted to nail every chord. This is more of a bebop style, where the obvious approach would be to play arpeggios.

Basic Exercise: C 2-5-1

If we do this in root position over 2, 5, 1 in C, the simplest level would be this, with shells in the left hand:

• Practice that over and over.

Embellishment

Just a little embellishment:

• Notice how there's quite a jump involved there.
• A fourth between the D minor root position shape and the G7 root position shape.

That's not ideal. However, I've managed to go to C by step with a smooth connection. In fact, I've encircled the E.

"It's always nice when you can approach a target note in this place, the third of the chord, from below and above."

Improving Connections

Now, let's try and improve the connection between the D minor and the G7.

• It's very easy to do that if you start your G7 arpeggio on the third.

Now I've got a semitone connection with the shells. This has taken me higher into the C chord because my target note is now the fifth, and I've encircled the fifth.

These are two very simple approaches, but you can take this idea and run with it.

Adding Rhythmic Variation

For instance, if you wanted to introduce some rhythmic variations, you could introduce a triplet and do a little bit more on the C chord.

• Before, we just basically hit the target note and wrapped up the phrase.
• Now, we're going to carry on past the target note.

You can combine a fixed pattern with an improvised bar on the end.

Phrase Variations

So those three phrases are all basically the same lick; I've just tweaked them a little bit. But there are other ways of playing vertically, of course.

• We could start on the third of the D minor and go down the G7, playing to the ninth as well.
• If you start on the third of A chord and play four notes, you usually end up on the ninth.

This time I've gone down G7 in third inversion, and that falls onto the third of the C chord.

Targeting Thirds

"Thirds are always really cool target notes to land on, especially if you go from the seventh of the previous chord."

The next example involves going down the scale of the G7 chord. Instead of going down the arpeggio, try ending differently.

• The second bar was improvised; I think I did four or five variations.
• See if you can do the same by taking this idea of going down the chord and starting the D minor like that.

If we start on the fifth, that will fall automatically, if you play it right, onto the third of the dominant chord, which is a lovely effect. It's really common in melodies and even in chord voicings.

Tweaking Notes

Now, a little tweak here. When I went up the G chord, instead of playing the ninth on top, I played the flat ninth.

So now I'm encircling the fifth from a semitone above. The B9 is a really common effect, especially in bebop.

If you know your diminished chords, you'll recognize this G7, B9 arpeggio as a B diminished seventh chord.

Applying Techniques to Longer Chord Progressions

Before we finish, we should just apply all this to long two fives as well. All those were short two beats on each chord.

Example in C Minor

Let's change key. Let's do it in the key from Perdido. Here we are, one bar on each chord:

• C minor 7: Ascending arpeggio targeting the third of the F chord.
• Now, another phrase going down from the C minor from the fifth.

Vary the ending. Try making up your own phrases that do this over any chord pair.

You may remember in part one, we did something like this on a perfect cadence in the final tune Improvert just before we finish.

Exploring Different Time Signatures

Then, let's do it in three-four, for instance, like what you might have done in G minor Waltz.

• I'm using nothing but chord tones, apart from this chromatic linking note, which enables me to use the E as a target note.
• Three notes from the C7 chord.
• Now down the G minor arpeggio, falling on the same target note, E natural.

Conclusion

So, review Perdido, G minor, Wolfs Love That Man, etc. and try out some of these ideas in your solos.