Beginners’ Lesson

Welcome back! For our third and final (for now...) look at improvisation for beginners, we’re going to consider its application in a songwriting setting. This is a situation I’ve found myself in a lot—it’s one where the bass and drums can be most useful even if you aren’t the songwriters in the band. With luck, it will cause the people you’re playing with to appreciate your contribution to the music at a higher level than ‘makes low-pitched noises in time’.

One of the characteristics that is common to almost every songwriter I’ve ever worked with, especially those who perform their own music, is a tendency to repeat ideas across multiple songs. At its best, this is about forming a recognizable style. From Tracy Chapman to Frank Zappa, having a thing that people recognize as ‘you’ is a really useful tool for a songwriter. However, there’s a point where this can become negatively repetitive, as songs can start sounding samey and a band can be caught in a loop of going over the same ground