How to practise improvisation – free course

"You can't practise improvisation, it's a gift." Wrong. Every great improviser has spent thousands of hours building a vocabulary, exactly the way you learn a language: by listening, imitating, repeating expressions, then combining them freely. Here is a method.

1. Transcribe by ear

Pick a short phrase (2 to 4 bars) from a recording you love. Listen until you can sing it, then find it on the keyboard. Only write it down afterwards. This work, slow at first, is the most formative of all: it trains your ear and your sense of style, and gives you authentic phrases. Start with very simple phrases and slow tempos.

2. Learn a lick, then vary it

A lick is only useful if you know how to transform it. For each phrase you learn:

M:4/4
L:1/8
Q:1/4=100
K:C
"C" E G A c- c2 z2 | "C" z E G A c2 z2 | "C" c A G E- E2 z2 | "C" E G A c d c A G |]

Original (bar 1): play it until it flows.
Displaced (bar 2): same phrase, one eighth note later.
Reversed (bar 3): same notes, in reverse order.
Extended (bar 4): add a tail to the phrase.
Then transpose it into at least three keys.

3. Record yourself

While playing you only hear half of what you do: your brain is busy inventing. Record every session (a phone is enough) and listen to at least one minute the next day, with a kind but precise ear. Note down one successful phrase to keep and one habit to avoid (always the same final note? always the same rhythm?).

4. Limited-material challenges

Two minutes with only three notes.
A single note value (only quarter notes, then only eighth notes).
Start every phrase on an offbeat.
Play only in the low register, then only in the high register.
Call and response: the right hand asks a two-bar question, the left hand answers.

5. A weekly plan (20 minutes a day)

Day	Activity	Suggested track
Monday	Transcribe a phrase (10 min) + play it over the track (10 min)	blues in C
Tuesday	Vary the phrase (displacement, reversal) + transpose	blues in F
Wednesday	Limited-material challenge + left-hand accompaniment	pop in C
Thursday	Target notes over a progression (thirds and sevenths)	jazz in C
Friday	A modal or impressionist colour	modal in D minor
Saturday	Recorded free improvisation (3 min) + listening back	no track
Sunday	Rest, or active listening to improvised music	—

Today's exercise

Start the pop track in C.
Play the example lick (bar 1) four times, placing it at different points in the progression.
Play its three variants (bars 2 to 4), then invent a fourth (a change of rhythm or register).
Improvise for two minutes using this lick and its variants as a "common thread" among other ideas.
Record yourself and note one phrase to keep.

Common mistake: piling up dozens of licks without ever absorbing them. Five phrases mastered, transposed and varied are better than fifty skimmed. And don't forget to listen to music: you only invent well in a language you have heard a lot.

Regularly revisit the early lessons: call and response, motif development, chord tones. They are the foundations of everything else.