Quotes About Improvisation

I honestly have no strategy whatsoever. I'm waiting for that script to pop through the letterbox and completely surprise me.

When I present the Charlie Parker book, I do a call and response that works quite well. With the Thelonious Monk book, I play the music and work with kids in a group to create a color wheel and show how the wheel can be mapped on a 12-tone chromatic scale.

Whenever I get the sort of fancy pants idea that I'm doing anything other than pure expression things start to go wrong. When I get too premeditated, things start to go wrong. I just shut that part of my brain off.

Whenever you have a role where you don't get to know anything about the character, you have to invent it yourself. You have to feel like it came from somewhere.

I just go where the guitar takes me.

If I knew where I was going, I wouldn't do it. When I can predict or plan it, I don't do it.

Generally, there's a lot of ad-lib involved with live TV and things like that, whereas with acting in front of the camera, it was, if you screwed up a line, well, you've got another take, and you also had a script to be able to study, so it wasn't all ad-lib and flying by the seat of your pants, which I like both aspects, actually.

There will be some tracks on the next album which that will consist of mostly noise and feedback, whereas others may just have guitar parts and samples.

When you write on the road, you are restricted to the instruments around you, whereas in the studio, you can plug anything in and try it.

A stand-up act is almost like a pool. You know what I mean? It's like a pool, and you're always skimming little leaves out of it, messing with the chlorine level, putting up umbrellas. You're trying to make one little stagnant body of water perfect. Whereas a late-night show is like a river, always moving forward.

I'm a great believer in letting lyrics just flow out, wherever they come from.

I realized I had a novel on my hands, but didn't know where it was going to go. So I thought, 'I'm going to do everything that you're not supposed to do when you plan a novel; I'm going to step back and let this thing take itself wherever it wants to go, and I'm not going to worry about how things connect until later on.'

My game is based on improvisation. Often, a forward does not have the time to think too much. You have a second, rarely more, to decide whether to dribble, shoot or pass to the right or left. It is instinct that gives the orders.

Once we started headlining at the Fillmore East, we were free to play all night, at least for the second set. 'Whipping Post' could get lengthy.

From the moment you say 'action,' this is the fun part - things should happen that surprise you, excite you, scare you, turn you on, make you laugh. If things aren't surprising you, when you say 'cut,' whisper things to the actors that will make them do things that do surprise you.

To sing a song is like whispering to a child's ear. It is an art heavily relying on improvisation.

I play a little bit of everything. I beat on the walls. I whistle. I scream. I go outside and scream because it sounds cool when it's recorded. I play drums on a chair. I snap, clap... just anything to build the track and make it feel like I want it to.

I play a little acoustic bass and a little guitar. In our house there are instruments everywhere, and I love picking them up and just noodling around. I pick up my husband's tin whistle sometimes. He's really proficient, but it's about the second most annoying instrument - after the banjo - if you don't know how to play it.

I tend to edit some as I go - partly because one of the reasons I don't outline much is that I don't know what the next scene will be until I've actually written the previous scene.

I have written before, but I was primarily an actor and improvisational performer.

That's why I don't want to know the questions before, when I give interviews whether TV or print. I don't want to prepare myself for what I will answer.

Producing a series is like being Lewis and Clark: You know where you're going, you just don't know how you're going to get there. When people say, 'You should create a bible for your show,' I say, 'You don't want a bible. It'll prevent you from making discoveries along the way.' And that's what happened on 'The X-Files.'

We'd dub the one that came off best into the final transcription. It gave us a chance to ad lib as much as we wanted, knowing that excess ad libbing could be sliced from the final product.

I'm in a profession where if you're planning more than six months ahead, you're doing it wrong!