Knowing which notes are safe is half of improvising. The other half is what you do with them: repeating an idea, answering a phrase, leaving gaps, landing on the right note when the chord changes, and shaping the sound as you play. This section works on each of those, starting with your ear.
Start this section in the interactive courseMost improvising is hearing a phrase in your head and finding it on the keys. The quickest way to train that is to copy short phrases by ear.
Listen for the direction first (up, down, same) and the size of each move (next door in the scale, or a skip). The first note is lit, so you only need the moves.
Sing or hum it back before you play it. If you can sing it, your hand finds it faster.
A motif is a short idea, two to five notes with a rhythm. Leads that stick in the ear are usually one motif repeated and varied, not a stream of new notes.
Ways to vary it: change the last note; start it a step higher in the scale; keep the notes and change the rhythm; play it twice and then change it.
Repetition feels obvious from the inside. Listeners need to hear an idea two or three times before a change means anything.
A call and response is a phrase followed by an answer. The answer can copy the call’s rhythm with different notes, finish on home where the call ended away from it, or echo its last few notes.
Here the page plays a one-bar call and leaves the next bar for you, four times. Play only in the gaps.
An answer that ends on the home note sounds finished. One that ends on the fifth asks for another round.
Rests are part of a lead. A gap after a phrase lets it land and lets the next one start fresh. Leads with no gaps tend to sound like scales.
A useful limit: no more than about three notes a bar on average, with at least one gap of two beats every two bars.
Space also makes room for whatever else is playing, which matters more in a full track than when practising alone.
Over a chord, its own three notes (root, third and fifth) sound settled; the other scale notes sound like they’re on their way somewhere. Use that at the bar line: land on a chord note as the chord changes.
Over Am F C G: A, C or E for Am; F, A or C for F; C, E or G for C; G, B or D for G. Notice that A, C and E cover the first three chords between them.
Between the landings, anything in the scale works, and passing through outside notes is fine if you don’t stop on them.
A lead is more than its notes. On most synths four things shape it as you play: velocity, pitch bend, the mod wheel and legato.
Velocity is how hard you press. If the patch routes it to the filter or level, harder notes come out brighter or louder, so accents become part of the line.
Pitch bend slides the pitch, usually up to two semitones. Bend up into a note from the one below, or let the last note of a phrase sag.
The mod wheel usually adds vibrato or opens the filter. Bring it in on long notes rather than holding it up all the time.
Put it together: a key picked at random, a loop, and sixteen bars. Find home, play the minor chord, run the pentatonic once, then play a motif, answer it, leave gaps, and land on chord notes at the changes.
Before that, the echo exercise moves the ear training into other keys: the same kind of short phrases, a new key each time.