We’re going to learn three easy strategies to improvise on saxophone to create killer solos.
I’m going to show you 3 easy ways to improvise on sax. These are the same strategies used by people like Gerald Albright, Dave Koz, and Mindi Abair. And once you learn them today, you’re going to see these strategies popping up in solos that you’ll already listen to all the time.
So today we’ll go from really easy ways to improvise on sax, through to still kind of easy, but way more interesting.
And if you’re thinking of joining the Cloudvocal Sax Jam 2022 competition, then stick around. You’re going to love this today. Because we’re working on the exact backing track that you need to record yourself with, to enter that competition. I’ll tell you a bit more about that a little bit later on.
Free PDF & Backing Track inside Locker
The Chords
So let’s start by looking at the chords. Now today’s progression is based on the Bill Withers tune, Just The Two Of Us. And actually, for the competition, Cloudvocal has made a separate backing track for E flat instruments like alto sax and bari sax, and B flat instruments like tenor and soprano sax. But we all use the same music just to keep things simple. Just make sure you grab the correct backing track for your instrument.
So, this is how the chords look and here are the anchor notes, or the chord tones. They’re the most important thing to understand about any chords that you’re improvising over. We’re not going to worry too much about these in our first strategy, but it’s really important to know what they are. We’ll talk more about them in a little bit.
By the way, you can get the full PDF for all saxophones for today’s lesson, from our Sax School Locker. That’s where we keep all of our free stuff. There’s loads of great content in there. Click the yellow button to sign up.
Strategy #1
So let’s dig into strategy #1 in our easy ways to improvise on sax.
Now, the cool thing about this chord progression is that you can use a single pentatonic scale over the whole set of chords.
Now, I know what you’re thinking. You’ve probably heard that kind of advice from lots of other people on the internet. But here’s the thing.
Most people screw it up because they miss out on the important ingredients that must go with that simple strategy. I’ll tell you a bit more about that in a second. The thing is though, this strategy works. Check out the clip from Grover Washington Jnr. This solo is killer and it works. And he’s only using pentatonic scales. He’s in a different key to us, but check out the way his solo goes.
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Strategy #1: Why Does this Work?
Well, it’s really simple from a technical point of view. There are a lot of the anchor notes that we spoke about before, from the chords, that are included in that pentatonic scale. So as you’re playing through the pentatonic scale, you’re covering a lot of the notes from the chords that are used in the progression.
So we’ll cover those pro tips in a second. But I’m going pop the track on -watch as I blow through on tenor. I’m just going to use the pentatonic scale, but I’m going to do a much simpler solo than what Grover was doing. Have a listen and see if you can hear the pentatonic notes I’m using.
Strategy #1: Secret Sauce
So what about those pro tips? What’s the secret sauce that can help you to use this simple strategy and to make solos that sound better?
Well, there are three things.
- Use simple melodic ideas
- Use simple rhythmical ideas
- Leave plenty of space.
So your simple melody ideas must have a simple clear rhythmical structure to them that fits in with that backing. Plus, leave plenty of space in between so everything makes sense.
Strategy #2
Our second strategy inour easy ways to improvise on sax will take that first idea of just using a pentatonic scale to the next level. This is a really simple strategy, but it’s super powerful.
And it’s something that pro players use all the time. Check out the clip from Gerald Albright, where he is doing exactly this.
Now that solo sounds amazing, but actually what Gerald Albright’s doing there is pretty simple. Check this out.
So here are our chords again. And what we need to do is identify the anchor notes or the chord tones that aren’t in our pentatonic scale from strategy #1. So for example, all of these notes are not in the pentatonic scale.
Strategy #2: Interesting Notes
And I like to think of these as our interesting notes. They add lots of colour to our melody lines. Now we can simplify this by writing it this way with just those interesting notes in each bar.
So you can see how they fit with the chords.
Now in that video from Gerald Albright, he’s doing exactly that. He’s focusing on those interesting notes in each bar, as he moves through the chord progression.
Watch as I play you another example. I’m going keep it simpler so you can hear what’s going on.
Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? And I think just making that small change makes the solo so much more interesting.
Strategy #2: Pro Tips
Now, if you want to take this even further, here’s a pro tip that will get you closer to what Gerald Albright’s doing in that clip that we just heard.
So Gerald is doing a couple of things.
- Focusing on those interesting notes
- Using more of the anchor notes in his solo.
And this is a great, easy way to really make your solos fit much better with harmony than just a single pentatonic scale.
Now, the trick to this and the way you can make it feel more comfortable is to spend some time going slowly through those anchor notes, and practicing them like you might practice arpeggios.
I would suggest you use a metronome and work on one chord at a time so you break it down. Get comfortable with those arpeggios over your whole range.
And if you spend a little bit of time working on that systematically, through all of the arpeggios, you’re going to find those patterns appear in your improvised solos without even thinking about it. Trust me. It’s going to sound awesome.
