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Get In The Zone: An Intriguing Improvisation Strategy from Wayne

Krantz

TO PARAPHRASE SONGWRITER KRIS KRISTOFFERSON, IMPROVISING

AIN’T FOR SISSIES. It takes big ears, an inventive mind, and a brave heart.
Bravery is essential, because improvisation means venturing into unknown
territories—in front of a live audience, hopefully. Sounds a bit scary, right? Maybe
that’s why so many players fold familiar things they’ve worked hard on into their
solos. Even the wiliest improvisers fall back on pet phrases and patterns from
time to time. Of course, there’s no crime in playing memorized licks—in fact, it’s
impossible to imagine many iconic players without their signature
maneuvers—but that’s not the kind of playing that drives Wayne Krantz.

When Krantz is improvising, it’s clear he’s not running up and down well-trod
licks, but constantly searching for new sounds in real time. Though he favors
rock and funk grooves, his rich harmonic sensibilities have a connection to jazz.
That gives him lots of latitude for discovery, even when his band is digging ever
deeper into an anything-but-jazz groove.

Krantz has a heavy résumé, including gigs and session work with Steely Dan and
Michael Brecker, but he’s mostly done his own thing for the past decade or so.
He recently ended his long run at the 55 Bar in New York City, where he’d played
more-or-less every Thursday with his trio since the mid ’90s. During that time he
released several CDs, including four recorded live at the 55. He’s also the author
of the book , which defines his unique approach to practicing
improvisation. (His CDs and book are available exclusively online at
waynekrantz.com, as are numerous live recordings and free, streaming “WK”
radio.)
Zoning In

Pure improvisation calls for practicing with a particular mindset. Unlike most

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guitarists, Krantz isn’t interested in mastering patterns or memorizing fingerings.

Instead, he practices while imposing strict limitations, which force him to be
creative. He’ll start by choosing a particular zone of the fretboard to explore.

“I call it a ‘zone,’” he says, “because when you say ‘position,’ people tend to think
of the scale patterns they already know, in certain positions on the neck. What I
do is more an exercise in, ‘Can I find the right notes here?’”

Krantz’s practice zones are smaller than your typical scale or arpeggio
fingering—a mere four frets wide, with no allowance for stretching outside the
zone. The appropriate fret-hand finger is assigned to each fret in the zone. Say,
for example, you’re in the 5th-fret zone (frets 5–8). You’ll play all of the 5th-fret
notes with your 1st finger, all 6th-fret notes with your 2nd finger, and so on.
“When you limit it to four frets instead of five,” Krantz explains, “you’re
necessarily going to leave out notes, which means you’re going to have to think,
and not just rely on what you know about a scale pattern. Don’t stretch out of
the zone—not even for a note that’s part of the structure, or sounds good—or
else it’s wrong in terms of the exercise.”

What can you practice in a zone? Any scale, arpeggio, or chord structure—in
other words, to use the general term Krantz prefers, any . More to the
point, you can work on improvising with these formulas. The notes you find
aren’t to be memorized or mastered. Zones are meant to be places where you’re
not only limited, but actually a bit lost. Krantz says, “It’s like, ‘I don’t know
this—at least not as a pattern,’ and I prefer it that way. By practicing using all
these things that I don’t know but can find quickly, I get better and better at
finding them. It’s working towards having access to of the possible formulas.
And, within that context, trying to be as musical as possible.”
Formula In Action

To demonstrate, Krantz chooses a formula—Abm7b9 pentatonic. The m7b9

formula is 1, b2 (the same chord tone as b9), b3, 5, b7—which, in the key of Ab,
translates to Ab, Bbb (or, enharmonically, A), Cb, Eb, and Gb. Krantz then opts
for the 5th-fret zone. It’s a considered choice. Right off the bat, the limitations of
this zone become apparent, as we can’t play the sixth-string root (Ab) of this
formula, even though it lies a mere half-step below our 1st finger at the 4th fret.

“Going through this low to high,” Krantz says, playing Ex. 1a, “I start with b2 and
b3 on the sixth string. The next available note is 5, on the fifth string. I can’t
reach b7 on the fifth or fourth string in this zone, so I skip to 1 and b2 on the

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fourth string. Since I can’t reach the next b3, I go to 5 on the third string, b7 on
the second, then b2 and b3 on the first string.

“I could map this out,” he continues, “to try to remember it and get good at
playing it fast. That’s how I used to practice scales. It’s how most of us are
taught, but I found it really hard to apply that to actual music making. Also, I
was always limited to only being able to play what I’d practiced. So I decided to
forget that whole bit of trying to remember stuff and getting fast at playing up
and down and all that. Instead, I practice trying to find any tonality in any zone,
and I make that search as musical as I possibly can.”

