The Making of a Piano Improvisation - Creating "Winter Scene"

Many people assume that improvisation is magic and that it takes a magician to be able to just sit down at a piano and spontaneously create music. They couldn't be more wrong! There's a method to the magic.

Just like visual artists, we musicians just don't slap paint on a canvas and call it a painting. We know what we're doing (hopefully) and create using some kind of technique or method.

The lesson piece "Winter Scene" is an improvisation that uses 2 chords in the left hand while the right hand improvises. The background of this aural painting - the chords, we're created first.

I used something called a sus 4 chord. This chord raises the third to the fourth to create an ambiguous sound. A sound that's perfect for creating a chilly ambiance. Once the chords were chosen, I used an ostinato pattern for them. The chords were changed every 4-bars or so and that's that - a complete harmonic textural background over which we paint our melodies!

Many painters will lay out and create the background of their paintings first. The background sets the mood. They may use certain colors or textures to create this mood but once the background is set foreground elements are added.

We can look at "Winter Scene" much the same way. The background is the ostinato pattern. The foreground is the improvised melodies we create with the right hand.

This short but effective piano improvisation utilizes time-tested methods to bring about a unique piece of music!

Edward Weiss is a pianist/composer and webmaster of Quiescence Music's online piano lessons. He has been helping students learn how to play piano in the New Age style for over 14 years and works with students in private, in groups, and now over the internet. Visit www.quiescencemusic.com/piano_lessons.html now and get a FREE piano lesson!