Improvised First Aid Skills

[Jenifer Griffard]

Manyclassical musicians are very often DEEPLY afraid of improvisation. And who can blame them? We are taught so many useless things in our college degrees and yet somehow this valuable skill has been cut out of the program. My jazz and folk music friends probably have no idea what I am talking about. This is the bread and butter of what they do!

In fact, I only really started improvising when I left university and started working in the real world. I sort of fell into it a bit and fumbled my way through the dark until I discovered it was not nearly as scary as I thought.

Most jazz musicians spend their time practicing the tools needed for improv, and arguably, the most significant tool they develop is the ability to understand and play their scales from memory. They KNOW their scales, no questions asked. They understand that their improvisations come out of these scale systems.

I remember sitting in a workshop with the incredible Hubert Laws and listening to him explain his process of improvisation. He explained how he heard the melody or musical idea in his mind first and then just let it come through his instrument. This seemed like an impossibility.

When I started my improvisation journey, the most surprising benefit was the improvement of my aural skills. In the beginning, I just moved my fingers without any clear idea of what sound would come out, but the more I did it, the more I started to glimpse what Laws spoke about: the ability to hear a tune and just play it. I began to hear changes in harmony and understand those changes. As a result, the connection between my ears and fingers became stronger and stronger. I was able to hear a note and play it! This helped me in a few other very surprising ways!

The improved aural skills allowed me to memorize more easily. Remembering how a tune sounds is much easier than remembering the individual notes. Our ears are POWERFUL memorizers. But, imagine you could just play that melody you hear in your head. This was such a powerful tool for me. To add to that, when you have a memory slip in a concert, you are so comfortable improvising that you can just improvise your way out of it!

In improvisation, there are no real mistakes. Yes, sometimes things sound a bit funky or weird, but very often, you can work your way through those moments and make them sound intentional. After having spent a fair amount of time improvising, I started getting better and better at working my way out of those harrowing concert moments.

To illustrate, let me share one of my favorite real-life examples. I was playing the Carmen Fantasy from memory with a big orchestra and a huge audience. Eek. I am nervous for my past self. Towards the end of the piece, there is a whole section in E major that is really just a glorified collection of scales. I lost concentration for a split second and my fingers lost the thread. Oh well, I thought, I can just improvise the next two measures with some other glorified scale passages. The conductor noticed. The flute players in the orchestra probably noticed. Anyone else? Maybe, but probably not.

Suddenly, her eyes lit up. Something ignited in her and out of nowhere she started creating music. Beautiful, connected phrases with a singing tone. There was a hidden musician in this student that all the lines and blobs on a piece of paper just could not unleash. It was an incredible teaching lesson for me. How had I not done this sooner?!

Deliberate practice refers to a focused and systematic approach to reaching your goals. Take a deep dive with Tatiana as she discusses this way of practicing and shows you how to apply it to your flute playing!

Your attitude when it comes to your flute practice is vitally important. Learn how you can embrace a positive, constructive practice mindset when it comes to your flute playing. We dive into 6 great attitudes to cultivate as a flutist.

Improvisational theatre, often called improvisation or improv, is the form of theatre, often comedy, in which most or all of what is performed is unplanned or unscripted, created spontaneously by the performers. In its purest form, the dialogue, action, story, and characters are created collaboratively by the players as the improvisation unfolds in present time, without use of an already prepared, written script.

Improvisational theatre exists in performance as a range of styles of improvisational comedy as well as some non-comedic theatrical performances. It is sometimes used in film and television, both to develop characters and scripts and occasionally as part of the final product.

Improvisational techniques are often used extensively in drama programs to train actors for stage, film, and television and can be an important part of the rehearsal process. However, the skills and processes of improvisation are also used outside the context of performing arts. This practice, known as applied improvisation, is used in classrooms as an educational tool and in businesses as a way to develop communication skills, creative problem solving, and supportive team-work abilities that are used by improvisational, ensemble players.[1] It is sometimes used in psychotherapy as a tool to gain insight into a person's thoughts, feelings, and relationships.