With that, Krantz flips his metronome on. It’s nothing fancy, and a piece of clear
tape covers the mini speaker grille to dampen the sound a bit. He’s got a
similarly utilitarian portable cassette recorder nearby. He hits the record button
and starts generating Abm7b9 lines in the 5th-fret zone. The first phrase that
comes is Ex. 1b. Melodically, it’s a bit jagged, which is to be expected when
you’ve only got a five-note formula to work with, and some of the notes are out
of reach and out of bounds. Krantz is getting into the flow now, and plays Ex. 1c
using the same limits. What’s interesting here is that he’s using both melodic
elements (one note at a time) and harmonic elements (two or more notes at a
time) within the same phrase.

If you’re wondering how useful it is to practice on a m7b9 harmony—not a chord

you see in many songs—consider that this novel pentatonic scale can be put to
other uses. For instance, it works great in E major. (Enharmonically reconfigured
as G#, A, B, D#, F#, it’s easy to see that it’s a subset of the

E major scale, which is spelled E, F#, G#, A, B, C#, D#.) Also, modally speaking,
it’s a cousin of F# Dorian (F#, G#, A, B, C#, D#, E), so this pentatonic acts as a
cool alternative (not your average blues box) over F#m7. It’s similarly related B
Mixolydian (B, C#, D#, E, F#, G#, A), so try it over B7.
Yes-Fly Zone

Krantz is ready to generate more lines, and now he’s got a new formula and zone
in mind—Gmaj7 (G, B, D, F#) in the 1st-fret zone shown in Ex. 2a. (Notice that
no Gmaj7 tones occur on the 1st fret, which means the 1st finger lays out
entirely in this zone. Trippy!) He dishes up Ex. 2b, rife with cooing half-step
bends. “I allow bending into any note that’s in the formula,” says Krantz. “Any
kind of guitaristic articulation is cool, as long as the note comes out right. I
usually don’t include open strings cause they expand the zone and fill in too

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many notes in the formula, allowing for more stepwise motion. Without them,
bigger intervals are built right in—which I like.”

Krantz hits the rewind button, then listens back to what he has just played. “I
listen,” he explains, “so I can ask questions about it—whether the time is good,
and the phrasing is right. If the note choices sound completely random, and I’m
trying to play melodically, then I’ve failed. If I’m trying to play in a random way,
then I’ve succeeded. It could be an attempt to play prettily, or an attempt to play
funkily. Whatever I try to do, I judge it by listening and then ask, ‘Is this as good
as it can be?’”
A Change Is Gonna Come

Krantz’s zone practice gets even more interesting when it is applied to chord
progressions. Each new harmony requires a new formula, so notes available in
one measure may be off limits in the next. Hold on to your hat!

“Sometimes I’ll make a list of random changes,” says Krantz. “It doesn’t matter
what they are.” He scrawls E7, Cmaj7#5, and Bbm7 on a piece of scrap paper,
then says, “First thing I’ll do is choose a formula for each chord. For E7, I’ll use
symmetrical diminished. For Cmaj7#5, I’ll use Lydian augmented. For Bbm7 I’ll
use Dorian. These are common names for common formulas. I know symmetrical
diminished is 1, b2, b3, 3, b5, 5, 6, b7; Lydian augmented is 1, 2, 3, #4, #5, 6,
7; and Dorian is 1, 2, b3, 4, 5, 6, b7. Then I’ll pick a part of the guitar—say the
3rd-fret zone—and then run through the changes. One bar for the first chord,
one bar for the second one, and two for the last chord.”

Krantz cycles through the 4-bar progression twice, with varied results. Ex. 3 has
a bluesy vibe; Ex. 4 is syncopated and hyperkinetic. (“That was me just kind of
bouncing around and being rhythmic.”) And at other times, Krantz plays simple,
supple, sustaining lines of just a couple notes per measure—which is perhaps a
good approach to start with if you’re new to rolling through changes in this
manner.
(Don’t) Get a Grip

Most of our examples so far have been melodic, focusing on one note at a time.
But Krantz’s approach can be applied to chordal improvising as well, allowing
new voicings to be generated on the fly. Work this angle for a while, and your
comping may never be the same.

Returning to the same progression we explored in the previous three examples,

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Krantz puts his harmony goggles on and plays Ex. 5. It’s melodic enough that it
could simply be part of a solo, yet it’s harmonically rich enough to be effective as
comping. In a sparse power-trio setting—as Krantz most frequently plays—the
ability to bridge the gap between soloing and chording is a vital skill. (Note:
When playing chords or even just diads during zone practice, Krantz allows
himself to break the one-finger-per-fret rule if adhering to it would make the
fingering at hand awkward.)

