Part 2

When you're improvising, does it actually feel like you're inventing something on the spot – or are you inventively re-arranging patterns from preparations, practice or previous performances? What balance is there between forgetting and remembering in your work?

I have never been a fan of practicing licks. But of course there is certain vocabulary in my playing that keeps showing up in different places and different combinations. But I’m trying to always invent on the spot and what helps me doing that is having creative band members who feed me stuff that inspires me to play my next phrase.

When practicing a certain concept, I think it’s important to stick with it for a long time but not worry if it doesn’t show up naturally in improvisation yet. If it doesn’t, it simply means that I haven’t practiced it enough yet or not enough time has passed for the brain to process the practice sessions. I want to get to a point where a concept becomes so easy to play that I forget about it, and then maybe it will show up naturally in the improvisations at some point.

It’s also good to sometimes take a break after practicing a concept for a while and then come back to it a few months later. When I catch myself thinking “oh I could apply the concept here“ during an improvisation, I think it tends to sound forced. I’d rather apply it at every occasion during practice but then forget about it when performing – and hopefully it will come out naturally.

Another aspect of forgetting and remembering is related to playing compositions live that I have recorded before. The process of recording, editing, mixing, and releasing an album is extremely long and by the time it’s done, I’ve probably listened to a given track about a hundred times. When playing live, sometimes these memories of the recording come up which may for example lead me to starting or ending a solo in a similar way to the recorded track.

This isn’t necessarily bad but I have to be careful to not make it the default choice and be able to also go against the memories and do something completely different.

Are you acting out parts of your personality in your improvisations which you couldn't or wouldn't through other musical approaches? If so, which are these? What, would you say, are the key ideas behind your approach to improvisation?

I think improvisation applies to most kinds of music.

As mentioned earlier, I came from classical guitar originally, and later on I have played classical piano for some years as well. In classical music the exact notes that you’re playing are given but you can improvise the dynamics, articulation etc. That being said, I though think that I can unfold my creativity in jazz much more and I feel more confident and adventurous.

Many classical musicians are afraid of improvising and – admittedly – it can feel scary when starting out, but eventually it helped me break free of the fear of making mistakes which I often felt when playing classical pieces. As Miles Davis said: “When you hit a wrong note, it's the next note that makes it good or bad.”

My approach to improvisation is very much based on my ears. I always try to play what I hear and constantly work on learning how to hear more stuff. At the same time I have also started practicing concepts recently that I don’t fully hear yet (like tapping and quarter tones), so these are more based on muscle memory/intuition. It’s about finding the right balance I guess.

In terms of your personal expression and the experience of performance, how does playing solo compare to group improvisations?

I’m not an experienced solo player, so I feel like I can express myself better when improvising with other people.

I have only played a handful of solo concerts and it’s always a big challenge because as a guitarist it’s hard to combine comping for oneself and soloing at the same time. It’s already hard to find a good balance when playing trio with bass and drums, but when playing solo you’re responsible for everything.

So in terms of what kind of textures are physically possible, the guitar feels very limited in comparison to a piano. Making the form and harmonic progression clear for the listener becomes my highest priority when playing solo guitar, and as soon as you only play melodic lines it can sound very abstract for the listener because – unlike a pianist – I don’t have a left hand to play chords independently underneath the lines.

Of course abstraction can also be something to use on purpose, as I mentioned I think a good balance is key. But with a rhythm section I definitely feel freer to express myself, because a big part for me is playing long melodic lines which I can’t do as well in a solo context without losing harmonic context.

In your best improvisations, do you feel a strong sense of personal presence or do you (or your ego) “disappear”?  

The best improvisations are usually the ones where I forget that I’m playing and totally disappear in the music. I always solo with my eyes closed if I don’t have to read music.

It’s the best feeling to open my eyes after a solo and feeling like I’ve just woken up from a dream. That’s my personal perception while playing though, and I’m not sure if these are always my best improvisations from a listeners perspective. That’s something I should investigate more in depth.

But what I can say certainly is that the opposite is almost always true: if I don’t feel good while playing and then listen back later, it usually sounds a lot better than I thought.

In a live situation, decisions between creatives often work without words. From your experience and current projects, what does this process feel like and how does it work?

I’m currently touring the music of Updraft in Europe with a quartet. The first six gigs were in the south of Spain with people who had never played my music before. As the week went on, we started understanding each other better and better and by the sixth gig, we’ve sort of become a completely different band.

I think the key is listening deeply to each other, getting to know each other musically and personally as well as possible to develop the necessary trust, but most importantly simply playing with the same people as much as possible.

Stewart Copeland said: “Listening is where the cool stuff comes from. And that listening thing, magically, turns all of your chops into gold.” What do you listen for?

I try to always be aware of what the rhythm section is playing behind me – of course I don’t always succeed. Sometimes it’s good to be egoistic too, after all they are accompanying me. But I’ve played so much in trio settings with bass and drums that I think I can follow both pretty well while playing.

I listen for melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic inputs, but also for variations in timbre or mood and try to react accordingly. As soon as there is a fourth instrument playing, either a soloist that I’m accompanying or a pianist who is comping for me, it becomes way harder for me to actively listen to everything.

That’s something I definitely would like to work on in the near future.

There can be surprising moments during improvisations – from one of the performers not playing a single note to another shaking up a quiet section with an outburst of noise. Have you been part of similar situations and how did they impact the performance from your point of view?

I can’t recall any specific situations off the top of my head but in general I would say that moments like these always instantly make me alert. They take me out of the comfort zone and sometimes this can lead to interesting results, other times it might not work out that well.

In a way, improvisations remind us of the transitory nature of life. When an improvisation ends, is it really gone, just like a cup of coffee? Or does it live on in some form?

Yes, it’s a beautiful comparison. I think improvisation – and music in general – lives on in our thoughts and emotions after the last note has been played, just like a person or pet that has left us.