The earliest well-documented use of improvisational theatre in Western history is found in the Atellan Farce of 391 BC. From the 16th to the 18th centuries, commedia dell'arte performers improvised based on a broad outline in the streets of Italy. In the 1890s, theatrical theorists and directors such as the Russian Konstantin Stanislavski and the French Jacques Copeau, founders of two major streams of acting theory, both heavily utilized improvisation in acting training and rehearsal.[2]

Modern theatrical improvisation games began as drama exercises for children, which were a staple of drama education in the early 20th century thanks in part to the progressive education movement initiated by John Dewey in 1916.[3] Some people credit American Dudley Riggs as the first vaudevillian to use audience suggestions to create improvised sketches on stage. Improvisation exercises were developed further by Viola Spolin in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, and codified in her book Improvisation For The Theater,[4] the first book that gave specific techniques for learning to do and teach improvisational theater. In 1977, Clive Barker's book Theatre Games (several translations and editions) spread the ideas of improv internationally. British playwright and director Keith Johnstone wrote Impro: Improvisation and the Theatre, a book outlining his ideas on improvisation, and invented Theatresports, which has become a staple of modern improvisational comedy and is the inspiration for the popular television show Whose Line Is It Anyway?

Viola Spolin influenced the first generation of modern American improvisers at The Compass Players in Chicago, which led to The Second City. Her son, Paul Sills, along with David Shepherd, started The Compass Players. Following the demise of the Compass Players, Paul Sills began The Second City. They were the first organized improv troupes in Chicago, and the modern Chicago improvisational comedy movement grew from their success.[5][6]

Many of the current "rules" of comedic improv were first formalized in Chicago in the late 1950s and early 1960s, initially among The Compass Players troupe, which was directed by Paul Sills. From most accounts, David Shepherd provided the philosophical vision of the Compass Players, while Elaine May was central to the development of the premises for its improvisations. Mike Nichols, Ted Flicker, and Del Close were her most frequent collaborators in this regard. When The Second City opened its doors on December 16, 1959, directed by Paul Sills, his mother Viola Spolin began training new improvisers through a series of classes and exercises which became the cornerstone of modern improv training. By the mid-1960s, Viola Spolin's classes were handed over to her protg, Jo Forsberg, who further developed Spolin's methods into a one-year course, which eventually became The Players Workshop, the first official school of improvisation in the United States. During this time, Forsberg trained many of the performers who went on to star on The Second City stage.[5][6]

Many of the original cast of Saturday Night Live came from The Second City, and the franchise has produced such comedy stars as Mike Myers, Tina Fey, Bob Odenkirk, Amy Sedaris, Stephen Colbert, Eugene Levy, Jack McBrayer, Steve Carell, Chris Farley, Dan Aykroyd, and John Belushi.

Simultaneously, Keith Johnstone's group The Theatre Machine, which originated in London, was touring Europe. This work gave birth to Theatresports, at first secretly in Johnstone's workshops, and eventually in public when he moved to Canada. Toronto has been home to a rich improv tradition.

In 1984, Dick Chudnow (Kentucky Fried Theater) founded ComedySportz in Milwaukee, WI. Expansion began with the addition of ComedySportz-Madison (WI), in 1985. The first Comedy League of America National Tournament was held in 1988, with 10 teams participating. The league is now known as CSz Worldwide and boasts a roster of 29 international cities.

In San Francisco, The Committee theater was active in North Beach during the 1960s. It was founded by alumni of Chicago's Second City, Alan Myerson and his wife Jessica. When The Committee disbanded in 1972, three major companies were formed: The Pitchell Players, The Wing, and Improvisation Inc. The only company that continued to perform Close's Harold was the latter one. Its two former members, Michael Bossier and John Elk, formed Spaghetti Jam in San Francisco's Old Spaghetti Factory in 1976, where shortform improv and Harolds were performed through 1983. Stand-up comedians performing down the street at the Intersection for the Arts would drop by and sit in. In 1979, Elk brought shortform to England, teaching workshops at Jacksons Lane Theatre, and he was the first American to perform at The Comedy Store, London, above a Soho strip club.

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