WELCOME TO PROJECT IMPROV! We’re here to help musicians use improvisation to discover new ideas and solve technical challenges with more joy, creativity, and strategy.
🎵 We will focus on improvising fun exercises for Mendelssohn's Scherzo (from Midsummer Night's Dream) excerpt.
Improvisation is more than spontaneous music making – it is a powerful tool for musicians to develop confidence, kinesthetic awareness, and strategic problem solving in tackling difficult technique. In this course, we will explore methods in designing and adapting improvised exercises to suit your playing needs.
This course uses spiccato to explore two core components of technique-based improvisation: Physical and Musical Improvisation. The aim of this course is to activate your creative thinking through improvisation, enabling you to build an intuitive relationship with your instrument and engage with technique musically right away at any playing level.
Did you know improvisation is a powerful tool for building instrumental technique?
In 2008, a study found that improvisation activates your creative brain and quiets the
heart linked to self-doubt. As classical musicians, we are trained to chase technical perfection
through scales and etudes. But I realized, what if we could hit those technical goals
and invite creativity into the process? My name is Connie Tai. I'm a classical violinist
and pedagogy researcher at Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. Over the past five years,
I interviewed soloists and educators around the world about technique, artistic expression,
and spiccato. With their insights, I developed the technique-based improvisation framework,
enabling musicians to improvise technical exercises that suit their playing needs.
In this course, we will use spiccato to explore two core components of technique-based improvisation,
physical and musical improvisation. Physical improvisation guides you to release physical
tension and develop a more intuitive relationship with your instrument.
Musical improvisation, on the other hand, uses musical elements like rhythm, dynamics,
and accent to strengthen clarity and expand the expressive range of your playing. My goal here
is to help you be more confident as a musician to problem-solve in practice room. With a slight
twist in thinking and lots of experimentation, let's activate creative thinking in improvising
solutions to a more difficult technique.