The Cloudvocal Sax Jam 2022
Now I promised I’ll tell you about this Cloudvocal competition.
So my mates over at Cloudvocal are running this competition called the Sax Jam 2022. And they’re giving away a ton of amazing prizes, including a brand new pro Yanigasawa AWO1 Alto Sax. Plus There’s saxophone stands, mouthpieces, and even a special prize from me in there.
It’s really easy to enter. You just need to put a video of yourself on YouTube, improvising along with the backing track that we’re talking about in today’s lesson. Here’s the details of the competition and you can get the backing track here.
Free PDF & Backing Track inside Locker
Strategy #3
Okay, let’s get stuck in with strategy #3.
Now, if you dig around on the internet, there are tons of lessons about things like enclosures and chromatic shifting and all sorts of fancy jazz techniques that we’re not going to talk about.
Instead, I want to focus on some simple, but really powerful tactics that you can use in your solos, particularly when you’re playing in this style. We’re going to look at a couple of tactics now that you can use in conjunction with those first two strategies that will make your solos so much more engaging for your audience, and a lot more powerful.
Tactic #1 Plan the Arc of the Solo
So the first tactic here is to plan the arc of your solo. And what I’m talking about here is being strategic about the way you tell a story, or take your listener on a journey through your solo.
Now, this is important. If you’ve ever been stuck in one of those annoying conversations with somebody who just talks at you forever and never listens to you, then you’ll know what I mean.
Just playing lots of notes all the way through your solo is a surefire way to disengage your listener. Instead, we need to take them through a progression. We need to take them along, grab them by the hand and lead them through our story as we go through our solo.
Grow the Intensity
And the way that we do this is to start with lower intensity, maybe lower energy, maybe lower down on the instrument, maybe simpler, melodic ideas. And then we end our solo where we’re higher intensity, maybe more complicated, melodic and rhythmical ideas. Certainly with a lot higher energy – that’s the most important thing. And maybe higher up on the range as well. So we’re going from calm at the beginning of the solo to high intensity at the end.
Watch the video for a great example of Mindi Abair doing exactly that as she’s blowing over this tune.
Now I’ve got a little clip from the start and a little clip from the end of her solo. And see if you can see how she transitions from the beginning to the end of her solo.
Tactic #2 Repeat small simple ideas
Now our second tactic is simple. Use small, simple, melodic, and rhythmical ideas, but use them repetitively to create interest and excitement.
Free PDF & Backing Track inside Locker
I told you it was pretty simple! But it works. And once you get your head around this, you’ll see it happens all the time in amazing solos.
Check out the video to see Gerald Albright getting stuck in. Man, those guys are rocking at the end of that solo.
And watch Mindi Abair again, with Dave Koz, and they’re riffing off each other at the end of their solo. Check out how short their ideas are and check out the energy that they’re creating on stage.
It’s a pretty cool technique. Isn’t it? And I bet now we’ve talked about this, you’re going to notice this in solos all the time, particularly in the commercial world.
How to use this tactic in your solos
So how can we do this ourselves? Well, we start by making clever note choices. And to be honest, in this example, anything from the pentatonic scale is pretty much going to work.
But there are a couple of things that you can do to make this sound even better.
Remember your ideas must be short, they must be rhythmical. And then try taking those ideas and moving them to different places in the bar. That creates a lot more interest and drama and tension in your solo.
Tactic #3 Resolve the energy
Free PDF & Backing Track inside Locker
And the second thing is to remember that once you build up all this excitement, you must resolve the energy. You can do this by returning down lower on your saxophone, and going down to a nice, safe note, like one of your anchor notes from the chord.
Putting it into practice
I’ll try and put that all into practice.
- building intensity
- create a story arc
- using a repetitive line to create drama.
I’m going to do it more simply. But let’s see if I can incorporate these ideas in my solo. See if you can spot them as well as you watch the video.
Conclusion
So, what did you think about that? Could you spot those two tactics being used in there? I hope so. And you can start using these easy ways to improvise on sax yourself, in your solos.
They don’t need to be complicated. Remember – keeping your ideas simple melodically, simple rhythmically, and leaving space will always make your solos sound better.
Final Thoughts
I hope you’ve enjoyed these easy ways to improvise on sax.
So we’ve talked about:
- using pentatonic scales
- adding interesting notes to our pentatonic scales plus some pro tips
- tactics to add energy to your solo.
Don’t forget to go check out the Cloudvocal competition. You have to be in this to win it, right?
And the thing is – to go through the process of applying the things we spoke about today, making a recording, and then sharing it for the competition – is going to make you a better improviser. It’s going make you more confident and it’s going help to pull all these ideas into focus for you. So I encourage you to enter as many times as you can and put these things into action.
Next Steps
Now there’s always so much more to learn about improvising. So I do hope you’ll go and check out Sax School PRO, where we can take what we’ve talked about today to another level. Our tutors are waiting to help you there. You’ll be joining thousands of other learners from around the world and there’s new lessons added every week.