Choosing the m7b5 formula (1, b3, b5, b7), and the 4th-fret zone as his
workspace, he sails through the formula in different keys [Ex. 6]. This
one-zone/all-keys strategy is a great way to organize your practice time.
Conversely, you could pick one key and explore it in every zone on the neck.
Remember, though—the clusters you find aren’t meant to be the ultimate chord
voicings, to be used time and again. They’re simply to be found, then forgotten.

“These things are being generated by my knowledge of the formula,” says

Krantz. “These aren’t patterns, in the sense of ‘Hey, look at this cool Ebm7b5
voicing I have.’ The whole idea of improvising is that you find cooler stuff than
you could ever think up ahead of time. The more you’re attached to form, the
more likely it is you’ll only know x number of voicings for a given chord, and the
less chance there is of something truly spontaneous happening.”
Keeping It Real

Krantz acknowledges this math-y routine can get boring if the approach taken is
too straight or pedantic, but finds ways to keep it interesting. If he gets bored
working with a formula—for example, a four-note pentatonic formula—he’ll
change it up by adding a note. (“It could be a note that’s diatonic, or just a weird
note from the chromatic scale.”) Adding two notes is another possibility. At the
extreme, he’ll take the chromatic scale in one key and subtract its 5, so it’s an
11-note scale. Even then, he’ll try to center his improvisation around the given
chord.

Varying the common formulas isn’t the only way Krantz staves off ennui. He’ll
change the tempo, or use different time signatures. He’ll play melodically for a
while, then harmonically. He’ll try using bends, then not using bends. “I might
even put the click on just beats two and four,” he says, “and then practice being
swingy, or not being swingy.”

Krantz reminds us that however creative you get with this routine, at the end of
the day it is just an exercise—to be left behind in the practice room. “If I’m on a

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gig, I don’t limit myself like this. The whole thing about playing live is that things
come up in the moment that have nothing to do with limitations. You find stuff
that’s cool, and you play it.”
Central Time

Besides Krantz’s harmonic command on the guitar, another remarkable element

of his playing is his time feel—his groove. Without ever sounding mechanical, he
consistently nails the beat bang on and, as he puts it, “lines up vertically with the
click.”

“That comes from my Steely Dan experience,” says Krantz, who played with the
band on and off from 1996-2006. “I always thought I had good time, but when I
got into that band I realized that they were playing in a part of the beat that I
didn’t have access to—dead center. Donald [Fagen] plays from there, Walter
[Becker] plays from there, and it’s where their rhythm section guys—usually
heavy R&B and funk players—play from. When I first tried to hook up with that,
especially in the studio, I wasn’t there and I didn’t like the fact that I couldn’t
control it. It’s a place—a physical place in the beat that you either play or don’t
play. Once you know where that is, and can hear it, you can go there. I got to
thinking that would be a very clear strong place to come from with my own
rhythmic ideas. Now, when I’m practicing, the two things that are always on my
mind are, ‘Am I playing right notes?’ and, ‘Is this in the center of the click?’”

To fine tune your pocket in this manner, says Krantz, the most important thing is
simply the desire to do so. “That sounds trivial,” he allows, “but without that, you
won’t be able to shift. Also, you have to record yourself, because this is
something that’s invisible to you as you’re playing. You have to listen to it on
tape, and hear it in relation to something that is centered. There’s nothing more
centered than that horrible click of a metronome. If you can make a bare click
sound good, your placement will get better.”
Finding the Notes

When practicing zonal improvisation, Krantz uses one of two tactics to find
“right” notes. One is to think of the actual note names he’s looking for. For
instance, to create an Ebm7b5 harmony, he’ll think of and play its chord tones:
Eb, Gb, Bbb (or, enharmonically, A), and Db. “The other way,” he says, “is to
think of function, which I do a lot. In whatever zone, I’ll say, ‘Where is Eb?’ Then,
‘Where’s b3 above it? And b7 below it?’ And so on. That’s how I move around. I
can see that ‘that note’s the 5,’ or ‘that note’s the 3.’ You learn to see intervals.”

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When jumping up or down the neck, however, and not working on site-specific
improvisation, Krantz tends to think in terms of note names. “When moving
horizontally, my hand may not know that from one note to the next is, say, a
major seventh. So I have to think, ‘What’s up there?’ If I need an F#, I go to
F#.”
Wayne’s Rig

Guitar Tyler Studio Elite with Suhr single-coils (neck and middle), Seymour
Duncan Full Shred humbucker (bridge).
Strings D’Addario .010-.046
Pedals Moogerfooger ring modulator; Dunlop CryBaby wah; Boss Blues Driver,
Octave, and Digital Delay; Loooper true-bypass signal router
Amp Marshall 2553 Silver Jubilee

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