Do you shy away from teaching vocal improvisation to your singers? Does the mere idea of scat give you heart palpitations? Do you write out notation for those places in the music that call for scatting? Improvisation can be a very scary idea for many – I know – I was one of them! When I started singing in a small vocal jazz group I really had no idea how to improvise and make it sound good. For those of us who are visual learners, getting away from the notation and really using our ears to know where to go musically is scary! It’s like having the safety net taken out from under us! Fortunately, I had a great mentor teacher who shared this technique with me and I have never had it fail!
I think kids tend to be less afraid of experimenting than adults, as this has been my experience. I have successfully used the following process to turn middle-schoolers into savvy scat-ers! All it takes is an open mind, a safe environment, and a 12-bar blues progression. Here are the steps I use but it certainly is not the only way – experiment to find out what works for you!
Steps to Scat:
1) Before you start: You will need to have a 12-bar blues progression ready to go. If you can play it on the piano, then awesome! If you can’t, there are two options: have someone record one for you (I recommend having it cycle through the progression about 4 times so you aren’t having to stop and restart so often), or you can buy an accompaniment CD that uses 12 bar blues. The one that I use is Russell Robinson’s “We’re Singing the Blues for You” because the accompaniment CD for this song is the 12-bar blues repeated over and over. The song itself is a great introduction to singing blues and doing improv as well. The lyrics explain how the chord progressions work and then there is some structured (notated) scat and then free scat.
2) Set the environment: Make a practice of listening to different jazz recorders that have improv sections. Ella Fitzgerald, Billy Holiday, Louis Armstrong and so many others have wonderful recordings to help your students develop their ear.
3) The basics: Outline the progression – 4 bars of I, 2 bars of IV, 2 bars of I, 1 bar of V, I bar of IV, 2 bars of I. Emphasize the root of each chord and have them sing along using only the root to start with. I like to have them make up new rhythms, create their own nonsense sounds, or use any words they wish. I’ve had kids make up lines about cheeseburgers, shopping…you name it! It makes them laugh and keeps the tone fun and light.
4) Branching out: Start adding new notes from the chords and giving them choices. You can add them as fast or as slow as your students are ready to go. Call and response is a great way to start this process. I often make-up something and then they echo it, then I have a volunteer do the call for the others to echo. It is a good time to stress that there are no right or wrong answers, but that there ARE patterns they will like better than others – the only way to know what they like is to experiment!
5) Give them wings: At this point they are ready to go it alone with a little encouragement! I have been astounded at how quickly some kids get it and run with it and it really helps the others get up the nerve to try.
6) Practice, practice, practice!! Like everything else, it gets easier with practice, and once you have laid the foundations you can do a little improv anytime you have a couple of free minutes!
I hope these steps will help you to introduce the art of improvisation to your students and turn them all into “savvy scat-ers!”
